I wasn’t sure if I liked this picture of sunset at the Frederick Fair or not, but I’ve decided that it’s worthwhile to post it.

Welcome to Mt. Airy.   I drove through this town on Saturday to pick up meat for a barbeque competition from the local butcher shop in town, Wagners.  (the competition was out of state, so sadly we can’t include any pictures)   I snapped a few photos and I’ll share them over the next few weeks.

Though people had lived in the area since the prior century, the town really developed in the 1830’s as the B&O came through it and built a station there.  It’s the perfect example of how towns would develop throughout the 19th century around new sources of transportation.    For this reason, it is significantly intertwined with tomorrow’s post.    However, it’s also intertwined with this week’s other mini theme: the battle of Gettysburg.

If you are one of those people who follows the Maryland Civil War Trails signage, you are probably used to stories like that of Mt Airy.  During the civil war, troops occupied Mt Airy to largely protect the railroad.  Its other piece of Civil War trivia comes from the fact that on June 29th,  on his controversial path away from both armies and from the town of Gettysburg, J.E.B. Stuart and his cavalry passed through the town of Mt Airy.

One other fun fact about Mt Airy is that it straddles two counties: Frederick and Carroll.

For anyone who is wondering what’s coming to the Frederick Fair this year, here’s your answer.    I’m sure it’s purposefully different than the entertainment fare you’d expect at the State Fair, which takes place only a few weeks earlier in Timonium.    I am very interested in the demolition derby.

We’re turning the first two days of this week into a two-part series on the Frederick Fair.   The fair has been in it’s current location on the eastern edge of Frederick since 1911.  Like most fairgrounds, it is used for a variety of purposes during the year. The highlight comes at the end of September when the official fair actually runs.

One last post about the bridge in Frederick as I found it to be interesting.    This portion of the bridge contains a  distorted picture (called an anamorphic projection) of a girl.  The catch here is that if you look at the picture from the proper angle.  (in this case from a window in the adjacent building) it looks normal.   By approaching from the opposite side as you can see below, I got close to it.

Well, nobody guessed what was different about the bridge in yesterday’s picture.   So I will show you here.   It turns out that all of those stones are actually just painted in.   

It is called the Mural Bridge and both sides of it, as well as the walkways underneath the bridge are painted to look like a stone bridge.  However, there is more.  There are tons of little extras just like this butterfly painted into it as well, but they are only visible when you move in to look closely.   

Does anybody know why this bridge in Frederick is unique?