Maryland Daily PhotoEvery Week Day a New Picture from MD

Hope you enjoy the upcoming holiday weekend.   Maryland plays Navy at the Ravens Stadium on Monday so I thought this picture from the upper deck would be appropriate.

Sorry for today’s delayed post.   How often do you find a spoon with  the name of your state one it?  The image below it is obscured by years of dust. It doesn’t look like it could be the seal, so I’m a little lost.   I will save the owner of the spoon from dust based embarrassment, but feel free to chip in if you think you might know what this is trying to depict.

What in the world does this belong to?

This perfectly normal picture of a Firehall is the first in a series of many pictures this week that cover a certain town in Maryland.

I won’t declare the theme until tomorrow.

I’m taking a cue from our friends at PDP and posting a gratuitous picture of the snow.   As bad as the heat can get, at least it doesn’t hinder our transportation.

If you caught Adam’s comment from Tuesday’s MDP post, you might think this picture is an admission of guilt. After all, I did shoot a bank in Mt Airy.   However, I assure you that I only used a camera and that this bank has been shut down for some time.  I really liked the look of it’s clock.  The whole thing reminded me of going to the bank as a child, at a time when banks felt obligated to install large or strange clocks in each branch.

When I drove through Mt. Airy, this building caught my eye.  It is situated in what appears to be an open area.  When I drove in for a closer look, I realized that the building was sitting in the middle of a cemetery.   It didn’t look like a church.  The only thing about the building that tells you anything about it is the date above the door, 1846.    A sign near the door lets visitors know that this is the site of an old school house, but there is a lot that was left unexplained after my visit.

A quick internet search tells us that this building is called the Pine Grove chapel, but was originally called the Ridge Presbyterian Church.  While built as a place of worship, its basement was also used as a school.

Train tracks no longer run through Mt Airy as you can tell by the town’s train station, which has been put into new service as a doctor’s office.

This unassuming building plays many roles in our state’s history.  This is referred to as the “Stone House” on the grounds of the Sisters of Charity in Emmitsburg Maryland.  The Sisters of Charity is an organization created by Elizabeth Ann Seton, the first American to become a Catholic Saint.  (generally referred to as Mother Seton) When she came to Emmitsburg to build a better system of education, she ended up founding a charitable organization that would stretch around the world.   This stone farm house was where that began.

What’s also significant about this place, and which ties to today, is that the grounds here and throughout the town itself were occupied by the Union army on the day of June 30 and the days preceding it in 1863.  In fact,  in the period leading to the battle of Gettysburg, Emmitsburg was thought to be one of the places where the Union may have engaged the Confederates.   As a result, the town was fortified and martial law was even instilled.  Of course, the battle didn’t happen there.  On July 1st, General John Reynolds would leave Emmitsburg on his way to relive the cavalry that had been holding off the confederates 12 miles north.

During the occupation of the town, the Sisters of charity provided food and shelter for the soldiers.  They were also among the first ones on the field to deal with the aftermath.

This gun sits outside the armory at Mount St. Mary’s college, aimed over the traffic on route 15.   I just really liked this shot.