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Thursday, February 23, 2012 |
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This Month's Delmarva Historic Dates
January 27, 1998 - The entire town of Chincoteague was flooded by a Nor'easter.January 24, 1940 - The bridge at Queen Sound in Chincoteague, Virginia was carried away by ice. January 18, 1857 - At Cape Henry, Virginia, ice formed thick enough to walk 100 yards from the lighthouse on the frozen ocean. January 16, 1877 - The Maryland-Virginia boundary in the lower Chesapeake Bay was demarcated by the Black-Jenkins Award which was upheld as late as 2003 by the US Supreme Court. January 13, 1912 - For two days a record cold wave brought temperatures as much as ten degrees below zero in Sudlersville, Maryland. January 10, 1883 - Fifty people were rescued at Green Run Inlet, on Assateague Island when the Sallie W. Kaye wrecked off of Ocean City, Maryland. January 4, 1650 - Henry Norwood and eleven other immigrants were abandoned near Fenwick Island, Delaware, by the sailing vessel The Virginia Merchant, after a stormy Atlantic crossing. January 3, 1861 - Delaware voters voted not to secede despite Southern sympathies in the Civil War. January 2, 1784 - The entire Chesapeake Bay froze almost all the way to the mouth blocking shipping lanes until March. |
Where on Delmarva is this? The Transpeninsular Line
This is the easternmost end of the Transpeninsular Line. The western end marks the center point of Delmarva beginning at the south western most corner of present day Delaware outside of Mardela Springs. It travels east to the Atlantic coast town of Fenwick Island at the foot of the town's lighthouse. In 1750 surveyors form both Maryland and Pennsylvania were commissioned to establish the boundary between the two colonies. At that time Delaware was still considered the "Lower Counties" of Pennsylvania. So, the stone monument erected to mark this spot, has Maryland's seal on the southern side and Pennsylvania's on the north side which is now not directly visible because of fencing. When Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon did their famous survey they were given the job of making a connecting line from the Transpeninsular Line to the twelve mile circle centered on the city of New Castle which created Delaware's northern boundary. British King George III ratified the resulting Mason Dixon Line separating Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware in 1769. In 1856 a lighthouse was commissioned for Fenwick Island by the United States Lighthouse Board and the US Congress. This area was known as a "false cape" because it was the easternmost part of the peninsula's ocean coast. And, there had been a growing number of shipwrecks on nearby shoals. The lighthouse was completed and the lamp was lit for the first time August 1, 1859. In 1978 the lighthouse was decommissioned by the US Coast Guard along with many other lighthouses. The property is now operated as a museum by a dedicated volunteer organization.
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