The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1878-01-18
MI i s G ell a n Q o 1l 8.
For tile Agis Dc Lnteliigencer.
Fifty Years Ago and NOW-RailrOad or
no Railroad.

An old gentleman who knew Hartford
county fifty years ago, used to tell this story
of her average citizen. Said he:
"In the spring you'd meet him on his way
to Baltimore, with his rcketty old wagon,
drawn by the scrawniest old horse; the
wagon piled with hoop-poles which had
been cut during the winter. Mr.. Hartford
County. dressed in linsey -woolsey, plodding
along beside his old "creetur," smoking a
corncob pipe and looking the picture of
meek puliteness. Accost him with, We'll
stranger, where are you fromF and he would
drawl out in the most lugubrious tones
Hartford county, honey, God bless yer!' p
Meet him next day, when he would be
going home with his wagon full of her.
rings, and he would be perched up on the
front, cracking his rawhide whip; his hat
set back on his head, great quid of to-
bacco in his mouth, and he looking as
proud and independent as the Grand Duke.
friend p and he'd sing out Hartford
county None oyer derned bizness Git
out O. my wayn His load of fish, the as
surance of provision for coming months,
made him saucy. He felt himself as big
man as anybody "'
Whether this be fancy sketch or not,
how much further ahead do we seem to be
to. day2 In the real, true spirit of enter
prise and Improvement, Hartford county is
almost as servile as her old-time citizen,
plodding along beside his load of hoop
poles. Whether the little Weakening up of
an assured possession would make her as
saucy as he on his load of herrngs, remains
to be seen and the chance for such sight
seems being indefinitely postponed.
Comparatively speaking, Hartford county
is fifty years behind many parts of our
country which do not possess one-half her
natural resources and advantages. The
causes which produce the strange apathy
of her people are evident enough, but an
enumeration and discussion thereof would
take up more time and space than this
article will allow. Twenty-seven years
ago-more than half of the fifty years-a
railroad through the county was projected,
and its affairs progressed through years,
nearly to the point they have now reached.
1t might have been that if our civil war
| had not INTERVIEWED by this time the
necessary amount would have been sub
scribed to begin grading the road bed but
| the war and other untoward circumstances
| did intervene, and here we are, still with.
| out railroad. The Hartford man of fifty
wears ago was not so far behind the rest of
| the world as many u Hartford man now is.
AS he knew nothing of railroads and their
advantages, he was not flying in the face of
civilization by crawling to the city on the
turnpike, the best thoroughfare his county
could then afford him. Half a century of
the worlds progress has gone by, and the
Hartford countians of to- day crawl to market
with their produce over turnpikes not a
shade better than when their grandfathers
wagoned hoop-poles over, and many OF
them have the narrow-minded ignorance
to think and to say that "rairoad would
be of no benefit to farming community"
There may be some who will doubt that
any intelligent man can be found within
the county limits So welded to old-togy-
ism as to concur in such an opinion, but it
is a lamentable fact that those who do are
neither few nor hard to find If we may
Judge of the whole by few, and of all by
certain proportion, then large number
of Harford's citizens are not only indiffer.
ent to her best interests but actually oppos.
ed to the measures that will advance her
improvement. Out of a group of Se0en men
assembled together few days ago in Bel
Air District, three declared themselves a;
unable to see what profit railroad would
be to the county, and argued that the pres
ent state of transportation, &C., was better
in every way. Three out of seven, and
they were some whom Hartford delights tC
call her best citizens, the "bone and sinew'
of the commonwealth; two were respect
able master mechanics, the other practica
farmer, all living within two miles of thu
proposed road. Surprising this proportion
of ignorant opposition to exist in all tut
districts of the county, is it any wonder
that the years go by and nothing is done
If such Hartford countians had the goos'
that laid the golden egg, they would Dc
with her just as the man in the fable did
or if they did allow her to get togethe
eggs enough to sit upon, they would neve
give her chance to hatch them, for the.
would lift her off so often to see if til,
eggs were there that they would all b,
chilled and die. That is the worst of 81
many Hartford people; they cannot bear t.
have their money where they cannot see it