Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1955-12-26
BY SMITH HEMPSTONE
Star STAFF Correspondent

SeoA StnA correspondent
FREDERICK, Md, Dec. 21.-
Members of the Frederick chap
ter of the OAR. of all people,
may be on the verge of uncork-
ing the oldest key of whisky
around these parts.
1t all started with Leo Har-
baugh. He was a stonemason
and a pretty good country engi-
neer up Frederick way in the
early 1905.
Thomas Jefferson was in the
White House at the time, had
just completed the Louisiana
Purchase, and found the real
estate business rather slow after
that. so he decided to go into
the road building business
Something that would run from
the Baltimore Washington area
up through Frederick to Cum
berland and out to the West.
Leo, who Frederick folks say
did most of the masonry on the
White House, was his man.
Bridge the Monocacy
He was given the job of build
ing a bridge across the Monoc-
acy River three miles east of
Frederick.
The job was started in 1903
and finished the following year.
And quite a job it was, too: four
stone arches, each IS feet long.
When the bridge was finished,
Leo, who wasn't the bashful type,
wanted to make sure that no
body forgot who did the Job.
AT the eastern end OF the
bridge he built huge masonry
demijohn, better than 10 feet
tall. inscribed his own name on ii
along with those of some of the
other fellows on the job and, 50
legend has it, sealed a keg OF
whisky inside the monument.
Now some folks might regard
that bit of cornerstone filling
IN poor taste. Rut Leo knew his
Frederick.
According TO the official His
tory of Frederick County" writ
ten by T. J. c. Williams and
Folger McKinsy, the Bentz-
town Bard" Frederick at the
time the bridge was built had a
population of 1885 males, 1924
females-and 140 distilleries.
100 Gallons a Year
These distilleries produce
145,000 gallons of whisky a year
which means every manjack in
the town could swill better than
100 gallons a year providing he
kept the womenfoiks on the
wagon and didn't have any need
for hard cash.
So you can see that both the
demijohn monument and the keg
OF whisky inside, if it's there,
were quite appropriate.
Leo was fat and happy until
three days later one of the arches
began to fiatten out. He figured
that his bridge shortly would be
in the Moncacy, so the legend
goes, he hot-footed it out OF
Frederick for parts unknown.
1t did fall in the Monocacy
too--l34 years later.
Nothing untoward happened
for quite some time.
In 1924, Lafayette dropped in
at Frederick and made speech
at the bridge, but nobody knows
what he said.
The next we hear of Frederick
Is in September, 1862, when Rob-
ert E. Lee is out with Stonewall
jackson on one of their periodic
strolls through Maryland.
Winters Word for II
An old lady by the name of
Barbara Frietchie got into a has
sic with Jackson and soon put
him in his place-if we are to
believe John Greenleaf Whittier
who wasn't there either.
Whittier doesn't mention the
demijohn or the whisky inside,
and Jackson's troops, being serv-
icemen, certainly would have
taken care of that in short order
II they'd known about it.
Two years later Jubal Early
dropped around, crossed Leo's
bridge and, in preference to
having to listen to Barbara
Frietchie sound off, defeated Lew
Wallace in the battle of the
Monocacy and marched on
Washington. He got as far as
Mount st. Alban before Grant
changed his mind for him. He
burned Chambersburg, Pa, in
stead.
On March, 3, 1912. Leo's bridge