TIME MACHINE ... 1941, 1905, 1972, 1968, 1893

(Reader-friendly viewing of newspaper archives material)

December, 1941
The Salisbury Times

(Excerpt)

DEFENSE READY IN WORCESTER

Organization Complete; Blackout Listed

Snow Hill, Md., Dec. 20 -With defense in Worcester County completely organized, S. Earl Tromley, Snow Hill, executive director of the County Council of Civilian Defense, announced last night that plans were almost ready for a complete air raid blackout throughout Worcester County within the next few nights.

The total blackout will press into action the four Home Defense Corps now functioning in Ocean City, Berlin, Snow Hill and Pocomoke City, all to act simultaneously at a "zero hour." 

Worcester County's first air raid was held by the Home Defense Corps in Pocomoke City on Wednesday night of this week and the half-hour test proved successful.  

February, 1905
The Marshall Statesman (Marshall, Mich.)

By Wireless From the Footlights

"Things that actually occur on the stage are often more ludicrous and startling than the invented incidents of the press agents," said James Young, who is appearing with Miss Viola Allen as Sebastian in "Twelfth Night" and as Florizel in "The Winter's Tale."

"I was playing a Shakespearean repertoire throughout the south and received an offer of a guarantee to put on "Hamlet" at the little town of Crisfield, on the eastern shore of Maryland. The theater in Crisfield was not a theater, but a long, narrow hall with a platform at one end for us and rows of benches for the audience. We could use no scenery, but there was certain business of the play that demanded some kind of preparation— namely, the burial of Ophelia. 

There was no trap through which to lower her, and yet she must be got rid of someway. So permission was obtained from the manager to saw out a bit of the stage for the purpose of improvising a trap. After this was done we found that it was twelve feet to the ground underneath, but this difficulty was overcome by piling dry goods boxes under the stage to form a platform upon which the gravedigger was to stand. The box of dirt, the skulls and bones all being placed in position, the trap was replaced, and we were ready for the performance.

Night came, the play proceeded uneventfully. We arrived at the churchyard scene, the trap was taken up, thrown aside and the curtain rung up. The dialogue between the clowns being over, one went with a "stoup of wine," and the first gravedigger, merrily singing, "A pickax and a spade," leaped into the open grave, but instead of landing upon the boxes that had been placed there he disappeared. We heard a splash and a yell, for the fellow had jumped into the Chesapeake bay. He was down under the building in impenetrable darkness and splashing waters eight feet deep.

The hall was built on piles, and the back extended far out on the shore. During the night a high tide came in and washed the boxes away, together with our useful 'props,' the bones and Yorick's skull. The poor clown was finally rescued, but It was probably the first time on record that 'Hamlet' ever furnished the principal sensation of a modern tank drama."

August, 1972
Bucks County Courier Times (Levittown, Pa.)

(Excerpts)
 Nixon planning election campaign 
By HELEN THOMAS

WASHINGTON (UPI) President Nixon has continued to assess his personal role in the coming election campaign in a series of behind-the-scenes strategy meetings with top aides. 

The President returned Sunday afternoon from a relaxed weekend outing on Assateague Island, a 33-mile strand in the Atlantic on the eastern shore of Maryland and Virginia.

He had with him his closest friends, including former Attorney General John N. Mitchell, who remains as one of his chief political brain-trusters; Charles G. "Bebe" Rebozo and New York industrialist Robert H. Abplanalp.

March, 1968

Pocomoke City residents were remembering well known general contractor and community leader Mervin L. Blades who passed away at age 57. His firm was Mervin L. Blades And Son. Blades was a member of the Pocomoke City Council from 1955 to 1958. He was a past president of the Pocomoke City Lions Club, past president of the Pocomoke City Volunteer Fire Company, and was a past exulted ruler of the Elks Lodge 1624 in Pocomoke.

March, 1893 (Time Machine archive)
(Oelwein Register, Oelwein, Iowa)

A Live Town Founded By A Woman

Elizabeth S. Chadbourne, a Boston elocutionist who studied her profession in the days when Georgia Cayvan began to prepare for her career, is the leading spirit and founder of Parksley, in Virginia. When Miss Chadbourne first visited and recognized the possibilities of the fertile peninsula which had been practically closed to the world until about five years ago, a single farm house with a station composed the town. Game was left to the city sportsman, soft shell crabs fed the hogs, whose flesh was staple product and food for the peninsula. Now there is a flourishing town with broad streets, pretty houses, and great prospects owned by a stock company, of which Miss Chadbourne is Secretary, Treasurer and largest stockholder. She is also the inside worker who interests people to invest. She understands all kinds of leases, deeds, etc., and can make out an agreement on the spot which all the quibbles of the lawyers cannot circumvent.


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