Baltimore County, MD Hello Baltimore County, 12 Oct 2016

Previous Meeting Next Meeting

⏯

youtube image

►

From YouTube: Historic Jerusalem Mill Village

Description

Go back in time and enjoy the living history at this lovingly restored mill village along the Gunpowder River that dates to 1772.

A

Welcome to hello, baltimore county.. We are here at the historic jerusalem mill village.

A

And we're just delighted to be joined by rick decker,, who is the president of the friends of jerusalem mill.?

A

Thank you for inviting us.

B

You're very welcome.

A

This is a little different than the usual hello baltimore county set..

A

Why don't you give us a sense of kind of where we are and what we're looking at here.

B

We're in the miller's house., this is the gentleman that would actually run the grist mill.

B

That made flower and corn meal.

B

and we're just about 50 feet away from his place of work.

B

It's a very short commute for him in those days..

B

This is the oldest building in the village.. It was made about 1770., it's a stone and wood structure.. It was also the first building that was restored.

A

Interesting., so what is the historic jerusalem mill?.

A

To me, it almost looks like a mini-williamsburg right here in baltimore county.

B

Well, and we don't mind that comparison at all,.

B

But what this village was formed, by, it was the original plot in 1687,.

B

Was jerusalem plot. and it was eventually bought by a quaker from bucks, county, pennsylvania,, david lee.

B

And he came here to set up an industrial village.

B

And he had a grist mill that he built..

B

He also joined that with a saw mill.

B

obviously, to build the grist mill and the saw mill, he needed a blacksmith shop.. He created a wheelwright's, cooper.

B

He eventually formed a farm so that he could do produce.

B

He then made himself a post office so that he could then sell stamps.

B

He made himself a general store, so he could have goods shipped in and be sold.

B

To make a long story short,, he was sort of kind of like.

B

A carnegie mellon,, vanderbilt, and rockefeller all in one.

B

It didn't seem like he liked to share anything.

B

so, the way I would like to characterize this village over 200 years:.

B

A multi-central industrial village and shopping mall.

A

About the history.

A

Of what you and the friends of jerusalem mill have done, here.

A

From 1772 to 1962. and--.

B

The river here was running a mill.

A

That was doing what exactly? and grist mill.

B

And it had a very good run.

B

by 1962 however,, most of the flour and corn meal.

B

Was being centrally produced in downtown baltimore.

B

And so the small grist mills that we had out here actually started going out of business..

B

The land, however, was very shortly thereafter bought up.

B

By the state of maryland as part of the gunpowder falls state park,.

B

To protect the watershed,, the little gunpowder and the big gunpowder that goes into the chesapeake bay.

B

Unfortunately,, the grist mill and the miller's house.

B

And some of the other buildings on this land started to fall into some disrepair.

B

neighbors that live literally right around this area. Here.

B

Formed a non-profit,, the friends of jerusalem, mill,.

B

In 1985, with the purpose of preserving and restoring.

B

And enhancing this particular part of the maryland state parks.

B

They started in this building.

B

using their own private donations and labor,.

B

They rebuilt this place from near ruins.

B

And started creating a living history program.

B

Where they teach open hearth, cooking, gunsmithing in the top,.

B

And calligraphy, and musical instruments, and a variety of other things.

B

And the state of maryland was so impressed.

B

That senator amos at that time, appropriated money from the legislature.

B

To rebuild the grist mill and they made the outside look exactly like. It was.

B

But they did make the inside an office. Building for gunpowder falls. State park., now,, the friends of jerusalem mill, have continued their investment in 11 of the 12 buildings that were on the 1803 census.

B

And that includes the blacksmith shop and the wheelwright;.

B

The post office, the tenant house,, the general store,.

B

And associated buildings [indistinct], including the stone bar.

B

A living history exhibit.

A

And you invite the public to come out and enjoy themselves and kind of poke around.. What are some of the experiences that they can have? Here??

A

We run a program year-round.

B

The volunteers are extraordinary., most of them are retired.

B

a great many of them are school teachers and they can't let go of that opportunity to educate.

B

And so they run a living history program, every weekend,.

B

Saturdays and sundays, from 1:00 and 4:00, and where you can just see a variety of people, reenacting, like the blacksmith shop or open hearth, cooking,.

B

Like I particularly appreciate.,.

A

And--, but we also have a beautiful garden that we've put in the back here.

B

That's very period correct for the colonial time., but some of the other events we've expanded to is we --.

B

Since it had been around for 200 years,, obviously this was a place that was affected by the civil war.

B

And in fact the general store was robbed in 1864 by major gilmore.

B

And so we reenact that every year on the anniversary, on the 11th of july.

B

And we have re-enactors here from the civil war and the cavalry comes and the cavalry takes and the cavalry then has a party afterwards.

A

So you--, obviously this has been here since the 1600s,, so the people that lived in this area were involved in the revolutionary war,.

A

The civil war, everything that's happened, since.

A

absolutely. and the thing that makes this work is the volunteers.

B

One of our founding members said: "it takes a village to maintain a village.".

B

And we're talking about 600 or 700 volunteers that rotate through.

B

They play characters that reenact certain period things.

B

And whether it's in the revolutionary war or in the civil war.

B

And they come weekend after weekend.

B

and,, you know,, they bring their children and their grandchildren and unfortunately, now their great grandchildren.

A

Of family-friendly, activities.

B

And we've reached out to the community. recently, in the last years,, we've had a first responders day.

B

We're blessed with having two very active volunteer fire departments.

B

In joppa, magnolia, and the kingsville volunteer fire department., and so they brought out all of their equipment, along with the maryland park service and the department of natural resources.

B

And we had all the local kids climb on all the equipment and then participate in the educational programs at the same time..

B

We also do legend of sleepy hollow,, which is coming up on the 22nd--.

A

On the 22nd of october.,.

B

You will see a headless horseman and you will see ichabod crane.

B

And you will see many, many people, characters, that are going in there.

B

In december,, we're going to have the real story of the teddy bear.

B

And teddy roosevelt--.

B

But then we also have a variety of other characters that you'll find,.

B

More classic ones that the children can interact, with.

B

So-- and our program kind of changes a little bit every year.

B

Different volunteers have "let's, try, this" and we're not afraid to try things.

B

And we really appreciate it., we have tremendous support from the maryland park service and gunpowder falls. State park,, which we're affiliated with.

B

And we've had tremendous support from the county, executive, barry glassman, of harford county., and we have tremendous support from the county executive of baltimore county --.

B

And especially with the recent renovation of the jericho covered, bridge,.

B

Which we celebrated on the 28th of april this last year.

A

Were out here with some giant scissors.

A

Showing that beautiful restored bridge.

B

I, like the part where they rode the horse drawn carriage together.

B

Through the bridge for the first time.

B

And so we're just blessed with very active local elected officials.

B

And two counties that love the gunpowder falls state park.

B

And we hope to be here: for-- we've been here: 31 years,, the friends of jerusalem mill..

B

The village has been here, 200., we're kind of hoping for another 200.

A

Very nice.: well, congratulations on all that you've accomplished here and we just invite everybody to come on. Out.

A

absolutely. go to our website at jerusalemmill.org.

B

And you'll get the latest information on our antique baseball from the 1880s,.

B

Which was-- the next game is on the 8th of october..

B

We also have the jousting club of maryland.

B

Their next tournament is here on the 24th of september,.

B

If you've never seen jousting. the state sport, right?.

A

Absolutely., it is the state sport. all right.. Well, thank you very much., it's just gorgeous here and we really appreciate what you've done to preserve it. well,, not me,, but thousands of us.

B

You and the thousands of friends of jerusalem mill.

A

Thank you very much., and thanks for watching hello, baltimore county and come on out., it really is a mini williamsburg-like experience right here in kingsville., we'll see you next time on hello, baltimore, county., (, ♪♪♪, ),.