We went to Maryland today.  This town is just cross the border about 7 miles from Gettysburg.  It is a "BIG" Catholic town so I thought this sign on a coffee cafe was so cute. 

 Emmitsburg was founded in 1785 and is in, Maryland, just south of the Mason-Dixon line separating Maryland from Pennsylvania.  

Emmitsburg was the site the Union had originally fortified to stop the Confederate invasion of the North in June 1863 during the Civil War. Half the town was burned to the ground in a mysterious fire on the night of June 23. Folklore has it that 'The Great Fire,' as it was known, was started by a Union sympathizer to prevent advancing Confederates from taking supplies from the town. However fate spared the town a battle between the opposing forces, which instead took place 12 miles north of it in Pennsylvania near the town of Gettysburg. The town was briefly held by the retreating Confederates on July 4.

I took a wheelchair lap robe to St Catherine's Nursing Care Facility here in town.  I can put of a little heart in the state Maryland.


The Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph's was founded by Elizabeth Seton in Emmitsburg, MD in 1809.  are the ones that are operating the Nursing Home I gave the lap robe to.  They are a very large organization.  I read that they are going to make one of the large building and turn it into a low income senior housing apartment.  

They were so important in their beginnings. They were there during the Civil War as nurses.  This is an part of a story about them during the war.  
 During the battle the sisters prayed for the combatants. On Sunday, the day after the battle ended, several sisters and Father Burlando set out for Gettysburg. Amid the carnage they began to care for those who had been moved to the churches and hotels of the city. Sisters were assigned in pairs to various locations. The next day more sisters arrived, some from Baltimore and others from St. Joseph’s. Government supplies began to arrive to supplement what the sisters had been able to provide. For as long as there were wounded, the sisters nursed the sick, and comforted and baptized the dying of both armies. One group of nearly 200 men was cared for in the field for three weeks until they could be taken to hospitals in New York and Philadelphia.

I thought this facade thingy was beautiful. The blossom of the Dogwood Tree.

We were also going to go kayaking in the state of Maryland too.  So we headed another 13 miles down the road to this National Park.  Got down to the lake and found a really nice place to launch the boats.  Then Rog discovers he took out his little ladder and forgot to put it back in the car, so we can not kayak today.  He needs the ladder to get the kayaks up and down from the car. 


In the 1930s, after years of making charcoal to fuel nearby iron furnaces, mountain farming, and harvesting of trees for timber, land was purchased to be transformed into a productive recreation area, helping to put people back to work during the Great Depression. Beginning in 1935, the Catoctin
Recreational Demonstration Area was under construction by both the WPA and the CCC. 

I discovered after the fact that the park originally planned to provide recreational camps for federal employees, and get this one of the camps eventually became the home of the Presidential retreat, Camp David. The Presidential retreat is not open or accessible to the public.  So were close to "the place".

We drove around the park.  Saw a couple of kayakers in the lake.  There was also a lot of people from the Conservation Corp. planting trees and bushes and cleaning up the place. We are planning on returning tomorrow and getting the big star on the Maryland map for kayaking.  We also have a couple of geocaching spots planned.  Get those puppy prints on the map too.

This is the Gray Catbird.  He is really a very pretty color.