Page 57 - The Hunt Winter 2021
P. 57

                 Landenberg was the nexus of much of this traffic, the first trains reaching there almost 150 years ago in October 1872 as part of
the Wilmington & Western Railroad. The Pomeroy and Newark Railroad also steamed along White Clay Creek, and the once- powerful B&O used the same tracks. In the days before automobiles, farmers found it more cost-effective to send produce to Delaware markets via rail rather than horse-drawn wagon. The railroads also serviced the mills along the way that produced woolen goods, flour and spokes for wooden wheels.
Rail traffic declined in the first half of the 20th century. Most of the iron rails were torn up and melted down for armaments and other uses during World War II. Gradually, a bulk of the wooden trestles disappeared, as well. In addition to the rail paths, there are still visible concrete bridge abutments along White Clay Creek. Just north of Landenberg on Penn Green Road, there’s a dramatic gap in solid rock—a manmade path for the trains of yesteryear.
An observant walker striding through wooded areas in our region may see narrow but defined paths between the trees that
were once the crude haul roads travelled by horse-drawn wagons going between fields of corn or hay and the barnyard. Family-owned farms were once plentiful in the Brandywine Valley. Gradually, they lost out to suburban growth and competition from large corporate agriculture. The abandoned remnants of a dairy farm crowd both sides of Route 100 just after it crosses the Brandywine south of Chadds Ford. It was part of H.G. Haskell
Sr.’s Hill Girt Farm, which he assembled out of smaller farms in the first years of the 20th century. Stocked with Guernsey cows, the commercial dairy lasted until 1972.
Another part of Hill Girt, meanwhile, continues to thrive as SIW Vegetables. H.G. Haskell III planted six acres in 1986. Today, the farm grows more than 50 varieties of fruit and vegetables on 60 cultivated acres, employing more than 40 workers in season.
INDUSTRIAL REMNANTS
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Mansions and grand country houses were often constructed on a wave of profits. In time, the industry’s growth and its related personal fortunes subsided. Many of these structures have since been repurposed as law offices, apartments, museums and art galleries. A few sadly outlive their usefulness and fall into disrepair.
Such is the case with Gibraltar, built in 1844
on a rock outcropping (hence the name) at the northwest corner of Pennsylvania and Greenhill avenues in Wilmington. It didn’t get off to a good start, built for a bride-to-be who got cold feet before she moved in. The spurned bridegroom and owner—John Rodney Brinkle, a grand nephew of founding father and slave owner Caesar Rodney— lived in Gibraltar for the rest of his bachelor days.
wltar was later home to members of the Sharp branch of the wealthy du Pont family. It has remained unoccupied since the turn of the century. In 1998, the mansion was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. It awaits repairs. TH
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