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Frederick By Nancy and Richard Woodworth "Our town has been here since 1745 and is still thriving on the same streets," said the woman at Frederick's visitor center. You can feel its longevity as you view the 18th- and 19th-century structures throughout the city's 33-block historic district. You can sense its prosperity in its downtown, enlivened by restaurants, boutiques and galleries. And you can empathize with its new slogan, "So Proudly We Hail," borrowed quite appropriately from the anthem written by native son Francis Scott Key. Here’s a town that possesses a strong sense of identity, as reflected in its slick monthly city magazine called, simply, Frederick. This area is "heaven in Maryland for yuppies," extolled a state tourism promoter. They come here to go antiquing, tour the battlefields, enjoy the restaurants and walk the sidewalks tread earlier by George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, the Marquis de Lafayette, Stonewall Jackson and Barbara Fritchie. Barbara Fritchie? She's the Civil War heroine who challenged rebel troops to target her rather than the Union flag she was waving as they marched the city's streets. "Shoot if you must this old gray head, but spare this country's flag," she pleaded, her defiance immortalized by poet John Greenleaf Whittier. Whittier's tale of "the clustered spires of Frederick" comes alive as the visitor explores the sights, an experience made much more worthwhile by the guided walking tours offered weekends and holidays. Court House Square was the scene of the first official repudiation of the British Stamp Act in 1765, ten years before the Boston Tea Party. A century later, Frederick was a town divided by the War Between the States, its sympathies lying both north and south. Churches and public buildings became hospitals for the wounded from nearby Antietam, site of the bloodiest battle on American soil. The local battle of Monocacy is credited with saving Washington, D.C., from destruction. Frederick itself was spared, after Confederate General Jubal Early occupied the town briefly and levied a $200,000 ransom for its salvation – an amount borrowed from local banks and finally repaid in 1951. Thus the city is a model of original architecture – "almost as fine as Williamsburg, and not reconstructed," in the words of our tour guide. Even the new downtown parking garages blend into the historic scene. Steeped though it is in the past, Frederick wears well its latter-day theme as "Cinderella City." Its proximity to the Baltimore-Washington megalopolis has turned it into the fastest growing city in Maryland, an up-to-date community of 40,000 with a vision and a sense of place tied to its past. Tourism is said to be the area's second largest industry. Many are attracted by Newmarket, a one-street town called the antiques capital of Maryland, just east of the city. Others head west to Antietam, the graveyard of the Civil War. At the center of it all is Frederick, a delightful blend of old and new. Material excerpted from Inn Spots & Special Places / Mid-Atlantic, by Nancy and Richard Woodworth. Copyright 2003. Wood Pond Press E-mail feedback to: Home
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