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During the early part of the twentieth century many handsome steamboats provided a link between Baltimore and the little towns on the Eastern Shore rivers. With the new drawbridge over the Choptank at Denton, built in 1913, the advent of the automobile, and the building of a new railroad crossing the county through Denton, fewer and fewer steamboats served the towns along the rivers. I do remember, however, the steamboat "Joppa" which came from Baltimore once or twice each week and tied up at the wharf directly across from our house.
The big event of the week for some folks, young and old, was meeting the steamboat. Sometimes there were mule teams with lumber carts, horses, carriages, or wagons loaded with livestock or chickens, all with wares destined for the city markets; or there may be empty conveyances awaiting the arrival of merchandise. Sometimes the steamboat was off of its schedule and needed to move on hurriedly, other times it seemed to have no particular schedule to meet and the crew seemed happy to visit with the county people.
I distinctly remember the time that my father went over to the freight warehouse on the wharf upon the arrival of the "Joppa" when I was about six years of age and returned with a small red and yellow wooden express wagon for me directly from Baltimore. Was I a proud youngster: It was so new that the paint in several places was still sticky.
The steamboat was discontinued around the closing years of the '2Os. A group of Denton citizens hoped to revive it and organized a company to do so, purchasing a steamboat that they named "The City of Denton." During the years 1930 and 1931 it operated for about a year, but it didn't last ... other more modern means of transportation had replaced the majestic, handsome, and mystifying old steamboat.
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