Clark Gardner
consulting engineer · active 1935
The engineer who designed Ocean City's first municipal sanitary sewerage system. He appeared before the council at a special meeting on 8 October 1935 and "discussed plans for sewer and various locations suitable for the disposal plant"; on 22 October the council accepted his terms of a flat six thousand dollars for all the work, or two thousand if the plans were drawn and the council did not carry them out. He sat with the mayor, the three councilmen and the town attorney on the evening of 27 December 1935 when the three construction bids for laying the sewer down Philadelphia Avenue were opened and the contract awarded to A. Stanley Mundy & Co. of Woodbridge, New Jersey, subject to the approval of the P.W.A. engineer. No first name beyond 'Clark' and no firm are given in the minutes. — 1936 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11: 1936 FULL PASS: two substantial additions. First, his day job - the Democratic Messenger of 13 August 1936 identifies him as 'Mr. Clarke Gardner, Salisbury City Engineer, who is the consulting engineer to Ocean City' and states that he designed the Ocean City sewage disposal system. Second, his 1936 work: he met the council specially on 29 February to report that he had made adjustments with the Board of Health so the plans would be acceptable and the town was ready to seek bids on Contract No. 2; he attended the council on 3 June when it examined the electric company's contracts; he travelled to Baltimore with the mayor and the town solicitor between the opening of the disposal-plant bids and the award to consult the Board of Health and 'Mr. A. Wolman'; and he appeared with an engineer named Dallas on 29 September to report on the progress of the sewer and on drainage. activeYears should read at least 1935-1936. — 1937 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11: 1937 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11: the year his sewer went into service, and the year he became the town's standing engineer rather than its sewer designer. On 31 March 1937 he came before the council with 'Dallas of Salisbury' and a Mr. Watson to explain 'the necessity of having a man to care for the plant'; a fortnight later the mayor telephoned him and it was decided the erecting engineer need not stay on to give instruction. In April he gave the Democratic Messenger the fullest technical description of the works the campaign holds: 7,750 lineal feet of cast iron intercepting sewer of 12 to 20 inches, laid below mean high water of Sinepuxent Bay; a plant on St. Louis Avenue between North First and North Second Streets capable of 3,000,000 gallons a day; under-water sewage grinders he said were the first in Maryland; chlorination in wet wells and discharge by force main to the inlet; and a design problem he named himself, 'the extreme variation in sewage flow because of the large differential in summer and winter population'. In July his firm Gardner & Dallas drew the plans for Elliott Bros.' private yacht basin. In November he went over the plans for connecting the west side of Philadelphia Avenue, was instructed to advertise the bids, and stood in the room on 14 December when they were opened. The Salisbury Times spells him 'Clarke Gardner' throughout. — 1944 FULL PASS, 2026-08-12: Ocean City's engineer through 1944 and 1945. On 21 November 1944 he was expected with plans for a concrete boardwalk, and on 28 November he and Geo. Purnell presented them - the cost was prohibitive and the walk stayed wood. On 19 December 1944 he agreed by letter to make a full survey of a water main extension and do all the work of getting the project approved by the Commission of Post War Planning FOR $200, signing the same night; he forwarded the plans in January 1945, was paid a separate $1,200 bill for zoning work in July 1945, brought the State's acceptance papers on 12 September 1945 on terms that had Maryland paying half the engineer's expenses, and attended the opening of the two water-main bids on 21 December 1945 that the council rejected five days later. He ordered two sets of insurance maps in April 1945 for use in preparing the zoning ordinance and sat with the Zoning Commission through its work. — 1946 FULL PASS, 2026-08-15: HE DREW THE ZONING MAP OF OCEAN CITY, MARYLAND, dated 7 May 1946 at a scale of one inch to four hundred feet, and Ordinance No. 99 adopts 'the district map prepared by Clarke Gardner, Consulting Engineer' by name and declares it part of the ordinance. ⚠ THE SPELLING IS A RECORDED CONFLICT: the map's own printed title block reads CLARKE GARDNER in draughtsman's capitals, the ordinance text in the clerk's hand reads 'Clarke Gardner', and the clerk's attendance line of 3 May 1946 reads 'Clark Gordon' or 'Clark Gorden'; a first reading of the map by the retrieval pass gave 'Clarke Gadnier' and is superseded. Whether 'Clarke Gardner' is one man or a firm cannot be determined - the map prints it without an ampersand - and the bottom of the title block is cut off by the sheet edge, losing whatever followed the name. He is also the engineer who wrote the town on bonds for water extensions, read to the council on 22 October 1946, carrying forward the post-war water main extension he had surveyed since December 1944. The identification of the 1946 map's engineer with this record rests on the surname, the profession and the continuity of the water work, and is not stated on any page.
In the record (34)
1936 · 1936-06-09
Ocean City never held the electric-plant referendum it won in Annapolis - in June 1936 it signed a five-year contract with the private company instead
Chapter 471 of the Acts of 1935 had authorised Ocean City to build and operate a municipal electric light plant and to borrow $150,000 for it, subject to a referendum for which the act fixed no date. Across twenty-six meetings in 1935 the council never selected one, and in 1936 the question came back not as a plant but as a price. On 2 June 1936 'Mr. Mitchell & Blake of Electric Light Co.' appeared before the council with a proposition for street lighting on a five-year contract showing a reduction of about $375 yearly after changing from 60 to 100 candle-power lamps, together with a one-year power rate. The council decided to consider it before signing; on 3 June, with the engineer Clark Gardner present, it examined the contracts for lights and power, decided to ask for some changes, and put William H. Scott in charge of seeing the electric people. On 9 June, W. Preston Laws moving and Scott seconding, it resolved 'that Contract be signed for Lighting Streets with "The Eastern Shore Public Service Company of Md" for five (5) Years since they had made the changes requested in meeting of June 3rd. Also that Power Contract be Executed for one (1) Year Contract listed as Schedule #9.' The municipal lights for the Fire House were not to be charged for. No referendum was ever called, no bonds were issued, and no municipal plant was built. — 1937 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11 [corrected]: The five-year term did not survive 1937. On 1 June 1937 the council 'agreed to sign contract if changed to one year' for the town's own lighting, and on 29 June, when Cecil Blake and two others came to ask that the power contract for the two sewer pumping stations and the disposal plant be signed for five years, 'Council agreed to sign contract for 1 year and contract was Executed on a 1 year basis.' Ocean City refused a five-year power contract twice in four weeks in the same year it took delivery of a plant that ran on electricity.
This is the answer the water-light-and-sewer thread has been waiting two years for. Ocean City went to Annapolis for a power station and came home with a better tariff. The credible threat of building your own plant was worth $375 a year and five years of certainty - which is the whole municipal-utility argument of the 1930s compressed into one council minute.
Eastern Shore Public Service CompanyW. Preston LawsWilliam H. Scott
Source · checked 2026-08-11
1936 · 1936-06-26
Ocean City took its sewage plans to Baltimore and to Abel Wolman before it let the contract
The disposal plant was designed by Clark Gardner, the Salisbury city engineer, who acted as consulting engineer to Ocean City; the Messenger noted in August that he 'was here over the week end studying details of the new Ocean City sewage disposal system, which he designed.' On 29 February 1936 the council met Gardner specially 'to Consult on disposal Plant', and he reported that he had made adjustments with the Board of Health so that the plans would be acceptable to them and the town was ready to ask for bids on Disposal Plant Contract No. 2. Then, between the opening of the bids on 26 June and the award, Mayor W. Thomas Elliott, Edmond H. Johnson and Gardner travelled to Baltimore and 'Consulted with Mr. A. Wolman and Board of health as to best plan to follow'. Abel Wolman was chief engineer of the Maryland State Department of Health and the most influential sanitary engineer in America. The plant Ocean City built discharged into the inlet at the south end of Philadelphia Avenue.
Ocean City Inlet & JettyMaryland State Board of HealthW. Thomas Elliott
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1936 · 1936-06-26
Five contractors bid on Ocean City's sewage disposal plant in June 1936, from $74,510 to $98,902
Bids on the disposal plant - Contract No. 2 - were opened at a council meeting on Friday 26 June 1936: Virginia Engineering Co. Inc. of Newport News, Va., $98,902.58; George & Lynch of Dover, Del., $79,270.50; M. J. McDermott of Georgetown, Del., $74,510.48; A. Stanley Mundy Co. Inc. of Woodbridge, N.J., $81,593.38; and B. J. Contracting Co. of New York City, $88,247.00. The council tabulated them, held its decision on the award 'until future date' and returned the certified check of the New York bidder. The lowest bid was more than the entire federal grant. Between that meeting and the award, the clerk noted, Mayor Elliott, Edmond H. Johnson and the engineer Clark Gardner went to Baltimore to consult the Board of Health on the best plan to follow, and a request went to Washington for an additional grant of $6,750, forty-five per cent of $15,000. — 1937 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11 [confirmed]: M. J. McDermott of Georgetown, Delaware, the low bidder of 26 June 1936 at $74,510.48, did get the contract. He started work on 26 August 1936 under Contract No. 2 of PWA Docket Md. 1065-R and the Mayor and City Council accepted the completed plant on 8 June 1937. This closes an open research request from the 1936 pass. Note that the final construction cost is still NOT established: $74,510.48 is his bid, and the 1937 press printed three different totals for the whole system.
Maryland State Board of HealthA. Stanley Mundy & Co., Inc.W. Thomas Elliott
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1936 · 1936-09-29
For weeks after the hurricane the ruined boardwalk stayed open behind barriers reading 'Danger at own risk'
The council met on 29 September 1936 with the engineers Gardner and Dallas, who reported on the progress of the sewer and what to do about drainage; W. C. Poole's letter was read and no action taken; and then 'Board walk was discussed and decided to put up Barriers and signs, Danger at own risk.' A meeting was called for the following evening with the committee 'to discuss what is best plan to pursue with Board walk', and the secretary was ordered to buy 400 feet of fire hose. In October, the Messenger's Ocean City column reported, 'The city is furnishing men to tear down and remove the front boardwalk and putting it where property owners want it, at the expense of the owner.'
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1936 · 1936-12-29
Ocean City's first municipal sewer was dug in 1936 and was still only seventy per cent complete at the end of it
The contract A. Stanley Mundy & Co. of Woodbridge, N.J. won on the Friday after Christmas 1935 was signed as Contract No. 1 on 15 January 1936 under P.W.A. Docket No. Md. 1065-R. Preliminary work began in the week of 12 March and the contractors started laying pipe along North Philadelphia Avenue between North First and North Third Streets on Saturday 28 March. By late May the council was fielding complaints about sand thrown up across Philadelphia Avenue at the street intersections and proposing to wet it down and roll it. Work stopped in late July while more federal money was sought, resumed in August, and the treatment plant on North First Street west of Philadelphia Avenue was under construction by mid-September, with Major Anderson supervising. On 29 December the council discussed its finances and ordered the attorney 'to prepare paper to get balance due on Grant on Sewer as it was 70% complete.' The Messenger had reported in August that the plant and force mains were expected to be in operation after 1 January. The system as designed was an interceptor of 8,000 lineal feet of cast-iron pipe, a treatment plant of reinforced concrete on piling with a brick superstructure designed for a maximum flow of three million gallons a day, and 3,100 lineal feet of pipe discharging into the Inlet at the south end of Philadelphia Avenue. — 1937 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11 [confirmed]: It was finished in 1937. The intercepting sewers by A. Stanley Mundy & Co. were accepted by the Mayor and City Council on 30 April 1937 and the sewage treatment plant, force mains and appurtenances by M. J. McDermott of Georgetown, Delaware on 8 June 1937, both under PWA Docket Md. 1065-R. Operation began in the week of 15 April 1937, the works were physically handed over on about 18 May, and Frank Tyre was appointed the first plant superintendent.
The town that voted 104 to 1 for a sewer in November 1935 did not get one in 1936. It got seven-tenths of one - and a treatment plant that would put Ocean City's sewage into the inlet the town had spent sixty years asking for.
Ocean City Inlet & JettyA. Stanley Mundy & Co., Inc.Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works
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1936 · 1936-12-31
The state's own account: Ocean City laid 7,750 feet of sewer and part of a plant in 1936 for $35,431, against a completed system of about $125,000
The Annual Report of the State Board of Health of Maryland for the year ending 31 December 1936, in the report of the Bureau of Sanitary Engineering under Abel Wolman as chief engineer, lists Ocean City first among the Public Works Administration projects begun in 1935 and carried on: 'Ocean City, intercepting sewers and a sewage treatment plant'. The figures are exact: 'Ocean City installed 7,750 feet of sewers and a portion of its treatment plant at a cost of $35,431. The system when completed will cost approximately $125,000.' The same report records that 'Ocean City expended $3,226 in the reconstruction of wells and in the installation of 150 feet of mains'. The report never names the inlet as the discharge point - a search of the volume for 'Sinepuxent' returns nothing.
Maryland State Board of Health
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1937 · 1937-03-31
The engineers had to come and tell Ocean City it would need a man to look after the sewage plant
'Mr. Clark Gardner and Dallas of Salisbury and Mr. Watson were present explaining the necessity of having a man to care for the plant' - 31 March 1937, six weeks before the works were accepted. On 15 April the follow-up question was put: 'Question of having Mr. Watson remain longer for to give instruction at the disposal plant was discussed and Mayor Elliott Called Gardner and it was not deemed necessary.' The town had built a mechanical sewage works and then had to be told, by its own engineers, that somebody would have to run it - and having been told, decided it did not need the extra fortnight of instruction. The same 31 March meeting discussed the grading of the streets, with the Mayor to see 'Mr. McDermott' about it, and the raising of the sidewalks on St. Louis Avenue.
W. Thomas ElliottM. J. McDermott
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1937 · 1937-04-15
Ocean City's sewage plant went into operation in April 1937 with the first under-water sewage grinders in Maryland, and put the town's effluent into its own inlet
'Operation of the new PWA sewerage system and treatment plant at Ocean City will begin this week,' the consulting engineer Clark Gardner told the Messenger on 15 April 1937. The description is the fullest the campaign has of what was actually built. 'The intercepting sewer, constructed along Philadelphia avenue, consists of 7,750 lineal feet of cast iron pipe, varying in diameter from 12 to 20 ins., laid below mean high water of the Sinepuxent Bay.' The treatment plant stood 'on St. Louis Avenue between North First and North Second Sts.' and was 'capable of handling a maximum of 3,000,000 gallons of sewage a day.' 'Among the outstanding devices employed in the new plant are the units for grinding the raw sewage under water. After grinding the sewage is chlorinated in wet wells, and is discharged through a force main to the inlet. The under-water grinding devices, Gardner said, are the first to be used in Maryland.' The engineering problems he named were 'the extreme variation in sewage flow because of the large differential in summer and winter population, and ... the water pressure at the outlet, 16 feet below the level of the bay.' The works were 'formally turned over to the Mayor and Council on Tuesday of this week', the Messenger reported on 20 May, and 'Mr. Frank Tyre has been appointed Plant Superintendent by the Mayor and Council.' The council's own Resolutions of Acceptance followed on 30 April for the sewers and 8 June for the plant.
The inlet the 1933 hurricane opened had been the fishing fleet's harbour mouth for four years. From April 1937 it was also the town's outfall.
Ocean City Inlet & JettyFederal Emergency Administration of Public WorksM. J. McDermottA. Stanley Mundy & Co., Inc.Frank TyreW. Thomas Elliott
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1937 · 1937-04-30
Ocean City accepted its intercepting sewers from A. Stanley Mundy & Co. on 30 April 1937
At a meeting in the Municipal Building on 30 April 1937 the Mayor and City Council unanimously adopted a Resolution of Acceptance declaring that they had 'accepted as satisfactory - subject to prior acceptance by the Consulting Engineer - a system of Intercepting Sewers and Appurtenances recently constructed at Ocean City, Maryland, by the A. Stanley Mundy Company, Inc., of Woodbridge, New Jersey, under Contract No. 1, PWA Docket No. Md.1065-R', and directed the Clerk to notify the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works. W. H. Scott moved it, Dr. F. J. Townsend seconded, and the motion carried. The council had signed Mundy's contract on 27 December 1935 and had given him a thirty-day extension in 1936 for 'the unusually arduous winter'; sixteen months later the pipe was in the ground and signed off.
A. Stanley Mundy & Co., Inc.Federal Emergency Administration of Public WorksW. Thomas ElliottWilliam H. ScottFrancis J. TownsendJohn M. Mumford
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1937 · 1937-06-08
On 8 June 1937 Ocean City accepted its sewage treatment plant, and the two-year job the town had voted 104 to 1 for was finished
Dr. F. J. Townsend offered the resolution and W. Preston Laws seconded it, and it passed unanimously: the Mayor and City Council 'have accepted as satisfactory - Subject to prior acceptance by the Consulting Engineer - Sewerage Treatment Plant, Force mains, and Appurtenances recently Constructed at Ocean City, Maryland, by M. J. McDermott, of Georgetown, Delaware, under Contract #2 PWA Docket NO Md. 1065-2R.' The clerk was again to notify the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works. McDermott had bid $74,510.48 as the low bidder on 26 June 1936 and started work on 26 August 1936; the plant was in the ground in ten months and had been running long enough by 15 April 1937 for the council to decide it did not need the manufacturer's man to stay on and give instruction. The system had cost the town $61,000 of federal bonds, an $8,250 cash contribution of its own and a federal grant that had been raised to $56,659.
The 1936 pass closed with the sewer '70 per cent complete' and a hole where the answer should be. This is the answer, in the town's own hand: accepted, 8 June 1937, from the low bidder of the previous June.
M. J. McDermottFederal Emergency Administration of Public WorksM. J. McDermottFrancis J. TownsendW. Preston LawsW. Thomas ElliottJohn M. Mumford
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1937 · 1937-06-24
Ocean City's sewer and disposal plant cost somewhere between $120,000 and $125,909, and the town's own paper printed three different totals in eight months
On 15 April 1937 the consulting engineer gave the figure as $120,000, 'of which Ocean City furnished $60,000 through bonds and the PWA contributed a grant of $56,000'. On 24 June the Messenger's survey of the town's non-taxable improvements called it 'the $125,909 sewer and disposal plant built from WPA and city funds'. On 25 November, reporting the extension, the paper made it $122,000. The town's own record supports the first breakdown better than the labels: the bonds were $61,000 issued to the United States in 1935 plus eight more of $1,000 in February 1937, and the grant had been raised to $56,659 in December 1936. It was a PWA project, docket Md. 1065-R, not a WPA one; the 24 June attribution to 'WPA and city funds' is wrong on its face. Whether the true total was $120,000 or $125,909 the campaign cannot settle, and the difference — about $6,000 — is roughly what the 1937 lateral extension was then estimated to cost.
about $120,000–$126,000 — the paper printed three different totals in 1937 and the PWA case file has not been read
Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works
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1937 · 1937-06-29
Two developers asked Ocean City for wells, a sewer connection and a street from Fourth to Ninth for about $70
'Franklin Woodcock and Edward Evans were present asking that wells be built and connected to Sewer through their development at a Cost of about $70, a street beginning at 4th street to 9th. They stating Mr. Gardner said it could be done so council agreed to meet with them and Mr. Gardner on Wednesday to decide if such was feasable.' Nothing more is recorded. Earlier, on 31 March, the secretary had been 'instructed to give grade for walk on North Division street for Edward Evans'. The town's brand-new sewer was three weeks from acceptance and private developers were already asking to hang subdivisions off it.
S. Franklyn WoodcockEdward Evans
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1937 · 1937-07-13
Elliott Bros. were given leave to dike their land north of First Street and dig a basin in it
The council reconvened after adjourning on 13 July 1937 and, on Laws's motion seconded by Scott, 'Elliott Bros. were granted permit to dike their land between North 1st Street & North 2nd Street and dig a basin as outlined by plans prepared by Gardner & Dallas and permit was O.K.' The town's consulting engineers, fresh from the sewer, were drawing plans to turn bay marsh at the north end of the built-up town into a private basin - the same shape of work, on a private account, that the fishing harbour at West Ocean City had been doing on the public one since 1936.
W. Preston LawsWilliam H. Scott
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1937 · 1937-11-12
The mayor's own fish company dredged a private yacht harbour on the Ocean City bay front, by permission of the War Department
'OCEAN CITY YACHT HARBOR COMPLETED - Ocean City, Md., Nov. 12 - Dredging of a new yacht harbor along the Ocean City bay front [near] North [Division] Street by the Elliott Brothers Fish Company was completed yesterday. Permission to construct the [harbor] was recently granted by the War Department. Mayor W. Thomas Elliott of Ocean City [heads] the Elliott Fishing [Company].' The town council had given Elliott Bros. leave on 13 July to dike their land between North First and North Second Streets and dig a basin to plans by Gardner & Dallas - the town's own consulting engineers. The mayor's list of the winter's building put the yacht harbour at $3,000. Ocean City's mayor was also its largest fish packer, and in 1937 he had the council's permit, the War Department's permission and the town engineer's drawings for a harbour of his own.
Elliott Brothers Fish CompanyW. Thomas Elliott
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1937 · 1937-11-25
Ocean City ended 1937 by ordering ten sewers that still emptied into Sinepuxent Bay to be diverted into the new plant
'Ocean City Sewage System Completion Is Due Next Spring', the Messenger reported on 25 November 1937. The Mayor and Council had 'authorised the diversion of ten sewer lines, now emptying into Sinepuxent Bay, to the mains leading to the disposal plant. The project requires about 3,600 feet of six and eight-inch lateral sewer lines and will cost about $10,000', with a deadline of 1 June 1938. Bids for connecting all the sewers west of Philadelphia Avenue to the main sewer were opened on the evening of Tuesday 14 December and the work went to George & Lynch at $6,921.15, undercutting both the firms that had built the PWA system. Eight months after the treatment plant went into service, ten of the town's own outfalls were still discharging raw into the bay.
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1937 · 1937-12-14
Ocean City ended 1937 by buying a second sewer: $6,921.15 to put an eight-inch line down the west side of Philadelphia Avenue
The PWA system had served the ocean side. On 9 November the secretary was ordered to ask the engineer Clark Gardner when he could meet the council 'and decide on what could be done on Connecting sewer on west side of Phila. ave'. On 16 November Gardner and Dallas went over the plans and it was decided to ask for bids 'for Connecting up with new Sewer 8" leaving present lines for Storm Drains'. On 14 December the bids were opened in front of the three contractors themselves - 'Mr. McDermott of Georgetown Del., Munday of Bridgeton N.J., Clark Gardner, Dallas of Salisbury' were all present - and read: A. Stanley Mundy $7,625.30, M. J. McDermott $7,373.50, George & Lynch $6,921.15, each with a certified cheque for $500. Dr. Townsend moved and Laws seconded, and the contract went to George & Lynch. The same evening the council released W. C. Pool from a sewer easement taken on his land in November 1929, 'as the City has no use for a sewer crossing any of the property on West Side of Phila ave', and told Mrs. Kuhit it would put in the necessary sewer on 8th Street when she was ready to build.
George & LynchA. Stanley Mundy & Co., Inc.M. J. McDermottM. J. McDermottFrancis J. TownsendW. Preston LawsW. C. Pool
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1938 · 1938-03-14
The West Side sewers came in at $7,134.05 on the engineer's final measurement, and the contractor was paid off in instalments
Ocean City's engineer Clark Gardner delivered his final measurements on the West Side sewers to the council on 14 March 1938 - 'total of $7134.05 and Treasurer instructed to pay same'. Three weeks earlier, on 23 February, the secretary had been instructed to pay the contractors George & Lynch $3,000 'on acct of Sewer'. At the same March meeting the secretary was ordered to buy a small pump costing $45 'to use in repairing leaks', which is the first sign in the record of the new system needing maintenance rather than construction.
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1939 · 1939-03-31
After refusing three times in 1938, Ocean City agreed in 1939 to run sewer and water to the Yacht Club Island - for a $15,000 assessment
On 24 March John Lynch, John D. Ayer, Frank Truitt and others came before the council 'in interest of Yacht club island asking for Extension of Sewer & water', and the question arose whether the sewage would run by gravity, the city engineer having figured the 14th Street sewer as reaching only St. Louis Avenue underground. On 31 March: 'Yacht Club Island Sewer discussed and decided that if they wanted sewer & water City would run sewer & water to East Side Chicago Ave, they to connect there and put them on tax books for $15,000 assessment. Carried.' In the new-assessment list of 21 June the clerk entered 'Yacht Club 12000'.
In 1938 the council was asked about this island three times and would not touch it - it 'could not help' in May, 'promised to think it over' in November, and on 22 November refused to buy it 'owing to the City's finances'. In 1939 it named a price. What changed was not the island but the answer to the question the 1938 pass could not settle: the town's interest in the Yacht Club Island was, in the end, the tax books.
John B. LynchG. Bertrand Cropper
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1939 · 1939-05-23
Ocean City sold $10,000 of sewerage bonds in May 1939 to run lateral sewers off the plant it had just built
Chapter 269 of the Acts of 1939 (House Bill 598), approved 13 April as an emergency law, empowered the Mayor and City Council of Ocean City to issue coupon bonds to the amount of ten thousand dollars 'for the purpose of improving the sewerage system of said town by construction of lateral sewers to connect with the sewerage disposal system recently completed in Ocean City under a Public Works Administration project'. They were to be styled 'Ocean City Sewerage and Improvement Bonds of 1939'. The council passed the sale ordinance on 18 April, coupons dated 1 May and 1 November and one bond retiring each year from 1940 to 1949 inclusive. Bids were opened at the meeting of Tuesday 23 May: Marburg, Price & Co. 101.699; Mackubin, Legg & Co. 103.2799; Stein Bros. & Boyce 103.939. On Rayne's motion, seconded by Bounds, the sale was made to Stein Bros. & Boyce.
The plant was finished in 1937 and the town spent 1938 discovering it could compel people to connect to it. 1939 is the year it borrowed to build the pipes that would let them - which is to say the sewer took three years and three separate acts of will, and the order was backwards throughout.
Stein Bros. & BoyceHarold J. RayneE. Raymond Bounds
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1944 · 1944-11-21
To catch the boys breaking Ocean City's windows, the council had the chief of police put a man in civilian dress on the streets from the end of the school day until after dark.
The chief of police was called in and the council discussed the best means to break up the boys breaking windows, deciding he would try placing one man in civilian dress one afternoon, on duty by the time School was out until after night, to catch whoever was breaking the windows. The same meeting heard that Clark Gardner would be present at the next meeting with plans for a concrete walk, and Allen Mumford brought a sketch of proposed steps for his home on Division Street.
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1944 · 1944-11-28
Ocean City's Boardwalk stayed wood because concrete was too dear: the plans were brought in on 28 November 1944 and the cost killed them the same night.
Clark Gardner and Geo. Purnell brought plans for a concrete walk and presented them to the council, and as the cost was prohibitive the council decided to continue the same construction with lumber for the present. It is the resolution of the debate the property owners opened on 24 October, when they asked the town to price a cement walk because it would be cheaper and last longer. The same meeting decided to bill property owners $25 a lot for the work of rebuilding a 16-foot walk; found the walk from 1st Street to 4th Street in such condition that it was best to build new rather than waste time and materials on the old, and ordered every owner notified by letter that if they did not act within 20 days the council would build and charge it to the property; accepted a five-year contract from the Electric Light officials for relighting the city streets, signed by the mayor and witnessed by the clerk; and heard Mayor Trimper ask every councilman to attend a meeting at Snow Hill on Thursday evening on post-war planning.
Ocean City BoardwalkEastern Shore Public Service CompanyDaniel W. Trimper, Jr.
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1944 · 1944-12-19
Ocean City's post-war water main extension began with a $200 agreement in December 1944: Clark Gardner would survey it and get it approved for the flat fee.
A letter with an agreement from Clark Gardner was read at the last meeting of 1944: he was to prepare plans and submit them to the Commission of Post War Planning on water main extension, agreeing to make a full survey and do all work pertaining to getting the project approved, for $200. On motion by Lynch, seconded by Savage, it was accepted and signed. The project ran the whole of 1945 - the plans were signed and forwarded in January, the State accepted the project in September and agreed to pay half the engineer's expenses, and on 26 December 1945 the council opened two bids, found the price too high and rejected them both. The same December 1944 meeting told the clerk to submit the cement walks needing laying, wrote to P. A. Morrison asking him to order materials to resurface and oil the side streets, and heard Mr. Insley offer a lot of lumber the town could not use because it was not cut to fit the boardwalk.
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1945 · 1945-01-23
Ocean City spent 1945 being asked for an airfield and never decided: first a letter in January, then a franchise sought in June, and by October it was Robert Cropper's project and he wanted a house moved off the town dump for it.
A letter from Clark Gardner referring to an air field was read on 23 January 1945 and the secretary instructed to write for information - the first mention of an airfield in the town's record. On 19 June three gentlemen came before the council asking their aid in securing an air port, and the council decided it wanted time to consider the project. On 26 June Edward Lynch and a second man whose name the clerk left blank asked the council to agree to give a franchise for an air field; after lengthy discussion it was agreed to have their attorney, Tommy Johnson, and the city attorney present the proper papers, and if they were in order the council would grant a permit. On 30 October Bob Cropper, before the council with a Chamber of Commerce delegation, wanted a house moved on the City dump to help in his proposed air field. Nothing in the 1945 minute book records a franchise granted.
Ocean City Chamber of CommerceThomas F. Johnson
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1945 · 1945-04-05
Maryland passed Ocean City's zoning enabling act in the 1945 session, and by 5 April the town was meeting its engineer and lawyers about 'the Zoning ordinance as passed by the Legislature'.
On 23 January 1945 Attorney Wm. Price, standing in for John S. Whaley who was sick, went over the law the City would need and was requested to prepare a bill to send to the Legislature so the enabling law could be passed. On 5 April the council held a special meeting for the purpose of meeting Clark Gardner, Engineer, and Price & Whaley 'on the Zoning ordinance as passed by the Legislature', with Gardner, Geo. Purnell, Wm. Price and John Whaley present. After much discussion on how to organise and what was required to set up the proper organisation to zone the City, it was moved and passed that Mr. Gardner order two sets of insurance maps for use in preparing the ordinance. The same meeting awarded the job of painting the town's tanks to Geo. S. Elliott for $700.00 and instructed Whaley to write up the licence ordinance passed on 20 March.
Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1945 · 1945-05-10
Ocean City's first Zoning Commission organised on 10 May 1945 with Frank Waller as president and Dr. C. W. Purnell as secretary.
The council met at 8 PM for the purpose of getting the Zoning Commission organized. Clark Gardner and Purnell were present to outline the programme, as was Attorney Wm. Price to aid in setting up the proper procedure. The members present were Harland R. Huston of Salisbury, W. A. Jarman, J. P. Whaley, Frank Waller and Dr. C. W. Purnell - the five men Mayor Trimper had been sent on 10 April to ask whether they would serve, and whom the council voted to accept on 24 April. Mr. Whaley read the law on the zoning set-up and Mr. Gardner went over the entire matter for the commission to consider, after which the commission organised by electing Frank Waller president and Dr. C. W. Purnell secretary, and set its next meeting for 24 May. It is six months to the week since the council first asked John S. Whaley to draft a zoning ordinance.
Ocean City Zoning CommissionDr. Charles Washington PurnellJohn P. Whaley
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1945 · 1945-07-10
Ocean City's reckoning of 10 July 1945 shows $6,827.29 in the bank against $21,000 of notes outstanding, after a town that had held $23,430 in cash eighteen months earlier borrowed twice in two months.
A typed statement headed 'REPORT FOR JULY TENTH 1945' lists taxes and water unpaid at $7,952.21, book account $12,718.00, bonds $20,000.00 and cash in bank $6,827.29 - $47,597.50 - plus estimated income of $9,300.00 from licences at $7,500, the comfort station at $300, the park lot at $500 and the magistrate at $1,000, for $56,897.50 in all. Against that: accounts owed of $24,657.18, being $21,000 in notes, $2,009.18 to Bob Quillin, $1,200.00 to Clark Gardner, $415.26 for parking lot material and $42.74 to the LaFrance Co.; and estimated expenses of $30,350.00, of which $20,500.00 is garbage, life guard and pay rolls to 1 October, $6,000.00 the State Roads Commission, $1,900.00 lights and power, $1,000.00 the Chamber of Commerce, $400.00 insurance, $300.00 administration and $250.00 repairs to signs. Total $55,007.18. In January 1944 the town had $23,430.94 in the bank; it borrowed $15,000 from the Bank of Ocean City in April 1945 and $6,000 on ninety days in May. The Chamber of Commerce had asked $3,500 and is budgeted $1,000.
Ocean City Chamber of CommerceAmerican LaFrance Foamite Inc.Bank of Ocean City
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1945 · 1945-09-12
Maryland accepted Ocean City's post-war water main extension in September 1945 and agreed to pay half the engineer's expenses.
On 6 September a notice from the Commission on Post War Reconstruction was read in which the project for extending water mains was accepted, and the clerk was told to forward the papers to Engineer Clark Gardner. On 12 September Gardner came with the acceptance papers to be signed, on terms under which the State would pay one half the engineer's expenses; on motion by C. O. Savage seconded by R. Dolle the council agreed to accept the terms and Gardner was told to prepare the plans. The project had begun with a $200 agreement in December 1944 and Gardner had forwarded signed plans to the commission in January 1945. It ended the year unbuilt: two bids opened on 21 December were rejected as too high on 26 December.
Cranford O. SavageRudolph Dolle
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1945 · 1945-11-20
Ocean City's first zoning ordinance ran to thirty-eight pages, was read aloud in a single afternoon, and was signed over to the council after a steak dinner at City Lunch.
The council met the Zoning Commission at 3 PM on Tuesday 20 November: Mayor Trimper with Dolle, Lynch and Savage; Frank Waller, Harland Huston, Walter Jarman, J. P. Whaley and C. W. Purnell for the commission, with Clark Gardner, Purnell, Wm. Price and John Whaley. Chairman Frank Waller called the meeting to order and Wm. Price read and commented on the 38-page document, finishing at 6:30, at which point the meeting adjourned to go to City Lunch for a steak dinner. Afterwards the members returned to the council office, had further discussion, and the document was signed by the Zoning members and turned over to the City Council. The mayor and council then arranged for a public hearing and its advertising, to be held on the afternoon of Wednesday 19 December and the morning of Saturday 22 December 1945. On 26 November the council resolved unanimously, John B. Lynch moving and R. Dolle seconding, that the report be accepted.
Ocean City Zoning CommissionJohn S. WhaleyDr. Charles Washington PurnellJohn P. WhaleyDaniel W. Trimper, Jr.
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1945 · 1945-12-26
Ocean City opened two bids for its post-war water main extension five days before the end of 1945 and threw them both out as too dear.
The council met on the evening of Friday 21 December to open bids on the water main extension, with Clark Gardner, Purnell and Messick of the engineers present, a Mr. McDermott representing George & Lynch, and two men representing a second contractor. Bids were opened from the two bidders and, after reading, held for consideration until Thursday 27 December, the certified checks with them. But on 26 December the council discussed them and decided the price was too high; on motion by John B. Lynch, seconded by R. Dolle, the bids were rejected and the certified checks returned to the bidders. The project had begun with a $200 survey agreement in December 1944 and had the State's acceptance and half its engineering paid; Ocean City entered 1946 with plans, an unadopted zoning ordinance and no water contract.
Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.
George & LynchM. J. McDermottJohn B. LynchRudolph Dolle
Source · checked 2026-08-12
1946 · 1946-05-03
On the evening of Friday 3 May 1946 Ocean City read its zoning ordinance through one last time, declared it 'as they wanted it', and fixed its passage for the following Tuesday.
The full board met with Wm. H. Price, attorney for Zoning, and the engineer. 'The entire Zoning ordinance was read over and changes in map were noted. Council agreed that the Ordinance was as they wanted it, and Attorney Price was instructed to prepare the Ordinance so it could be finally passed at next regular monthly meeting to be held on May 7th 1946.' The meeting rose at 10:30. The sequence from there is complete: the commission's report signed over 20 November 1945, public hearings 19 and 22 December 1945, the council reading and amending on 3, 4, 11 and 25 April 1946, the final read-through on 3 May, counsel's draft minute on 4 May, and passage on 7 May. This is the meeting at which the town's mayor is first written 'D. Trimper Jr.' in the 1946 book.
The engineer of the 1946 zoning map is printed CLARKE GARDNER on the map and written 'Clark Gordon' by the clerk four days earlier - almost certainly the Clark Gardner who had been Ocean City's consulting engineer since 1935.
Staton, Whaley & PriceDaniel W. Trimper, Jr.John B. LynchCranford O. SavageRudolph Dolle
Source · checked 2026-08-15
1946 · 1946-05-07
Every parcel in Ocean City got a three-part code - use, height in feet, area class - and the map, not the ordinance, is the only place that says which parcel got which.
Ordinance No. 99 sets up three independent axes: four use districts (Industrial, B, BB, Residential); two height districts, forty feet and thirty feet, and only two in the whole town; and three area districts, A, B and C, governing lot coverage, yards and density. A is the densest - 80 per cent of an interior lot, 90 per cent of a corner lot; B allows 70 and 80 per cent with a twelve-foot rear yard on a hundred-foot lot and sixty families to the acre; C allows 40 and 50 per cent, a twenty-foot rear yard and twenty-four families to the acre. So BB-40-A means BB business use, forty-foot height, A area, and the letter B means 'business' in the first position and 'area class B' in the third. The town used at least six of the twenty-four combinations the scheme permits. Par. 22 makes the map's names, numbers and letters govern the whole area inside each boundary line, puts a boundary drawn along a street or alley down its centre line, puts a boundary along navigable water at the pierhead line or mean low tide, and provides that submerged land later reclaimed takes the zoning of the upland it adjoins - so Ocean City could fill the bay without re-zoning it. The ordinance's own text never lists which blocks are which. The districts live on the map and only on the map.
Source · checked 2026-08-15
1946 · 1946-05-07
The 1946 zoning map ran from the Inlet to North 26th Street and stopped dead: everything platted beyond it was drawn, left blank and unzoned.
Read from the Inlet northward, the adopted map goes: the ocean side from the southern limit to Wicomico Street is BB-40-A, the amusement class; Wicomico Street to North First Street is B-40-A, general business with amusements absolutely prohibited; the whole bay side from the southern limit up to about North First Street is I-40-A, industrial, its ocean-side edge a line 150 feet behind Philadelphia Avenue stepping north-east behind St. Louis Avenue, with the causeway marked TO BERLIN coming ashore inside it; the ocean front from North First to North Fifteenth carries district 3 with a B-40-A block interrupting it between North Eighth and North Tenth; a heavy line runs bay to ocean down North Fifteenth Street and everything north of it to about North Twenty-Second is R-30-B, residential, the height limit dropping from forty feet to thirty; North Twenty-Second to North Twenty-Sixth is BB-30-B, the town's other amusement-capable district; and a heavy line down North Twenty-Sixth Street ends the zoned town. The blocks of North Twenty-Seventh Street and northward are platted on the sheet and left entirely blank, unhatched and unnumbered. The scale is one inch to four hundred feet and the sheet is signed in ink over the print by John B. Lynch as President of the City Council, Rudolph Dolle and Crawford O. Savage as councilmen, and attested by Dolle as Secretary.
John B. LynchRudolph DolleCranford O. Savage
Source · checked 2026-08-15
1946 · 1946-10-22
With the council a man short since August, a townsman wrote in asking to be appointed - and the minutes record no answer.
'Letter from Talbot Bunting asking to be appointed as a member of City Council was read.' No action is recorded, and the seat John B. Lynch resigned on 27 August was still vacant at the last meeting of the year on 26 November. Bunting was one of the party-boat dock owners the council had summoned in March to explain their charges to boatmen, and in December 1944 he had come before an earlier council with Frank Sacca in the interest of advertising Ocean City by radio. The same 22 October meeting read letters from the Public Service Commission about a bus permit, from Arthur Harris on the Inlet, and from Clarke Gardner on bonds for water extensions, and told Bert Cropper to go ahead towards a unified grade for the streets of the entire City.
Public Service Commission of MarylandJohn B. LynchG. Bertrand Cropper
Source · checked 2026-08-15
1946 · 1946-11-15
Ocean City contracted for two artesian wells at its north end in November 1946 and was taking advice on bonds to pay for extending its water mains.
'Letter from Shannahan Artesian Well Co. Inc. with proposal for driving two wells at [the] North End was read, and on motion by R. Dolle, seconded by Savage, contract was awarded to Shannahan for the work.' No price is entered. Three weeks earlier the clerk had read a letter from Clarke Gardner on bonds for water extensions - the same engineer who drew the zoning map, and the same man who had carried the town's post-war water main extension through 1945 until the council rejected both bids five days before Christmas as too dear. The 1946 answer is not to let the contract but to drill at the north end and think about borrowing. The same meeting had Councilman Savage ask the town to look into making places where the fire trucks could get water from the Bay, and what that would cost.
Shannahan Artesian Well Co. Inc.Rudolph DolleCranford O. Savage
Source · checked 2026-08-15