History

Gladys Jackson

Named with Willie Ludlam to the Red Cross department of the Ocean City home defence council on 11 December 1941 — one of the twenty-two people the town put on its war footing four days after Pearl Harbor, and one of two women named in the 1941 minute book in an organisational capacity. Two other Jacksons were named the same evening: Chas. J. Jackson to Communication and Bob Jackson as an Air Warden. Whether any of them was Black is an open question the campaign has not answered; Ocean City's Black community had a Jackson Mission in 1939, and the town's minute book has never once identified a resident by race. — 1942 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11: bio: …Whether any of them was Black is an open question the campaign has not answered; Ocean City's Black community had a Jackson Mission in 1939, and the town's minute book has never once identified a resident by race. → …All sixty-two manuscript sheets of the 1940 federal census for Ocean City and West Ocean City have now been read, and every one of the six Jackson households enumerated in them — Alexander Jackson's on Atlantic Avenue, Charles T. Jackson's, Charles Jackson's, John T. Jackson, Lawrence Jackson's and William Jackson's — is entered in the race column as W. No Jackson anywhere in either enumeration district is entered as Neg. That does not by itself identify the three people on the December 1941 roster, and Gladys Jackson herself has not been found in the census; but it makes it very unlikely that the Jacksons of Ocean City's home defence council were Black, and the campaign should stop treating that as an open possibility. — The 1941 pass left the race of the three home-defence Jacksons open and named it the highest-value question on the black-ocean-city thread. The instrument for answering it — the 1940 census manuscript schedules — was already on disk with 55 of 61 sheets unread. All 62 sheets have now been read and the answer is a clean negative.

In the record (2)

  1. 1941 · 1941-12-11

    Measured negative for a second consecutive year: no person in Ocean City's 1941 council minutes is identified as Black, and no Black institution is named — but three Jacksons hold posts on the town's home defence council, and nobody has established who they were.

    All eighteen page images of all seventeen documents filed by the Mayor and City Council of Ocean City for 1941 and the first meeting of 1942 were read for any reference to a Black applicant, resident, business or institution. There is none by name or description. Charles C. Richards, refused a permit for a Colored Recreation Hall on 22 November 1938, does not appear, in a third consecutive year of looking. The colored dance hall of South Ocean City does not appear. The Henry Hotel does not appear. The Jackson Mission, which took the last permit of 1939 to raise its building twenty-four feet, does not appear. The 1940 census names — Wade Morgan, Stella Bowen — do not appear. What 1941 adds is a question rather than an absence. When the council named the eleven departments of its home defence council on 11 December, three of the twenty-two people it named were Jacksons: Gladys Jackson to the Red Cross, Chas. J. Jackson to Communication, and Bob Jackson as one of the two Air Wardens. A Chas. T. Jackson also stands on the clerk's March list of property owners notified of a building hearing. Ocean City's Black community had a Jackson Mission in 1939 and the 1940 pass noted that the only Jackson in that year's minute book was a man refused leave to put a windmill east of the Boardwalk, of whom the clerk recorded nothing but the surname. Whether the Jacksons of the 1941 defence roster are Black is NOT established by any document read this year, and the campaign should not guess in either direction — but it is now the single highest-value open question on this thread, because if they are, then a town whose minute book has never once named a Black resident put three of them on its war footing in one evening. — 1942 FULL PASS, 2026-08-11 [corrected]: The open question this fact exists to pose is now answered, and the answer is negative. All 62 manuscript sheets of the 1940 census for enumeration districts 24-22, 24-23, 24-24 and 24-25 have been read (the 1941 pass had 6 of 62). Six Jackson households appear across Ocean City and West Ocean City and EVERY ONE is entered in the race column as W: Alexander Jackson, 60, a lawyer of Atlantic Avenue, with his sons Lee, 25, and Robert, 26; Charles T. Jackson, 72, with his wife Mabel; Charles Jackson, 33; John T. Jackson, 85, living as a grandfather in another man's household; Lawrence Jackson, 50, a farm hand of West Ocean City, with his wife Clothilda and three sons; and William Jackson, 39, a pound fisherman of West Ocean City, with his wife Bertha and two sons. No Jackson in either district is entered Neg. The measured negative about the minutes stands unchanged and so does the value of the roster; what changes is that the campaign should stop carrying 'the three Jacksons might have been Black' as a live possibility. Two further gains: a Robert Jackson of 26 living on Atlantic Avenue is the likely 'Bob Jackson' made Air Warden, and Charles T. Jackson is now a distinct man from Chas. J. Jackson and is found again in 1942 as a judge of the town's election.

    Ocean City Home Defense Council

    Source · checked 2026-08-11

  2. 1941 · 1941-12-11

    Four days after Pearl Harbor and on the day Germany declared war, the Ocean City council sat down and organised a home defence council — eleven departments, twenty-two names, and a Department of Evacuation.

    The 1940 minute book does not mention the war once, in the year of the fall of France. The 1941 book does not mention it either — until 11 December. The council met at 7:15 on Thursday evening with Mayor C. P. Cropper and Councilmen Harold Rayne and Raymond Bounds, granted a building permit to Chas. S. Powell for a two-apartment dwelling on the alley between 11th and 12th Streets, let the English Diner move to a site next to the Post Office on Dr. Chas. W. Purnell's ground, and resolved to borrow from the Bank of Ocean City to meet bonds and coupons due 1 January. Then: 'Mr. S. Earl Tromley, John I. Timmons and Miss Lena Riggin were present to help in organizeing home defence council and the following were selected to head the orginization.' Those three were not helpful neighbours. As the Worcester Democrat printed a week later, they were the entire executive of the Worcester County Council of Defense — Tromley its Executive Director, Timmons its Chief Air Raid Warden, and Miss Lena H. Riggin its Executive Secretary, all three of Snow Hill — going town to town. They were carrying an order. The same paper prints the telegram that sent them: 'Supplementing my telegram December 10, immediate arrangements must be made to hold blackouts just as quickly as possible. No delay in this matter, as conditions are very serious. Let me know when ready. Col. Henry Barrett, Director of air raid Precaution Service for Maryland.' The roster Ocean City adopted that night, verbatim from the minute: John B. Lynch, Commander. Harold Rayne and L. B. Cropper, Dept. of Public Safety. J. M. Mumford and Robert Allen, Dept. of Public Works. Dr. F. J. Townsend and Guy R. P. Dennis, Dept. Public Health. Archie Davis and Morris Peacock, Dept. Fire Protection. D. Trimper Sr. and Denard Baker, Dept. Transporation. Arthur Davis and Preston Laws, Dept. Gen. Supplies. Rev. Dewees and F. W. Truitt, Dept. Evacuation. Willie Ludlam and Gladys Jackson, Red Cross. E. M. Scott and Chas. J. Jackson, Communication. Bob Jackson and Wm. H. Purnell, Air Wardens. The council adjourned at eleven. Pocomoke City's mayor and council met specially the same Thursday evening and resolved to organise a Civilian Defense Corps of their own, and Pocomoke's published department list — Public Safety, Evacuation, Transportation, Communications, Public Works, Fire Protection, General Supply, Public Health — is the same scheme under the same headings. So the eleven departments were a template handed down, not a local invention; what Ocean City supplied was twenty-two names, and the names are the whole value of the document. By 18 December the county could report that Home Defense Corps in Snow Hill, Pocomoke City, Berlin and Ocean City were 'now complete in every detail', and Mayor Clifford P. Cropper sat on the county council himself.

    Ocean City Home Defense CouncilWorcester County Council of DefenseBank of Ocean CityClifford P. CropperHarold J. RayneE. Raymond BoundsJohn B. LynchS. Earl TromleyMiss Lena H. RigginMorris PeacockWillie LudlamFrancis J. TownsendArchie DavisL. B. CropperRobert AllenJ. M. MumfordDaniel Trimper, Sr.W. Preston LawsF. W. TruittEdward M. ScottWilliam H. Purnell

    Source · checked 2026-08-11