If you’re out and about near Chestertown Business Park via Lynchburg Street, you may notice a new memorial marker in the form of a stone with an affixed metal plaque on it. The placement of this marker commemorates the passing of 70 years since the morning of July 16, 1954, when an event that literally shook Chestertown to its core took place.
While it was a long-time coming, says Joan Horsey, a member with the Cadwalader Chapter of the Kent County Questers, a local interest group that strives to keep history alive by supporting preservation, restoration, and education, it is more than well-deserved.
“No one has ever done anything to remember this, and it’s probably one of the worst things that has ever happened in the town of Chestertown,” says Horsey, a member of the marker committee.
And however common a stone may be as a marker, it serves as a worthy metaphor for the strength, the resiliency, and the common bond created among the people affected by the events of that day; those who were lost, and those who helped the injured and went on to recall the depth of the tragedy for the historical record.
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It was the heart of the Cold War era and like many small towns across America in 1954, Chestertown was soldiering along economically doing its part to create a safe and strong community for its residents and for posterity. A large part of that effort was being done at the Kent Manufacturing Company, a factory compound that initially came to local prominence in 1941 by generating munitions’ detonators during World War II.
When the war effort began winding down, however, workers were concerned about their loss of income as were the town leaders in regard to the progress that had been made locally after years of economic atrophy. A decision was then made to shift the manufacture of what was being produced at the plant from detonators to fireworks, M-80s, to be exact, which were an important component in training our U.S. troops for combat.
And for a while that decision seemed justified; until that humid morning in July of 1954.
By all accounts, it started out as an otherwise unremarkable sunny Friday, but then at 10:25 a.m., what local news sources described as ‘a mighty boom’, shook the town. But this would be the mere first shot over the bow, as a series of three subsequent explosions followed in staggered, but ferocious succession.
Local, first-hand accounts of what happened that day provided by Kent County’s Bordley History Center reveal tales of a shell-shocked yet valiant and resilient citizenry, ready to assist wherever they could.
The blasts, at first, compelled some residents to seek cover across the Chester River Bridge, but many ended up coming back to lend a hand, as workers who had the opportunity to flee the explosion where found, some stumbling and bloody, along the town’s thoroughfares. Other residents boldly outsmarted roadblocks to try and find loved ones they knew were working in the plant that day.
The local hospital quickly became filled to compacity, and a make-shift triage unit was stationed on the hospital lawn. Everyone of able body assisted those less fortunate.
It was reading the records of these accounts and that of other reliable sources, that intrigued local author, Erika Quesenbery-Sturgill to make the manufacturing plant explosion the topic of her talk at an assembly of the Kent County Questers last summer.
Quesenbery-Sturgill, a former director of economic development for the city of Havre de Grace and a marketing and communications professional, says she had become interested in learning more about the explosion some years ago when she had the opportunity to work with the Historical Society of Kent County.
“That’s when I first really got involved in the study of the Chestertown explosion, just being able to access information there, which [the Historical Society is] an absolute treasure chest of local history,” says Quesenbery-Sturgill.
After uncovering so much information, she says, she felt compelled to write a book about it, which is currently in the final stages of completion.
To truly understand the enormity of what residents experienced that day, Quesenbery-Sturgill, feels it’s important to remember the contextual aspects of its time and place.
“We have to remember when we’re looking at that period, just after World War II and that Cold War period, the location that we are in, Dover Air Force Base, Aberdeen Proving Grounds at the time, the Bainbridge Naval Training Center, and the munitions plants that were located all along the area…” she says, were ever-present reminders of the greater threats that existed, and the importance of being ready to meet them.
Women, who started their careers at the plant during the war, made up 80 percent of its workforce, she says, and they were aware of the danger that working there presented. Yet they persevered. They wanted the autonomy that working and earning a paycheck provided them, and they felt a sense of security in their fellow co-workers that they knew how to do things safely and did so for the common good. (Ten of the 11 workers who lost their lives to the blasts were women.)
Tested and resolved, they were used to the smaller events that happened on occasion, but this was something in the “worst-case scenario” category.
The blast would not only exact its toll in lives and livelihoods lost, but its tangible impacts also resulted in significant damage to local homes and businesses, with nearly every piece of glass storefront in the town shattered. Again, with the townspeople unified, they rallied to help set things right and restored a semblance of order in much less time than was anticipated.
The blast’s cause, says Quesenbery-Sturgill, was never formally defined or attributed, but she outlined a plausible theory.
“It was almost as if there was a spark, she explains. “It caused a fire in a drying tunnel, and then that sent fire down the tunnel and went to other explosive elements and caused an explosion. And the natural question is, well, what caused the spark? And the closest I could get to finding a printed response within any of the primary source documents of the period were basically saying, ‘There will never be another munitions plant built in Chestertown or Kent County again.’”
A unified protest in the aftermath of the tragedy would result in that definitive decision, as the town moved away from manufacturing that category of explosives for the foreseeable future.
“So, it was kind of like, well, since we’re not going to have one, we don’t need to look any further,” she adds.
For some residents, however, the loss of the plant as an employer remained unthinkable, and resulted in some plucky, if not ironic, responses.
Primarily, upon learning there was another such factory manufacturing munitions in Elkton, a subsect on the citizenry sought jobs there, and even pressed for local bus service to get them there, which was arranged.
This, Quesenbery-Sturgill adds, is part of some of the newer information she was able gather on the matter.
“I found an article … I want to say it was [written] in, I think November or October of 1954 where 35 of the survivors from the plant blast took jobs up in Elkton and started riding a bus to get to Elkton to work there. At that time, it was called the New Jersey Fireworks Company in Elkton. And I was just like, ‘Are you kidding me?’”
Above and beyond the greater tragedy she says the Chestertown explosion was a commentary on the bonds of the townspeople and their resolve to want to make things better, and to be part of something bigger than themselves even if that meant putting their lives at risk to do so. That Greatest Generation sentiment of all for one and one for all is remarkable and serves as a prescient reminder for those who follow.
“But when it comes down to it, the real story is about the people, the faces, the names, how it impacted them, what they did, how they survived it, how some of them did not survive it. But it was about this being a part of our lives and how we overcame.”
For further historical reference, visit The Historical Society of Kent County’s Bordley History Center at 301 High Street in Chestertown. Quesenbery-Sturgill’s book, Working to Preserve Freedom When Suddenly Taken: The Great Chestertown Explosion of July 16th, is anticipated to be published in March of 2025 by Author’s Heaven Publishing.
Lisa Gotto is a recent resident to Chestertown, who is greatly enjoying learning more about the area, its people, and what makes living here so special. She hopes to continue doing that through her work with the Spy and her role as owner of Tea Leaves Media, LLC, a communications and content generation company. Since acquiring her B.A. In Communications & Journalism from Shippensburg University of PA, Lisa has been writing and editing for decades for numerous media outlets including The Morning Call and Lehigh Valley Style in Easton, Pennsylvania, and What’s Up? Media in Annapolis.