For years, decoy collectors, recreational boaters and curiosity-shop browsers have found a haven in Havre de Grace, Harford County's little city by the bay.
Here, where the Susquehanna River meets the Chesapeake Bay, day-trippers can park their cars and stroll the town end to end. When they tire of downtown antiques stores, impressive Victorian mansions and restaurants, they can head to the town's southern tip and take in serene vistas of the bay or the river.
But even as residents and city officials look to capitalize on the town's quaintness, they must decide how to handle growth.
"We're at this kind of juncture where we have to make this decision," Mayor Gunther Hirsch said.
Can the city balance large-scale projects on its outskirts -- a 40,000-seat automobile racetrack is proposed for just outside the city -- with the small-scale charm that attracts visitors? Or will development someday overwhelm the qualities residents hold dear?
The town's population is rising. After growing by fewer than 200 people between 1980 and 1990, it rose by nearly 1,500 from 8,952 in 1990 to 10,400 last year -- an increase of 16 percent, according to city officials.
The new residents are moving into developments around town. Pastel condominiums and three-story townhouses have sprung up at the end of lanes that used to dead-end at the T Susquehanna.
They're selling for anywhere from $89,000 for a condominium to almost $300,000 for a townhouse; all have a dock instead of a back yard. On the outskirts of town, single-family houses and townhouses fill a hillside that was farmland only five years ago. The average cost of a single-family house with a bay view: $150,000; townhouses sell for less than $90,000. When completed, the latest development will have 300 detached houses and almost 250 townhouses and condominiums.
Such developments have been turning areas closer to the Baltimore Beltway into anonymous edge cities for years. But Havre de Grace, 25 miles outside the Beltway and 15 miles from the Bel Air-boom area, is still detached enough from suburban sprawl to retain a small-town heart.
"It's one of the few places in Maryland on the waterfront that's an organic town" -- not a development, Dr. Hirsch said. "It's not one of those newer towns where you always have to jump in your car to go from A to B. In this town you can still walk."
And some who come to stroll like it so much they want to stay.
"People come in to town, not knowing what's here and say, 'God, I love this town. What are house prices here?'" said Shirley Stalder, a Century 21 Realtor. She said property values have risen about 25 percent in five years as avid boaters, families wanting to escape the city and couples juggling far-flung commutes discover Havre de Grace.
For Toun Oluwole and her husband, Ladi, price was the determining factor when they came to Havre de Grace last year. They moved with their three children to a four-bedroom house in Grace Harbour, the sprawling development on the hill above town.
"We were looking for something very nice and not too expensive," said Mrs. Oluwole, a registered nurse at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She said prices in Havre de Grace were about $30,000 less than in Bel Air, and even more affordable than in North Carolina, where they used to live.
Mrs. Oluwole is happy in Havre de Grace. "I love it," she said. "It is very nice. The waterside and everything -- very peaceful."
But the proposed motor sports park could disrupt that peace, opponents of the project say.
D. Richard Rothman, president of Timonium-based Suburban Homes, thinks a 550-acre site off U.S. 40 is the perfect spot for a racetrack that would draw as many as 40,000 fans per event from the mid-Atlantic region. The city must decide whether to annex the land and provide the zoning needed for the track.
"Havre de Grace is basically midway between Baltimore and Philadelphia," he said. "It's in the middle of everything."
Built on the former Blenheim Farm, the park would feature vintage, Indianapolis-style and stock car races, and concerts and festivals.
Those aren't the kinds of activities Havre de Grace should be known for, said Ruth Hendricksen, co-chairwoman of Citizens Against Racetrack.
"It's just going to change the whole nature of the town," she said. Noise and traffic on race days would be a nuisance to residents and could drive away tourists looking for "the quiet day at the bay," she said.
But such concerns are "imaginary," according to Mr. Rothman. He said traffic on the 17 days of racing would be less than the average flow to Aberdeen Proving Ground, the military base about five miles south of the city, where about 14,000 people work. Mr. Rothman said races and other attractions at the park would funnel patrons to the city's downtown shops and restaurants.
It wouldn't be the first time that racing fans have flocked to the city.
With its grandstand overlooking Chesapeake Bay, the Havre de Grace Racetrack brought horses and spectators here during the first decades of this century. The land is now occupied by the Maryland Army National Guard.
Havre de Grace narrowly missed becoming the nation's capital in 1789. Now the city calls itself "The Decoy Capital of the World," a designation that stems from the duck hunting that once thrived here. The hunting declined, but the art of carving decoys still flourishes.
The town's history has always been influenced by it's strategic waterfront location.
The settlement on the Susquehanna was little more than a stop on the road north in 1695 when a state-sanctioned ferry began operating in 1695.
"Nobody would dwell here except they couldn't get across" the river, said local historian Ellsworth B. Shank.
But the town grew. Herring and ice harvesting on the river, and corn and tomato canning in town employed hundreds beginning in the 1800s.
The opening of the Susquehanna and Tidewater Canal in 1839 turned Havre de Grace into a bustling commercial center as steamboats from Baltimore and barges carrying Harford County lumber, flint and grain passed through the outlet lock here.
Extending from Havre de Grace along the Susquehanna River to Wrightsville, Pa., about 40 miles upstream, the canal was damaged by floods and closed in 1900.
The city's water-related history is the focus of a proposed museum to be built next to the landmark Concord Point Lighthouse. A local group is trying to raise $1 million to build a maritime museum that would chronicle the settlement of the area, the burning of much of the town by the British during the War of 1812, and the city's water-related history since then.
Thomas McFalls, project manager for the fund-raising campaign by the Lower Susquehanna-Upper Chesapeake Alliance, said the state has approved $400,000 for the museum, which is contingent upon the alliance raising another $400,000. The group has raised $200,000, according to Mr. McFalls.
City officials hope a walkway that connects Millard E. Tydings Memorial Park at the southern tip of the city with the Lockhouse Museum at the northern end also will enhance the waterfront area.
A wood and concrete walkway with an observation deck already allows visitors to skirt the water's edge from the park to the lighthouse. The 2,400-foot Promenade attracts bird feeders, bird watchers and just plain walkers.
"Without actually going out on the water we can be right there," said the Rev. Paul Schmidt, 35, of Bel Air. The assistant pastor of St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Bel Air was taking a leisurely walk recently with his parents, Ron and Joyce Schmidt of Illinois.
"Whenever I come back to Maryland, I always come down here," said Mrs. Schmidt, 59, who was born and grew up in Havre de Grace.
But the spot wasn't always so nice. Thomas and Nancy Mooney of Parkville remember when the point was still an impenetrable thicket of trees and bushes. The couple, ages 72 and 69, respectively, discovered Havre de Grace on one of their excursions "off the main stream" about 10 years ago.
"It's just a delightful place, picturesque," Mrs. Mooney said.
Some business owners hope to bring a similar transformation to the city's historic downtown. In the once-thriving commercial area centered on Washington and St. John streets, gray street lamps bend high above the street; store signs cover forgotten gingerbread detailing; and the few restored brick buildings dating as far back as 1787 seem lost among simple concrete edifices from more recent decades. One or two storefronts sit vacant on each block along with stalwarts that survived the disappearence of canning and shipping industries and the growth of modern shopping centers.
Joseph's Department Store on Washington Street has survived 58 years in the same location. Joseph's son, Eli Silverstein, said competitive prices and a Levi's department that features more than 2,000 pairs of men's jeans keep customers coming back to the no-frills store.
But Mr. Silverstein would like to see vacant storefronts filled and shoppers return from the malls. He wants to enlist the Merchants Guild in an effort to give the streets a nostalgic face lift with "old-time, turn-of-the-century lighting fixtures" and other decorative touches.
"Everybody that comes to Havre de Grace says, 'What a charming city,' " he said. "What we want to do is make it more charming."
About the name
Legend has it that, in 1782, the Marquis de Lafayette, hero of the American and French revolutions, gave the town the name Havre de Grace, French for harbor of grace, because it reminded him of Le Havre in Normandy, France. Maryland historian Ellsworth B. Shank believes a lesser-known French officer is responsible for the name. But forget your French accent if you want to pronounce Havre de Grace correctly. It's "Haver dee Grayce" or "Haver dee Grass," not "Havre de Grahs."