One of the many spots we liked to go fishing was Gunpowder Falls at Jones Road. After winding down the thin narrow country lane that I’ve always been fond of because its name is my own, you come to a crossroads with a railroad track where you have to tap your brakes before looking both directions down the long, straight rail line, and then rattle over it to park in the gravel clearing a few seconds down the road across from an abandoned junkyard. You know you’ve gone too far when you see rusted Oldsmobiles swallowed halfway into dilapidated sheds and tires stacked up like towering Oreo cookies.

We would usually grab our rods and head down the narrow trail leading out of the parking area into the dense forest. The sky would turn bright green as the sun shone through the ceiling of leaves, shading the path below, interrupted only by the occasional strand of sun that warmed your skin and made your eyes blink away the light spots momentarily transferred to every glance. We’d stroll side by side through the meandering trail, sometimes splitting up different places where the trail branched off to see who could find the best shortcut. Even if the trail was shorter, however, it was usually so narrow and overgrown with thorns that it took twice as long to navigate through it without tripping or being pricked. We always met up where the trail met the riverbank and where the giant graffiti-ed concrete arches of the railroad bridge loomed into the sky high above the highest treetops in the forest. We’d pass under the cool, shady bridge and continue on along the sandy river bank, climb over some big rock formations and finally throw our lines into a deep pool where the rushing river gathered and poured over rocks into a waterfall I used to let my feet swirl in the water until we caught a long, writhing eel and decided I’d keep my toes dry.

But this time was different than the others. After Christian’s truck bounced into the gravel lot and hummed to silence as he turned the ignition and clipped his key ring onto the front loophole of his faded blue jeans, he handed me my rod out of the truck bed, littered with half-full boiling sweet tea bottles and random articles of muddied-up clothing, and suggested we walk along the railroad tracks this time. It might take a little longer, but it was a straight shot and a clear pathway. Fascinated by the heavy locomotives of bygone eras, I obliged, hoping I might even see some antique-hued box cars chugging down the track.

We left the truck behind, walking back out onto Jones road, my eyes wandering to see what could be salvageable at the junkyard across the street as discarded materials slowly sunk into their shallow graves. The skeletal frame of a seventies Bronco had potential. We continued down the road and turned left onto where the train tracks intersected with the road. The view ahead showed a narrow strip of glistening white and grey gravel stretching as far as I could see, surrounded without interruption by dense green foliage hanging, rustling, and sprouting from endless trunks, branches, vines, and bushes. Dividing the stone route were evenly lined wooden planks spaced about six inches apart, pinched by the weight of two thick parallel steel lines that reached across every plank, with endless railroad spikes holding the wood and steel together.

With each step I felt the pointed edges of the stones jut bluntly into my heels through the worn-thin rubber soles of my leather flip-flops I refused to throw away. I watched Christian trudge ahead in his sturdy, spackle-splattered leather work boots. I hopped up onto one of the steel lines and took cautious steps, placing one foot directly in front of the other with arms reaching out in the sunshine like a gliding tern. I pretended to walk the thin iron as Christian does daily at work, though I was only a footstep off the ground and not a multi-story fall. My ballerina tip-toeing on the shiny, worn, metal slowed my pace and I watched Christian hiking happily down the line from a distance , a thin cloud of dust and stone flecks vanishing behind his boots as they raised from their heavy steps and kept on moving. With his work boots, tattered jeans, and driver’s cap, he looked like a young man walking out of the depression era, making some money walking the lines, looking for hazards and hammering in loose railroad spikes. But now the spikes were a gravely rust-eaten brown, some bent and cast off to the edges of the stone pathway, soon to be lost under the jungle of tall grass lining the forest. 

Over a century ago, in this same midsummer month, Major Gilmor of the Confederate cavalry detachment moved north unnoticed through Baltimore County into Harford County. The soldiers stopped at the General Store in Jerusalem Mill, a site less than a mile from where we jump off the Vinegar Hill bridge. There they looted supplies and captured horses, pushing on to arrive the morning of July 11 at the Gunpowder River Bridge, which belonged to the Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore Railroad. For this day they planned what would come to be regarded as one of the most daring raids ever attempted by detached cavalry on either side of the war.

I waited for Christian to turn around and notice my balancing skills before I leapt off the steel back onto the stone gravel and pranced forward, catching up to him. Since I turned on the tracks, the horizon had morphed from a blurry line of gray-green into a clear view of the tracks continuing onto the long bridge ahead, the one we usually pass under to get to our fishing spot. The tracks continued straight on, but the treetops lining its edges were replaced by blue sky. As we approached the bridge, I crossed over the tracks onto the right side, the direction of the path to the fishing hole. A few stones overflowed the edge of the gravel path onto the steep hill that sloped downward from the track. While surveying for poison ivy and patches of thorns, I looked for thick, surfaced roots to hold and rocks where we could step on the way down I looked up to see where Christian thought we should climb down to the shoreline, but he wasn’t beside me.

I spun around and caught half of him out of the corner of my eye, then focused on the bridge in time to watch his mischievous grin sink beneath the rusting frame. Rolling my eyes for only the sun to see, I laughed and ran to his rabbit hole to find his fingertips still wrapped around the edges of the beam’s surface. Looking between the gaps of metal beams I saw his blue eyes staring up at me from below my cautious feet.

“I gotta’ find a better place to climb down,” he reasoned, as if that had been the purpose of our trip all along, looking around at the surrounding beams, all intersecting in gigantic X’s. I couldn’t help but giggle at his large body, contorted awkwardly against rusty joints, one boot reaching for a sturdy surface, one holding his weight, as he eyed the bridge for climbable structures; the results of his persistent inner-child teaming up with his recent affinity for ironworking. If you don’t know what ironwork is, imagine those famous black and white photographs of men sitting on a long steel beam, with the New York skyline in the background as they took a break to eat their sandwiches and smoke their cigarettes—those are the original ironworkers, the cowboys of the sky, a title Christian is more than proud of. I watched him heave himself out between the beams and dust himself off.

“C’mon, let’s walk over to the other side,” he said excitedly.

“Wait, what if a train comes while we’re walking across? I am not going to be caught standing on the side of that bridge with a freight train rolling by!”

“Eh, we’d have room. If you just stood still you’d be far enough away,” he reasoned in his ‘everything will be fine, don’t worry about things so much’ tone.

I leaned down and rested my ear on the sun-baked steel track, its shiny steel surface polished with each caboose that rolled past. At first I just heard a ringing, like the sound of nothingness reverberating in my ear, then a louder ringing and high pitched hiss whirred through the metal into my ear. I looked up to say “I think we should wait,” but was interrupted by a distant hoot of a not-yet-visible train. I gave Christian a look that said I told him so before dashing nervously to the edge of the gravel, as far from the tracks as possible without falling down the steep hill on the right. He walked calmly to my side and we both watched anxiously for a charcoal black engine to round the bend before the bridge.

I heard another high-pitched whistle, only this time loud and close enough to reverberate down into the river gully and back against the steel bridge, and watched the long train chugging briskly down the tracks in our direction. It rattled over the old bridge and the static noise of engine and wind flooded my ears as I watched with dizzying awe the tall, rusted boxcars whoosh by me, merely feet away. Dusty maroon, chalk white, cornfield yellow, denim blue, with thin glimpses of rustling trees and sunlight in between. My breath was taken away by the gusts of air pushed against my squinting face, like I was sticking my head out of the passenger window of Christian’s truck. The tracks rattled as the heavy locomotive kept rolling down the line, spanning far towards where we had come from, and still snaking around the bend where the engine car first emerged. I began to wonder just how long a train could be when the south end of the track was quickly revealed, the last car carried quickly over the bridge, opening the curtain to a once more empty, tranquil track over the river and beyond as the train whistled on its journey north.

But the train never made it north on July 11th, 1864. When the confederate cavalry approached the bridge, it was not empty, as I had witnessed it. Defending the bridge at both ends were seventy troops from the 159th Ohio Infantry. Gilmor’s troops captured two trains, evacuated the passengers, seized the supplies on the train, and set fire to one of the trains before backing it over and partially destroying the trestle bridge. The telegraph communications lines were also cut along the bridge. Among the passengers captured on the northbound train was Union Major General William B. Franklin, who was taken as a prisoner of war back to Virginia.

“Pretty cool, huh?” Christian turned to me and asked, his voice muffled by the static of the train still chugging between my ears. I felt the warmth of the sun lying lazily on my shoulders and thighs, chilled by the shade of the boxcars and the brisk breeze.

“Yeah,” I answered with utmost honesty and eyebrows raised high above my cheek-reaching smile. Standing next to thousands of tons of hauling metal was the kind of experience that would get the blood pulsing a little in anyone, and I liked the idea that this particular feeling may soon become antiquated as the years race on and leave slowly chugging boxcars to rust beside other remnants from a slower-paced past.

“Well, now that a train just passed, this is the safest time to cross. There’s usually only about one each hour,” Christian reasoned convincingly.

“Alright,” I agreed, my heart beating faster as I followed him, walking over thin metal grating, watching my steps carefully, looking at the green-blue river between my footsteps. I imagined the train that had been speeding over the bridge moments ago, and the rusted metal brackets on the cars that would have been inches from my face or closer if I had been standing there a minute earlier.

The late afternoon sun reflected brightly off the river, sparkling golden dimples reaching off the warbling surface to my brown eyes, encouraging me to walk a little faster to reach some shade where the rays could no longer reach the track at the other end of the bridge and I didn’t have to look down at the river with each step. Christian stood at the end of the bridge performing a cursory investigation of the spot he had pointed to earlier from across the bridge. “You gonna’ come down with me?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I want to see you do it first” I replied, quiet and cautious, hoping he wouldn’t have much luck and I wouldn’t have to decide whether or not to crawl down from relative safety into a tall, rusty railroad bridge spanning over shallow water.

He kneeled down and, grasping the beam that attached the bridge to the grounded tracks, he lowered himself down under the ledge into the tight, dark crevice where the old stone wall adjoined the bridge to the side of the cliff. I peered through the crack to watch him climb down to the base of the wall where a two-foot strip of gravel stones extended to a long fall into the river below.

He looked around and then I heard echo up from below, “Your turn!”

I was scared. If a train came when I was halfway lowered I’d surely both panic and lose my little head. “I don’t know if I can climb down there,” I hesitated.

“Sure you can. I’ll help you.” Knowing I may never have the chance again, I bent my knees and lowered one foot down, reaching blindly with pointed toes to find a spot to place my foot. Knowing Christian was about seven inches taller than I am, I realized the edge to rest my foot on was probably further down than I could reach. I had to drop down beyond where I’d have the strength to hold on and hope that my foot would catch me. I lowered quickly and Christian guided my foot to the edge of the stone. Now halfway down the wall, I grasped a rusty beam with one hand and an edge on the stone wall with the other, noticing the dampness of the stones and the bright green moss sprouting out of cracks and smelling the algae slime slicked across much of its cool surface. My heart pounded as I climbed awkwardly down the tight, shadowy crevice, my weak muscles burning and my mind trying to ignore the few spiders I saw resting menacingly around me. Christian helped me down to the gravel at the bottom and his light eyes lit up when I stood next to him and together we looked at the scene before us.

The dark beams arched high over us and we stood small, vulnerable in the cool, shadowy cathedral.  I lowered my knees and kept close to the wall, my warm hands, tingly from climbing with a tight grip, grazing the cool white and gray stones. I watched Christian’s backside as he ventured over to the thick beam attached to the concrete ledge where I sat. His scuffed boots positioned themselves straight on the long rectangle and followed one after the other as he walked across the open air, a silhouette against the blue sky and peering sunshine. With work boots, cautious footing, and a serious expression he looked more like a man than his usual Huckleberry Finn self. He made it to the first vertical beam where he could hold on while he sat down, straddling the horizontal beam with boots swinging back and forth, pedaling the air lazily, looking like an overgrown child once more. He leaned back against the tall vertical beam and folded his hands in his lap as he rested his eyes from the sun pouring over his face, just right of the invisible line where the bridge’s shadow began, and the warm, rust colored steel appeared dark brown.

I placed one of the stones into my palm and tossed it gently below to watch it splash with a plink. The almost-still, blue-green surface rippled and I watched, with squinted eyes, the sun rays reflect off the water and dance in waves on the cool steel, between the dark semi-circles that were my thick eyelashes in the foreground of my vision. After a few peaceful minutes, Christian rose and began maneuvering himself to walk one of the many thin crossbeams that spanned the distance between the two long horizontal beams. The steel was only about four inches wide; he could look down without seeing it under his boot. I nervously watched him mount the thin rail and steady himself with bird-wing arms until he slowly reached the wide horizontal beam on the other side.

I decided to leave my nest on the gravel, and walk carefully to the first beam Christian had walked across. The rectangle did not have a flat top; instead it was a continuous X pattern of small welded metal strips, with a hollow center. I climbed low, gripping the Xs with my hand and scaling them with my feet pressed against them. I quickly made it to the first vertical bracket and placed my thin legs in two spaces between the Xs and sat down on top. It seemed secure enough. I looked to my side at the view from above the river with nothing but the breeze in front of me. Christian smiled at me from across the bridge, proud that I had actually made it out onto the bridge without his coaching. We sat there, just the two of us, in the shadows, watching the river meander below as a lone heron stood like a statue on the bank downriver in a sunny cloud of gnats.

“Lisa,” Christian yelled in a serious tone, “You might wanna’ get back to the ledge.”

“Why?” I asked, confused, just as I noticed it. I could feel it coming from miles away, stirring eerily in the rusty steel that cooled the grip of my hand. I panicked but didn’t think I’d have time to make it back to the ledge, and knew for certain that I didn’t want to be crawling over the beam in transit when the metal started to quiver under the weight of the heaving locomotive. I stayed where I was and tightened my grip on the steel as Christian yelled across to me, over the nearing engine rumble, “Don’t worry, you’ll be okay.” I had no choice but to believe him.

When it finally passed over, the bridge shook violently and small stones sifted into the water far below, their splashes falling silent against the roar of the freight train. I had one hand firmly on the bridge and one shielding myself, in fear a stone from the gravel above might deflect off the train and puncture my soft blonde head.

The initial adrenaline eased and I looked over to Christian. We mirrored one another’s wild smiles and I knew that this memory, the dirt under my nails from climbing, the cool bumpy steel rattling beneath me, the bridge resting strong once more as the train whistled distantly down the line, would be tangible longer after the steel crumbles and the forest swallows up the old railroad track into an artifact of yesteryear. 

The scariest part was getting back out, wedging myself between the moist rock wall and bridge beams, hoisting my body up by grabbing onto peeling layers of rusted steel, taking the risk that a train would not be coming when I was crawling halfway out from between the tracks. My thighs burned as I emerged into daylight, Christian lending a hand, pulling me up from our newfound sanctuary below.

Gilmor later claimed that if his men had not been so tired, he would have gone into Baltimore and captured the city. Only one man was lost in Gilmor’s detachment during the raid, Sergeant Field, who was murdered at point blank range by a local union-supporter named Ishmael Day. When the advance guard for Harry Gilmor’s raiders was in the Fork area, Ishmael Day placed a large Union flag over his gate. Gilmor’s Ordinance Sergeant Eugene Fields told Day to take the flag down. After Day refused, an argument ensued and Ishmael Day shot Sergeant Field with a shotgun. Gilmor’s men burned Day’s home and Day immediately fled. The mortally wounded Sergeant Field was taken to Wright’s Hotel operated on Harford Road accompanied by Gilmor where Field later died. This is the present day location of our beloved convenient store and curb-side hangout, High’s Dairy Store.

After the incident, the tale has it that Day fled into the nearby fields and hid under a cider press for several days until he could escape to the bustling city of Baltimore. He later returned to his birthplace in Fork and rebuilt his home. When Ishmael Day died he was buried in the cemetery of Fork United Methodist Church where I walked every Sunday morning with my mother to attend church. As a child, I unknowingly frolicked over Mr. Day in my patent white shoes and yellow-bowed bonnet as I hunted for neon Easter eggs each April in the church graveyard.