Richard Haynes has lived in three different houses on the same road during his lifetime.
At 94, the Rohrersville resident has witnessed a lot of southern Washington County history, and much of it he has experienced personally.
“For the first three grades, I walked to Rohrersville School two miles away,” Haynes said. “Fourth, fifth and sixth, I went to Park Hall School. That was a one-room school. For seventh and eighth, I went back to Rohrersville Elementary School.”
Even as he worked on his parents dairy farm, Haynes graduated from Boonsboro High School with the class of 1943. He married Marietta “June” Clopper, raised two children, continued to run the family farm and worked for the Boonsboro Post Office.
Since 2009, the Haynes has written and published four books on local topics, including the Rohrersville Band, the Shifler Marble Quarry and days gone by in the Pleasant Valley area. The titles are “And the Band Plays On: A History of the Rohrersville Cornet Band of Washington County, The First 170 years”; “They Way It Was”; “Shifler Marble Quarry and Marble Business in Rohrersville Area — 1850s until 1962” and “And the Band Plays On, 2008 — 2017”.
The affable senior said he wasn’t much of a writer back in school.
“I never had any idea I was going to do anything like (writing books),” he said. “I guess I did it to keep out of mischief. I’m not sure.”
Finding inspiration in the minutes
Haynes said his father was in the Rohrersville Cornet Band of Washington County, which was organized in 1837 by G. Washington McCoy and is currently the oldest community band in Maryland.
At 94, the Rohrersville resident has witnessed a lot of southern Washington County history, and much of it he has experienced personally.
“For the first three grades, I walked to Rohrersville School two miles away,” Haynes said. “Fourth, fifth and sixth, I went to Park Hall School. That was a one-room school. For seventh and eighth, I went back to Rohrersville Elementary School.”
Even as he worked on his parents dairy farm, Haynes graduated from Boonsboro High School with the class of 1943. He married Marietta “June” Clopper, raised two children, continued to run the family farm and worked for the Boonsboro Post Office.
Since 2009, the Haynes has written and published four books on local topics, including the Rohrersville Band, the Shifler Marble Quarry and days gone by in the Pleasant Valley area. The titles are “And the Band Plays On: A History of the Rohrersville Cornet Band of Washington County, The First 170 years”; “They Way It Was”; “Shifler Marble Quarry and Marble Business in Rohrersville Area — 1850s until 1962” and “And the Band Plays On, 2008 — 2017”.
The affable senior said he wasn’t much of a writer back in school.
“I never had any idea I was going to do anything like (writing books),” he said. “I guess I did it to keep out of mischief. I’m not sure.”
Finding inspiration in the minutes
Haynes said his father was in the Rohrersville Cornet Band of Washington County, which was organized in 1837 by G. Washington McCoy and is currently the oldest community band in Maryland.