Cars in a small town play a remarkable role in the character of a community. The older they are, the more people can remember the first owner, and the second, and perhaps a third. They park on our streets as mobile reminders of friends and moments of past adventures, political campaigns, sports teams and other symbols of our local culture, and like the county itself, age with a particular grace.
With Chestertown RiverArts taking a few weeks off this summer with their wonderful Humans of Kent County, the Spy thought it would be fun to document some of the more famous or infamous cars of our community. To disclose the identity of the car owners would make it too easy for our readers. Take a guess and leave a comment below. And submit your own photos of the cars of Kent County with your own stories.
The Volvo Series 200 (1974 to 1993)
Perhaps no other singular vehicle 0r model best exemplifies the life of an American college town more that the Volvo Series 200 station wagon. With owners ranging from academics to trust fund anarchists, the car of choice was Swedish car company’s decidedly very square, and precariously underpowered, family wagon.
One of Chestertown’s best-known owners of the series 200 was Professor Norman James on Queen Street. Parked outside the James home near High Street, (it’s now Washington College’s Patrick Henry House), Norman and his family would maintain the tradition of having the rear window proudly display where his children were attending school. So much so that it was hard to see through the various colleges and prep school stickers.
But the attraction for downtown Chestertown was the sight of Norman, an exceptional intellectual and scholar, and therefore one of the worst drivers in town, attempt to parallel park on Queen Street. On the few days that Alice, his wife, would allow Norman to drive at all, it would take him from five to ten minutes to accomplish that feat, complete with the sound of the Volvo bumping the car in front and rear as neighbors tried to assist the professor.
This particular version, seen recently near Collins Road, has kept that kind of local tradition with its lawyer owner handing it down to the family college student.
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