Six Bridges of Kent Narrows
350 Years of Connecting People to Places and Goods
If a bridge is symbolic of connection, the 350-year, six-bridge history at the Kent Narrows emphasizes its significance as a transportation hub connecting people with goods, epicures with seafood, and excursionists with beaches.
The first bridge at the Kent Narrows was not a fixed structure, but it did transport people and goods across bodies of water—it was the essential ferry boat. In colonial America, waterways were the most efficient means of moving goods, so it’s no surprise that the Maryland assembly of 1658 required each county, except Kent which already operated successful ferries, to maintain a ferry out of the county tax levy. The act made county courts responsible for ferries, though private enterprise quickly assumed the role. The ferry at the Kent Narrows dates to 1672. By water, the Kent Narrows connects the Chester River to Eastern Bay and by land, the Isle of Kent to the Delmarva peninsula.
By 1826, problems with shallow water depth—locally it was known as “the Wading Place”—spur development of the next bridge: an earthen causeway connecting Kent Island to the eastern shore mainland. The causeway advanced delivery of goods to points east and west but blocked maritime traffic. Still, the causeway was utilized for 50 years before it was removed and the channel dredged to accommodate a new bridge: the 1876 drawbridge. With this bridge, the flow of maritime traffic was restored and the seafood industry flourished as goods were delivered by land and sea. Buyboats delivered oysters, clams, and crabs to burgeoning packing houses. Seafood was shipped nationwide. By the early 1900s, some accounts list nearly two dozen packing houses in the region.
In the early 1900s, a railway bridge was constructed over the Kent Narrows enabling a train to transport goods and people by rail to points eastward, extending all the way to the beaches at Lewes and Rehoboth, Delaware. Tourists traveled by ferry to reach Kent Island and then boarded the train easterly. Beach tourism boomed.
In 1952, at the same time the Chesapeake Bay Bridge was constructed, a new drawbridge was built over the Kent Narrows, recently renamed the Watermen’s Memorial Bridge. Automobiles could now travel from the western shore to the beach. Sadly, demand for ferry and train travel came to a halt. The train bridge saw its final crossing in 1956.
The sixth bridge, a 65’ high, fixed-span bridge constructed in 1990, is the one we use today to accommodate heavy beach traffic and the flow of goods east to west. Watch closely and you’ll likely see Bayshore Brand Oyster trucks transporting seafood packed by Harris Seafood at the Kent Narrows.
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350 Years of Connection at the Kent Narrows
Palmer, Fanny. Colonial Ferry Landing at Dock. 1847. Lithograph.
In 1672, a ferry connected Annapolis to Kent Island and the Kent Narrows. This lithograph shows what a ferry might have looked like during that period.
1906 map shows steamboat and rail routes across the Eastern Shore reaching Atlantic beaches in Rehoboth, Delaware and Ocean City, Maryland.
Below, old postcard shows views of Kent Narrow’s 1876 drawbridge to the left and early 1900s railroad bridge at right, courtesy of Allen C. Brown of hmdb.org.
Old postcard shows the train station at Lewes, Delaware.
Old postcard shows the train station at Rehoboth, Delaware.
Dredging of the Kent Narrow channel and construction of a drawbridge in 1876 opened the way for buyboats, like the Muriel Eileen of Georgetown pictured at left, to deliver oysters, clams, and crabs to nearly two dozen packing houses in the region. Today, the Harris Seafood Company is the sole surviving full-time packing and shucking house.