The Capitol of Grace: Havre de Grace site of Washington DC

Exactly: Maryland would wrap around this alternate federal district.

I could see this as pushing for the development of a northeastern rail corridor, especially after construction of the PRR Hudson River tunnels. I don't see, however, a major impact on Baltimore as a port, since the Patapsco is a fine natural harbor. What I could see also is the ~30 miles between Baltimore and Havre de Grace getting settled / built up in a big hurry to the point that it would be one long run of development today--even more so than IOTL.

One possible side effect: a second interstate route from Harrisburg through Dauphin and York Counties, but this one running southeast toward Havre de Grace so that the bureaucrats could live around Red Lion, Dallastown, Yoe, or Delta and still have a fairly easy commute.
 
This is actually one of the most interesting and likely-to-be-overlooked aspects of the whole POD. Despite being in Maryland (still a Southern state) and being less than 80 miles away from OTL's DC, this alt-capital is going to be far more closely tied to the north than DC ever was in the antebellum period of OTL. Culturally, one may look at the city as a hybrid between Baltimore and Philadelphia.

Washington DC, in the antebellum days, was still very much a southern city. I can't help but think that in countless tiny ways, this must have influenced the mood of national politics. Might this alternate capital 'feel' more northern to both its inhabitants and to its politicians? Might that mean - even if only in small ways - a lesser willingness to compromise with the southern slavocrats?

I wish people remembered this more. It was not till the Civil Rights era that Washington shed its southern character completely, even if it got the occasional influx of northerners every major war starting with the Civil War. It was in a more unique cultural spot as capital to be sure, and Maryland and NOVA were always a bit more outward looking and commercialized versus the rest of the south, but it was very much southern where it counted for a long time.
 
I wish people remembered this more. It was not till the Civil Rights era that Washington shed its southern character completely, even if it got the occasional influx of northerners every major war starting with the Civil War. It was in a more unique cultural spot as capital to be sure, and Maryland and NOVA were always a bit more outward looking and commercialized versus the rest of the south, but it was very much southern where it counted for a long time.

It could be argued that this character could be noticed up until the end of the Cold War in some ways, even if it's not so evident nowadays. In a TL where the capital is in Havre de Grace, I'd imagine that both sides of the Potomac would've stayed more or less that way (as is right and proper :p). HdG offers a more "neutral" location between North and South right off the bat.
 
The Boy Scouts of America wouldn't be able to have Camp Rodney right across the bay from Havre de Grace :confused:

OTOH, Pennsylvania would be a perpetual blue state once the Capitol Conurbanation reached as far as Lancaster and York. Philadelphia would likely still be PA's redheaded stepchild, however
 
One thing that would be cool to see is how L'Enfant, or whoever, designs with the waterfront. Would the president's home be along a long eloquent waterfront? Perhaps you see a water front revival effort in the late 1900's. Where would the later day monuments placed? Perhaps you get a WW2 monument on the shore as a D-Day replica? Maybe you have a grand avenue from the waterfront to the Capitol? Where would the OTL famous rallies take place? Water would be a major feature in this Capitol. Also it doesn't have to be a square. Perhaps you have a peninsula with the border being from the mouth of the Bush River to the Susquehanna north of Havre de Grace. Or Maybe a Larger Square than D.C. as most of the area of D.C. would be water here.
 
The Boy Scouts of America wouldn't be able to have Camp Rodney right across the bay from Havre de Grace :confused:

OTOH, Pennsylvania would be a perpetual blue state once the Capitol Conurbanation reached as far as Lancaster and York. Philadelphia would likely still be PA's redheaded stepchild, however

Philadelphia is not much further from Havre de Grace than Lancaster or York are, and on the land route to New York. By what possible metric is it a "redheaded stepchild", anyway?
 
Philadelphia is not much further from Havre de Grace than Lancaster or York are, and on the land route to New York. By what possible metric is it a "redheaded stepchild", anyway?
During the last Senate election Pat Toomey's biggest line of attack against Katie McGinty literally boiled down to "she's from Philadelphia." It worked, too. Not to mention the fact that Harrisburg has to be dragged kicking and screaming before it funds anything that benefits the city- for example the fight over SEPTA's state funding in which one Republican state legislator stated that he doesn't see the point in "subsidizing poor people's bus fare." Every other school district gets funding from Harrisburg no trouble, but when Philly schools need money the automatic question is "why can't they fund themselves." People from central PA seem to love going on about what a wretched hive of scum and villainy the city is.

The cherry on top of the shit sandwich is the fact that Philly has been struggling with a drug problem for decades and rural Pennsylvanians would just sneer and look down their noses at the city, but when the opioid crisis hits York and Carlisle and Williamsport suddenly it's a national emergency. Personally I think that Philadelphia and its collar counties would be better off if we took our roughly four million people, and 33% of the state's economy, and formed our own state.
 
During the last Senate election Pat Toomey's biggest line of attack against Katie McGinty literally boiled down to "she's from Philadelphia." It worked, too. Not to mention the fact that Harrisburg has to be dragged kicking and screaming before it funds anything that benefits the city- for example the fight over SEPTA's state funding in which one Republican state legislator stated that he doesn't see the point in "subsidizing poor people's bus fare." Every other school district gets funding from Harrisburg no trouble, but when Philly schools need money the automatic question is "why can't they fund themselves." People from central PA seem to love going on about what a wretched hive of scum and villainy the city is.

The cherry on top of the shit sandwich is the fact that Philly has been struggling with a drug problem for decades and rural Pennsylvanians would just sneer and look down their noses at the city, but when the opioid crisis hits York and Carlisle and Williamsport suddenly it's a national emergency. Personally I think that Philadelphia and its collar counties would be better off if we took our roughly four million people, and 33% of the state's economy, and formed our own state.

None of that is really relevant when you’re talking about early 19th century growth patterns. 100% of that is due to Philadelphia being an industrial colossus.
 
During the last Senate election Pat Toomey's biggest line of attack against Katie McGinty literally boiled down to "she's from Philadelphia." It worked, too.

It worked because Trump won the state and Republicans across the country often did better than him. One bright side of that state is that Democrats still win a lot of state offices and court seats.
 
None of that is really relevant when you’re talking about early 19th century growth patterns. 100% of that is due to Philadelphia being an industrial colossus.

Oh I wasn't talking ab out the 19th century. I was just complaining because I have a sense of resentment towards the rest of the state and I think the 5 cunty area around Philly would be better off without "the T."

It worked because Trump won the state and Republicans across the country often did better than him. One bright side of that state is that Democrats still win a lot of state offices and court seats.
Our legislature has a republican majority in both houses and outside the Southeast (used to be the city limits in general) republicans dominate pretty much everything. My comment about the rest of PA being hostile to philly still applies, however. Not gonna make any accusations, but I've always thought the hate we get from the "Alabama in between" and the fact that Philadelphia is pretty much PA's only large concentration of black people are correlated.
 
Thinking more about this, the issue of access to the interior is the most important.

Here's the Chesapeake Watershed:

cbaysmall.png


The Potomac is labeled, basically everything to the north is the Susquehanna.

I don't know the geography incredibly well, but the Alleghenies of West Virginia are an incredibly challenging place to build a canal. Washington had the idea for the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, which eventually reached Cumberland Maryland but never crossed the mountains to Pittsburgh. No canal ever made it from the Susquehanna to the Ohio, but there's a relatively short and direct railroad portage.

Pennsylvania_canals.png


Also notice that canals easily connect the Susquehanna to Philadelphia and the Delaware.

I don't really know enough about the history of canal building and the opening of the old Northwest to speculate at length, but the choice between DC and Havre de Grace came down to choice of watersheds. Each city sits on the fall line of a major river, as do pretty much all the major cities of the mid-Atlantic and Southeast, and it was a question of which watershed would open the way to the West better. Washington was an advocate for the Potomac, so his city won.

What if there had been a Pennsylvania visionary who could have seen it through? Maybe Ben Franklin gets into land speculation on the Susquehanna?

EDIT: https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...7b0-9e03-785c9b214109/?utm_term=.4941a235b6ab
 
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Unfortunately the Susquehanna is not really able to be used as a source of commerce because it's not usable for shipping due to rapids and a portage railroad was built but wasn't very efficient and was brought by the Pennsylvania railroad and most of the state owned canals which it closed by the end of the 19th centry . The Erie canal was probably the best way of getting goods between east and west until the railroads
 
Unfortunately the Susquehanna is not really able to be used as a source of commerce because it's not usable for shipping due to rapids and a portage railroad was built but wasn't very efficient and was brought by the Pennsylvania railroad and most of the state owned canals which it closed by the end of the 19th centry . The Erie canal was probably the best way of getting goods between east and west until the railroads
But was the Potomac any better? I know they had to build the "Chesapeake and Ohio Canal" (what a grandiose name) alongside it; with similar funding, could a similar canal be built around the Susquehanna rapids?
 
their were canals built around them but the main problem is that really until coal and later on wood are needed in quantity their isn't much reason to build one and by that time railroads are already showing themselves to be more useful. You have roughly until 1840 before railroads show that they are superior to canals in that canals are only useful in warm weather and tended to need constant maintenance to be stay open. The Susquehanna compared to the Potomac flows in the wrong way to be useful for over mountain transport via water.
 
I still see Alexandria and Georgetown developing into somewhat major cities - that said, having a major city at the mouth of the Susquehanna is a MAJOR difference.

As a Virginian though? We will miss that NoVA money, but not that NoVA traffic. Or the hipsters. Maryland can have them.
 
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