HISTORICAL MOMENTS BY GEORGE CHEVALLIER

Electricity in Salisbury

Before the emergence of electricity in Salisbury, almost all power came from natural gas or wood. Some homes had oil lamps, but they all used wood stoves for cooking.

Before there was a road over the water on Isabella Street, there was a tumbling dam from the then-named Humphrey’s Pond. Two brothers named Richmond and William Johnson bought the Pond and renamed it Johnson’s Lake. They built a generating plant to supply Salisbury with electricity near the standpipe near Chestnut St. This plant burned in 1889. The City had to go around and hang a lighted lantern on street poles at twilight until service was restored. It was restored when they completed their new plant, which was in the old grist mill at the Isabella Street Falls where Salisbury Monument has their business today.

The plant was sold in 1900 to a group headed by a Philadelphia financier named Louis Dalmas. The property was improved and a new plant erected. It is pictured above.

The group had paid $42,000 for the Johnsons’ interest. In 1907 Dalmas sold his controlling interest of 600 shares to a group of local businessmen. They operated as the Salisbury Heat, Light & Power Company until 1915 when it was sold to Day & Zimmerman of Philadelphia. The name was changed to Eastern Shore Gas and Electric Co. Day & Zimmerman sold the entire operation in 1929 to a group who combined all the holdings into the Eastern Shore Public Service Company with general offices in Salisbury. The expansion program continued, until every company on the peninsula, except five municipally owned plants, was brought into the system. At this time, having given up on generating electric power from Johnson’s Lake, the lake was bequeathed to the City of Salisbury, which owns it today.

New and larger generating plants were needed to supply the ever- increasing need for electricity in Salisbury, and these were located first in Laurel, Del. and then by the large coal-fired generating plant at Vienna. Along the way, the company changed its name to Delmarva Power & Light Co.

Today there are electric transmission lines all over as electricity is either brought in or sold off on a regular basis as the need arises. The parent company, Delmarva Power, is now headquartered in Wilmington, Del.