William (Bill "Tick") Washburn

This fellow evidently was somewhat of an eccentric. Doris (Hamilton) Hitch (this compiler's grandmother) related a story about "Tick" Washburn that happened not long after Doris and her husband Carroll Hitch married in 1930. According to her, she could see a fire back in the wooded part of their property on the corner of St. Lukes Road and Milton Mill Road near Fruitland in the fall of the year sometime in the early 1930s. When Carroll Hitch went back to investigate, he found "Tick" Washburn just sitting next to a camp fire warming himself. Eunicelee (Washburn) (Johnson) Hupke independently related (in 2001 to this compiler) that "Willie" Washburn would be "OK" much of the time but, when the weather began to turn cool every year, he would begin to "wander" around the area without an apparent home. In the Dryden collection at Salisbury University's Center for Delmarva History and Culture, there is an obituary clipped from a newspaper (presumably the Salisbury Daily Times) dated Nov 11 1965 that states that Willie Washburn, 86, of Eden (MD) died Saturday (would have been Nov 6 1965) at the Eastern Shore State Hospital (note, this was a state mental institution in Cambridge, MD). He was a son of the late William H. and Henrietta Washburn. The only survivors are nieces and nephews. Burial was at Zion Cemetery near Fruitland. [Compiler's note: there is no stone on Mr. Washburn's grave]