A good man died this week, William Donald Schaefer aged 89 was one time Governor of Maryland and prior to that the best mayor the city of Baltimore will ever have.
He really cared about the dirty, crime ridden wasteland that the city had become. During his time as mayor he revitalized the decaying inner harbor area and built lasting facilities that continue to attract crowds and money to the city even now. Baltimore’s Inner Harbor is now home to fine dining, a world class aquarium and is close to the new Baltimore Orioles home field at Camden Yards, all due in large part to Schaefer.
He was one of a kind, he cared little about anything but the city and the stories of his attempts to clean it up are legendary. His morning ride to city hall in the mayoral limo always followed a different route, when there he would seek out the police chief and tell him ” At Fourth and Pratt this morning I saw an abandoned car I would like it gone by the time I go home.” Later on he would simply say ” I saw another abandoned car today, find it and remove it” This in a city of 700,000 was quite challenge for the chief and pretty soon abandoned cars were hard to find in the city.
He was a most politically incorrect politician and once as Governor of Maryland alienated most of the local media by referring to the Eastern Shore of the state as ” The shithouse side of Maryland”. Much to Shaefer’s delight, many of the residents of the Eastern Shore were pleased by this outburst much preferring to be ignored,left alone and unvisited by the residents of of Washington DC, Baltimore and similar. I still have a faded bumper sticker that reads “I’m from the shithouse side of Maryland and proud of it”. The comment became part of the many myths surrounding the man and as I logged on to the Chariot this morning I saw that an old post of mine here that quoted the man had become “a Top Post” probably because of clicks from the curious remembering the man from Baltimore.
RIP Mr. Mayor, and clean up that place when you get there.
Boadicea's Chariot 
It makes a pleasant change to see a politician who actually does his job and is recognised for that. Nice one, LW.
Ahhhh!, that explains it then. I did leave a reply to your earlier query on your ‘Creek Dweller’, photo reminder post.
Good post LW, thanks.
Bravo: Thanks, he was not a saint by any stretch but he did wonders for the city.
Soutie: Thanks, sorry to waste your time, as soon as I posted I realised the “Top Posts” was a click counter, it was easy from there to deduce it was the announcement of the Guv’ners death this week which led searchers to the Chariot. I’m always surprised when the site turns up on a search engine, even more so when people click through to it.