Lester Burn - Chesapeake Beach Resort 1900-1929

From 1920 to 1924 Lester Burn worked in Chesapeake Beach as a young man selling tickets for the Great Derby roller coaster and the railway.   This account was inspired by the oral history collected by the museum in 1982.

VOICE:
Friday at last! End of a long week at my new job at the park. I am so glad to be out of that Great Derby ticket booth! It’s like a closet. And all I hear is the clack-clack-clack of the roller coaster and people screaming. By noon my shirt is soaked through with sweat!  But I’m glad to have this new job, even if the boss is a little strict.  I asked him if I could get off at 9 to go dancing and he said, “not until the last train has left!” Well, dancing will be over by then. Maybe I’ll just take a stroll through the park. But first I’ve got to unload these hogsheads of tobacco from the carts up near the platform for the next train, then ticket all this luggage. It’s hot in the station but a lot better than that darn ticket booth.