Echoes of the Past: Eden Mill Nature Center's Drums
Friday November 9, 2007 8:24 AM
During the summer of 1994, on three separate occasions, several groups of people heard tribal drumming coming from the river hills surrounding Eden Mill Nature Center in Pylesville, Maryland. The source of the music was never identified but it was agreed upon by all that experienced the sounds that it was distinctively Native American.
Eden Mill Nature Center was created in 1991 in order to "provide an opportunity for all people to develop a greater appreciation and awareness of the historical and natural resources of the area." Much of the history of the area involves the mill, which was built in the 1800s, burned down, was rebuilt and was expanded over the next century. The surrounding land, however, has a history that stretches much farther back. Susquehannock Indians, a tribe that maintained permanent villages on the Susquehanna River, had seasonal hunting camps on the river hills overlooking what are now nature center grounds. Several of the spots frequented by small groups of Susquehannok Indians are thought to have been located along nature center hiking trails. By the time the mill was established in 1802, Native Americans were long gone from the area due to the spread of European diseases, forced removal and intermarriage with settlers. Deer Creek, a body of water that runs all the way from Shrewsbury, Pennsylvania to the Susquehanna River, about six miles from the Chesapeake Bay, runs through the valley and plummets over the dam beside the nature center. This section of Deer Creek is routinely used for nature center volunteer-led canoe trips during the months of April through October.
On the morning following the first night of an educational two-day camping trip led by volunteer Peggy Smith, Smith awoke to the sound of deep drumming. All except four of the campers on the trip were students from Gallaudet University, an internationally renowned school for the deaf and hearing-impaired. Therefore, the only campers that were able to hear the drumming were three Eden Mill volunteers and a Gallaudet professor. Ironically, the trip itself was designed specifically to experience Native American culture and the goal was to build a model of a Susquehannok longhouse.
"I thought somebody was playing it on a boom box. But then I remembered, the students can't hear anything," Smith said, "Another volunteer came by my tent. She said to come out; she wanted to know if I had heard that. We walked around the circle of tents together. We walked around and the music didn't have a direction. We couldn't pinpoint where it was coming from. It would fade in and fade out. We couldn't hear the actual sound of human voices but you knew they were there — chanting. When people started getting up, we asked the hearing people if they had music and no one did. It went on for a good half hour. Pretty soon everybody who could hear was up — the look on their faces was 'OK, this is weird.' By the time we got caught up in the routine of the day it was gone."
Another person present during the first event was Frank Marsden, founder of Eden Mill Nature Center, verified that "There was a whole group of us that heard it. It wasn't like one of us just thought we heard it. As we tried to hear where it was coming from, it would actually move around us. As you walked toward the drumming, it would sound in another direction."
Peggy Smith was also present for the second occurrence. Another volunteer, who wishes to remain anonymous, was there as well. This volunteer explained that, "I was fascinated by the story. However, every time I went canoeing on Deer Creek, I was terrified that I might actually hear it too. I was a young volunteer — 10 or so years old at the time. So, on this particular afternoon, when we were canoeing around the last big bend of the creek before the mill was in sight, and the drumming started — I listened to it for about a minute and then covered my ears. When I took my hands off my ears the drumming had stopped."
The third event occurred when two other volunteers (who are no longer active at the mill) were finishing up a twilight canoe trip with a small group.
Today there are new homes on the hill opposite Eden Mill Park. In 1994 that area was all farmland. Although the drumming has not been heard since that summer (or at least hasn't been reported by or to any of the volunteers), Eden Mill Nature Center volunteers always keep an ear out for the still unsolved mystery of the Native American drumming phenomenon.
[photo courtesy of Maryland Department of Natural Resources]
