This location at the southwest corner of Warren Street and North Union Avenue is shown on the Robert Young Stokes Plat of Havre de Grace as the place where John Donahoo (builder of the Concord Point Light Station) purchased a lot for his home in 1815. More research is needed to determine whether he actually built a home.

William S. McCombs (1850-1928) purchased the property here in 1883 and sold it the following year to the C.C. Pusey Company, owned by Clarence C. Pusey (1864-1922) and William H. Brown. They operated a hardware store here and had a warehouse further west off Juniata Street.

In 1901, Clarence C. Pusey was elected Mayor of Havre de Grace, which was disputed by Robert K. Vanneman who took the issue to court. Vanneman’s claim that Pusey didn’t pay taxes on real property in the city was dismissed because the court found that Pusey, together with his partner, Brown, did own property and paid taxes. The dispute garnered a lot of attention and Pusey served as Mayor from 1901-1907. Clarence C. Pusey was also known for designing boats, and in 1917 served as a director of the Maryland Ship Building Company. His own boat was the 38-foot full cabin “Edwina.”

The Pusey Company sold a variety of goods, including ranges, tin ware, oil stoves, meat choppers, agate ware, farm implements, and ice cream freezers, as can be seen on one side of a Victorian trade card commonly used for advertising in those days. The reverse of the trade card states that their location was “near the P.W. & B. Depot,” in keeping with this location. C.C. Pusey also served on the boards of The Graw Racetrack and the Havre de Grace Hospital and was appointed United States Sub-Treasurer in Baltimore in 1910.

For a short time, this location was home to The Brown Implement Company, of which William S. McCombs was President. It was owned by McCombs’ daughter, Nellie McCombs Brown, and her husband, Clarence J. Brown. In 1920 they sold this property to George and Adeline Sadler who ran Sadler’s Hardware Company, selling hardware and agricultural implements.

The Sadlers sold their property to Elmore Deibert in 1923, as announced in The Newark Post on March 21, 1923: “Elmore Deibert, a former Elkton boy, had purchased a large hardware store in Havre de Grace for a price said to be $11,000. He will enlarge his present garage business.” Elmore Deibert ran the Harford Motor Company in the 1920s, then the property became Havre de Grace Auto Parts, followed by an Amoco gas station operated by Oliver E. Sutor in the 1940s, which then became Arco. Members of E.C. Coen’s family owned this property from about 1953 through 1972 and ran a taxi service—while he lived at 620 Franklin Street.

In 1977, Dorothy Elizabeth Howell sold the property to Robert D. Poole (1935-1998) and Charlotte V. Poole and from then until 2014 it was owned by Paul and Shirley Poole until Shirley Poole sold it in 2014 to Harford Property Services Development, LLC. For most of that time, this was an investment property. In the early 2000s, this is remembered as Starrk Moon Kayaks with rental kayaks and an apartment on the second floor and then empty for some time. The property was purchased by Harford Property Services Development LLC in 2014 with J.D. Russell as its Chief Executive Officer and was renovated and redesigned.

This address is also listed as the location of the Victoria Russell Foundation, Inc., an independent charitable organization founded to help foster a strong relationship between the community and first responders.

County Records
Built 1930. 1920 sq ft retail store, 4560 sq ft lot.