Surfing the Gray Wave
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- Written by Kris Legates
Coastal Delaware is at the crest of a population transformation
By Andrew Sharp
Photograph by Marianne Walch.
From the May 2023 issue
It’s called the gray wave, or the silver tsunami: a striking increase in the number of older people in the population as the baby boomer generation ages, birth rates drop and technological advances increase our lifespans.
This global trend will strongly shape the coming years, and Sussex County is out in front — nowhere more so than in the coastal area.
Census figures for southern Delaware are enough to make a demographics researcher spit her coffee. Around 30 percent of the population in Sussex County is age 65 or above, far above the national average (and is even higher on the eastern side of the county). And according to projections, that share is set to increase in coming decades.
Workers in their 20s might read these predictions and immediately begin pondering the economic implications: Who is going to support this crowd of needy seniors? What about housing and health care? And that’s how the story is often framed — look out, the gray horde is coming.
Doing the Dirty Work
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- Written by Kris Legates
Running a coastal housekeeping operation is often quite a chore
By Pam George.
Photographs by Carolyn Watson.
From the May 2023 issue
Prior to the pandemic, coastal housekeeping companies were cleaning up. Jennifer and Jimi Kellogg, who founded Dust n Time in 2009, had five vans on the road, each ferrying up to five cleaners between jobs.
Biamby Cleaning Services’ revenue soared from $7,000 in 2009 to six figures by early 2020. And Ecolistic Cleaning, which uses earth-friendly ingredients, had expanded from Annapolis to Baltimore to Sussex County, where founder Courtney Sunborn now lives. Then came COVID-19. In early spring 2020, Gov. John Carney banned commercial lodging and short-term rentals to all but essential workers. Many residential clients did not want people in their homes — and many cleaners didn’t want to enter them.
While news headlines focused on the ailing hospitality industry, housekeeping companies quietly suffered. “We lost six figures’ worth of income,” says Jeannie Biamby.
The situation has improved, but the coastal industry is still adjusting to a new normal, with rising wages needed to attract and retain staff while supply costs soar.
The Surrender of U-858
- Details
- Written by Kris Legates
In May 1945, a German submarine surfaced off Cape Henlopen. The officers and crew couldn’t have picked a better place to give themselves up.By Bill Newcott
From the April 2023 issue
Imagine you’re waging war from a submarine, patrolling the enemy’s coast 4,000 miles from home. Suddenly you get a radio flash: “Hey, guys, we’ve just surrendered. The war is over.”
What do you do? Do you turn around and cruise across a stormy ocean to a defeated homeland? Try to find a port in some neutral country?
Or, you might do what German sub captain Thilo Bode did off the East Coast on May 10, 1945: surface, reveal your position via a distress signal — and have your 44-man crew stand in formation on deck, hoping against hope the approaching U.S. warships won’t sink you.
Finally, you just might end up seeing your captured sub towed into the harbor at Lewes — and docked alongside the pier at Cape Henlopen.