In 1921, Cumberland Police and Fire Commissioner A.K. Hummelshime attacked the authenticity of Washington’s Cabin in a letter to then Cumberland Mayor Thomas Koon. Hummelshime claimed that the logs used were gathered from multiple locations over a period of one hundred and fifty years, essentially claiming the cabin’s connection to George Washington was fabricated.
After a confrontation between Hummelshime and the Mayor at the City Council meeting on March 14th 1921, however, Hummelshime was forced to concede that the charges in his letter where based on hearsay. (This is reported in the clipping from the Evening Star of 20 Mar 1921, below.)
Hummelshime may have conceded, but was not convinced. The Baltimore of 22 Apr 1921 (see below) reports that on April 21 1921, General John G. Pershing had dedicated George Washington’s Headquarters at Riverside Park. The streets of Cumberland were “transformed into a mass of color” for the formal procession to the Park, and 10,000 persons gathered for the event.
Hummelshime, despite having conceded the argument to Mayor Koon, did not ride in the parade with his fellow Councilmen since he believed the building to be a “pure and unadulterated fake”.
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