Jessop’s Tavern in Old New Castle is one of 50 small U.S. restaurants that will receive a $50,000 grant from a historic preservation organization to upgrade, bolster, and grow its business.

The money given to the colonial American tavern, which has roots tracing back 350 years, comes from a four-year-old program from American Express and the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s “Backing Historic Small Restaurants.”

It was started in 2021 to help culturally significant restaurants during the pandemic. The program has aided nearly 125 historic small restaurants in every U.S. state, Washington D.C.., and Puerto Rico. 

The restaurant management software company Resy also is offering each historic restaurant complimentary use of its program for one year to help streamline costs and boost restaurant operations.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation selected this year’s grantees from a group of restaurants that operate in historic buildings or neighborhoods and provide cultural significance to their communities through their history, cuisine, and locations.

Many of the 2024 grant recipients include family-owned establishments or those operating for generations.

Jessop’s Tavern at 114 Delaware St. in the historic section of New Castle has been operated by the Day family since November 1996. The colonial tavern is located in a structure that was built in 1674 and predates the end of the Revolutionary War by more than 100 years.

The name Jessop’s comes from Abraham Jessop, a coppersmith who began living in the building in 1724 and operated his barrel-making business there.

It has housed various businesses through the years including the Captain’s Log restaurant in the 1950s and The Green Frog Tavern in the 1970s.

Jessop’s serves American foods with English, Dutch, Belgian, and Swedish influences such as Dutch pot roast, shepherd’s pie, roast duck and Dutch apple cakes.

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It is well-known for its focus on Belgian beers, with more than 300 bottles and 20 drafts dedicated to Belgian brands. Don’t be surprised to see someone in a tricorn hat. The staff has been known to wear colonial-style garb.

Here is the complete list of restaurants that received grants.

Visit savingplaces.org/historicrestaurants for more nformation.

Patricia Talorico writes about food and restaurants. You can find her on Instagram, X and Facebook. Email  ptalorico@delawareonline.com. Sign up for her  Delaware Eats newsletter.

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — Family and friends gathered along the Delaware River Monday night to celebrate the life of one of their loved ones.

Through prayer and memories, loved ones shared a few words to honor 42-year-oldDarnell Dogan.

They gathered along the river in Philadelphia because it’s a spot he visited often to fish. It’s also the last spot Dogan was seen before he went missing.

“Last Thursday they found his body in the water. We don’t know the circumstance — suspicious circumstances,” said Juanita Johnson, Dogan’s mother.

Dogan’s family said he was out on a boat last Tuesday night with people they didn’t know.

That was the last time they heard from him.

By Wednesday afternoon, his family reported him missing.

“He loved his family, he loved his religion, his dogs, and he loved fishing. That’s why we’re here,” said Johnson.

Some kind of material was seen around Dogan’s wrists when the marine unit found him floating in the water on Thursday.

When the missing person report was filed, detectives say they spoke with the people who were on the boat with Dogan.

Police said the death is suspicious, but no charges have been filed at this time.

“That was my best friend, and to know I’m not gonna get a call from him, not talk to him anymore — nobody can understand except people who went through this,” pleaded Johnson.

Homicide detectives are working on the case, and the cause of death is still pending from the medical examiner’s office.

WILMINGTON, Del. — The chief executive of Delaware’s largest county is calling for a federal investigation into the campaign finances of the state’s lieutenant governor, who is his chief rival for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.

New Castle County Executive Matt Meyer held a brief news conference Monday to respond to a forensic review commissioned by the state Department of Elections that uncovered significant improprieties in the campaign finances of Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long.

“Delawareans, all of us, deserve to be able to trust our elected officials and know that rules and laws apply to everyone, and apply to everyone equally,” Meyer said, decrying what he called Hall-Long’s “near-decade long illegal conduct.”

The forensic review, conducted by a retired FBI senior executive who is a certified fraud examiner, found that Hall-Long and her husband had received payments totaling $33,000 more than what she purportedly loaned to her campaign. It also found that Hall-Long’s husband and former campaign treasurer, Dana Long, wrote four campaign checks to himself but falsely reported that they had been written to someone else.

Jeffrey Lampinski, the fraud examiner, also determined that, from January 2016 to December 2023, Dana Long wrote 112 checks from his wife’s campaign committee account to himself or to cash, and one check to his wife. The checks totaled just under $300,000 and should have been reported as campaign expenditures. Instead, Lampinski found, 109 were never reported in initial finance reports, and the other four, payable to Dana Long, were reported as being made to someone else.

“The report found that Ms. Hall-Long broke the law,” Meyer said. “The report provides evidence that she tried to cover it up, and was still covering it up until the last moment, when she asked our state election commissioner to keep the report detailing the illegalities confidential and not to release these findings to the public.”

A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Delaware declined to comment on Meyer’s call for a federal investigation.

Hall-Long’s campaign released a statement describing Meyer’s remarks as “totally unjustified.”

“Matt Meyer’s press conference today was a desperate political attack to distract the voters from the issues that matter most,” Hall-Long said in the statement. “As I’ve always done, I have voluntarily cooperated with the Delaware Department of Elections and I will continue to do just that.”

Hall-Long has been under intense scrutiny since September, when she abruptly announced the postponement of a campaign event with Democratic Gov. John Carney that was to be held the next day, saying she needed to “attend to a personal, private matter.”

In reality, her campaign was in disarray after people brought in to lead the campaign discovered major discrepancies while reviewing years of finance reports. The scandal led to the resignations of Hall-Long’s campaign manager, chief fundraiser and campaign treasurer — who had replaced Dana Long as treasurer only five months earlier.

In late September, Hall-Long said she was working with “independent campaign finance experts and forensic accountants to thoroughly audit the finances.”

In October, she issued a “campaign audit update” declaring that an accounting firm hired “to audit records and receipts” found “no wrongdoings or violations.” She has refused to release a copy of the purported audit.

In fact, according to documents included in the report commissioned by the state elections commission, the firm hired by Hall-Long relied exclusively on information that she provided, conducted no audit, and made no determination about wrongdoing.

“We will not audit or otherwise verify the data you submit to us,” Karen Remick, owner of Summit CPA Group, wrote in a Sept. 21 letter to Hall-Long’s campaign committee.

“Our engagement does not include any procedures designed to detect errors, fraud, theft, or other wrongdoing,” Remick added.

In November, Hall-Long submitted amended campaign finance reports covering a period of several years, acknowledging that she and her husband had made campaign-related expenses using personal credit cards and loans that had not been properly reported.

According to election officials, however, the amended reports still do not bring Hall-Long into compliance with state campaign finance laws. In an email earlier this month, election commissioner Anthony Albence assured Hall-Long that he would not refer the matter to Democratic Attorney General Kathy Jennings, but that he expected Hall-Long’s committee to take “prompt corrective action.”