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Middletown couples in search of a night on the town won't have to venture far next Saturday, as they'll have dinner specials, carriage rides, a walking tour and other activities at their disposal, right in Middletown.

Middletown's Main Street Association is planning "Date Night" on Aug. 14, intending to showcase the available options in town. Ruth Davis-Rogers, manager of the association, said the goal of events such as date night is to show people that they don't necessarily have to leave town to have a fun evening.

"We want people to think about ‘we don't have to leave Middletown to go out for a night, not it's the weekend we'll go to D.C., or to Frederick,'" Davis-Rogers said. "We have great restaurants here in Middletown. It's the end of the summer, we have small-town America here."

Couples register for $30 and get dinner specials, carriage rides, a walking tour and a keepsake photo, as well as dessert in the courtyard of Zion Lutheran Church, in return. Davis-Rogers said the association is also providing babysitting, as a way to help couples with young children get out.

"There's a lot of couples when they have young children, they don't have a chance to get out – babysitting's hard to find or it's expensive," she said. "We thought, ‘What if we did something else?' It kind of expanded from there."

Though the town already has several regular events, such as the Middletown Heritage Days Festival and Christmas in the Valley, Davis-Rogers said she doesn't think adding the association's events will be a problem for residents.

"It's like having a family," she said. "You have your regular holidays, but it's fun to have other activities happen as well. That gives more reason to stay in town and more things to do. You don't want things to be boring. It makes you think about ‘what are some of the other things we can do, what hasn't been done?'"

Davis-Rogers said she hopes the association can be involved in some way, even in the more traditional town events that are already planned. "All the different committees are inter-related," she said. "Hopefully there will be a presence of Main Street in every activity."

She said the association is in the planning stages for a ghost tour of town near Halloween, though the event will be family friendly. "It's not going to be spooky-scary, appropriate for kids," she said. "There are interesting characters in the town; it's nice to bring those characters to life in a new way."

The association is also looking for stories from residents who have had unusual occurrences in town or their homes to supplement the tour. The event will also highlight the town's founders and other interesting former residents, and the history of the town, which she said was very rich.

"Right where the town hall is there used to be a livery stable, and there was a fire and they lost a lot of horses," she said. "It's very interesting, in a town that age, that you're not just standing on former open fields. There's history – in every single spot you're standing something happened."

Though the planned events cover very different subject matter, the end result is still the same – focusing attention on what Middletown has to offer. The events put on by the Main Street Association helps keep money in town to support local business, one of the goals of the association.

"If everybody in town once a month stayed in town and spent their dollars, the town would be more healthy," she said.

Burgess John Miller agreed with that sentiment, and said the events help bring business downtown, an essential part of helping the downtown shops and restaurants.

"Part of being a Main Street [Maryland] community is you're trying to build a business and encourage more business," he said. "One of our goals is not only redeveloping economically, but also what we have already. That's a responsibility as a town that we have."

Miller also said the events from the association fill a different need in the community than ones such as the Middletown Heritage Days Festival, focusing on the business side of town, rather than its history.

"This event in Main Street is focusing on our business community – what they have, what they have to offer," he said. "For us it fills a very important niche."

E-mail Tripp Laino at tlaino@gazette.net.

-5-9 p.m., Aug. 14

-$30 per couple; dinner not included

-Includes babysitting, carriage rides, walking tour, keepsake photo, dessert in the courtyard of Zion Lutheran Church

-To secure carriage rides and babysitting services, tickets must be reserved and/or purchased in advance.

-Tickets available by calling 301-371-6171

-For more information, visit mainstreetmiddletown.org