Skip to main content
A Duel in Dorchester County, Maryland
QUOTE OF THE DAY: A Duel Solution in Dorchester Quote of the Day

QUOTE OF THE DAY: A Duel Solution in Dorchester

    “At this period political discussions partook of much personal rancor and vituperation …” Those words are meant as a description of America in the 1820s, though it seems to me that they might just as well have been written about the current political environment. James Stewart … Mr. Stewart’s views at this time on the national issues impressed him that the principles of the Democratic party…
Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitor Center on Maryland's Eastern Shore
Coming Attraction: The Tubman Underground Railroad Visitors Center Destinations

Coming Attraction: The Tubman Underground Railroad Visitors Center

Chris Elcock first visited the future site of the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitors Center in July of 2008. He’d come across the bridge from Baltimore that day in order to help decide whether his firm, GWWO Architects, would throw its hat in the ring when it came time to design the facility. Now slated to open in March of 2017, the center is the latest…
Crab Pickers on the Eastern Shore of Maryland
QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Never before had seen a crab. No, they didn’t know what to do with it.’ Quote of the Day

QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Never before had seen a crab. No, they didn’t know what to do with it.’

    Local crab houses first started bringing in Mexican migrants as crabpickers in the early 1990s. A few years in, the historian Virginia Jenkins conducted a slew of interviews at Eastern Shore seafood houses to try and get a handle on how everything was going. Here is one thing she learned: Traditionally , women have taught their children or other family members how to…
Wintry Mix 2016: A Secrets Collection of Sweet & Snowy Scenes on the Shore MiscellanyThe Newsroom

Wintry Mix 2016: A Secrets Collection of Sweet & Snowy Scenes on the Shore

  Welcome to the Winter Wonderland, Eastern Shore style! As fans of the Secrets Facebook page already know, we are building up a fantabulous inventory of Sweet Scenes for every season on the Delmarva peninsula. Welcome to the Wintry Mix, 2016. This little collection is still under construction, and new formats and images may be coming aboard in the weeks ahead. But in the meantime, all Wintry Mix shots…
Simmons Center Market Exterior
Time Capsule: This Old Grocery Store Has 80-Plus Years of Stories to Tell DestinationsWay Back Machine

Time Capsule: This Old Grocery Store Has 80-Plus Years of Stories to Tell

Most folks nowadays get to experience old-time general stores only through the magic of books and movies. But if you venture off of Route 50 and head into the heart of Cambridge, you can still get a taste of the real thing. Simmons Center Market has been around for more than 80 years now. The store’s name honors the memory of the late James “Jimmy”…
Danny Killer Marsh Eating Raw Eggs
The Crazy Fun Day When Danny “Killer” Marsh Went After a New World Record Way Back Machine

The Crazy Fun Day When Danny “Killer” Marsh Went After a New World Record

These images you see in this post are blurry because they're screenshots from a grainy fortysomething-year-old video, but that video just so happens to be the greatest Eastern Shore footage I have ever seen. One commenter on the YouTube link posted below says: “This is the best thing I’ve ever found on the internet." Another: “Greatest YouTube video ever." They are not exaggerating. The year was 1980.…
Hand of Harriet Tubman Reenactor (HTURR Byway)
Finding Freedom Along the Harriet Tubman Byway Road Trips

Finding Freedom Along the Harriet Tubman Byway

  When it comes to gaining a sense for the story of the Underground Railroad, the Eastern Shore is about as good a destination as it gets in this country. It is, after all, the birthplace of Harriet Tubman and the site of her 1849 escape into freedom—and then of her many fearless journeys back into the danger zone to help others escape. Tubman, who…
Downtown Cambridge Scene with Crab Hats (JJP)
Cambridge, the Comeback Kid of the Eastern Shore Road Trips

Cambridge, the Comeback Kid of the Eastern Shore

    Cambridge is the comeback kid on the Eastern Shore these days. The restaurant and bar scene is hopping. The waterfront is getting spruced up. And best of all the town just seems to have character to spare these days—it’s the kind of place where they build downtown Christmas trees out of crab baskets, compete in crazy tricycle races while wearing goofy costumes, and throw…
The Freedom House in Cambridge
The Freedom House in Cambridge CharactersDestinations

The Freedom House in Cambridge

The story of this fabulous piece of folk art begins with my friend Branden Spear. A young home-improvement contractor in Cambridge, he got locked up in a dispute with the officials on a local historic-preservation board about whether he could use a certain type of window on the hard-to-see back side of this house. First, the decision got delayed over and over and over again.…
December 5, 2014