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Wicomico County Archives | Secrets of the Eastern Shore

Strange & Wondrous

The Quarter Question: Is a Little Piece of Pittsville, Md. in Your Pocket or Purse?

NOTE: This is a rough draft for a chapter in an upcoming book that is (very) tentatively titled: Strange and Wondrous Tales from the Delmarva Peninsula. You can see the other books in my Secrets of the Eastern Shore series here. The next time you fish around in your pocket or purse for some change, give some thought to the humble quarter. Yes, that’s an image…
April 8, 2021
CharactersWay Back Machine

The Honeymooners at Great Shoals Light

When 19-year-old Vernon Cooper landed at the mouth of the Wicomico River, the Wisconsin native didn’t catch on right away that he’d found his forever home. He didn’t have a crystal ball. He couldn’t see that there was a Dames Quarter gal in his future. The U.S. Coast Guard stationed Vernon at Great Shoals Light in 1951. That screwpile affair had been guiding vessels on…
December 30, 2020
CharactersWay Back Machine

Fruitland! “The Holly Capital of the Peninsula”

The holly-wreath industry on Delmarva was born at the turn of the 20th century in Southern Delaware, then quickly moved across the border into Maryland. Soon enough, holly became known far and wide as “Maryland’s Christmas Crop.” Estimates of the number of Eastern Shore residents involved in that holly trade in any given year run as high as 10,000. Most were farmers, looking to earn…
November 25, 2020
CharactersWay Back Machine

The Legend of Gilbert Lare, aka “The Del-Mar-Va Bandit” of the 1930s

The criminal career of Gilbert Lare, aka "The Del-Mar-Va Bandit,” began with a seemingly minor affair. Wilmington News Journal, Dec. 27, 1926: Gilbert Lare, a young man of , was arrested by Constable Thomas Nichols breaking into store on South Main Street Wednesday night and removing two slot machines. … The machines were found early the following morning along the river shores, broken up, and…
June 30, 2020
Way Back Machine

BLACK GOLD IN PARSONSBURG! The Delmarva Oil Craze of the Early 1900s

If someone ever makes an Eastern Shore version of "The Beverly Hillbillies," the family at the center of things would have to hail from Parsonsburg, Md. That sleepy town of 350ish souls--it's just east of Salisbury, on the way to Ocean City--was the epicenter of the Great Delmarva Oil Craze. Consider, for starters, the advertisement that the Wicomico Oil & Gas Co. took out in…
May 2, 2020
CharactersWay Back Machine

Somerset Journey: The Steak Knife Was Invented in Crisfield, and That Story Begins on Marumsco Creek

The story behind the creation of the steak knife in your kitchen drawer involves a bit of manufacturing ingenuity, but there is more to it. Think romantic sleigh rides, a devastating fire, steadfast religious faith, and then—a Christmas gift from a friend that changes everything. This Somerset County, Md. tale begins with a farm boy who hated farm work. He much preferred puttering around in…
March 31, 2020
From the BooksQuote of the Day

ROAD TRIPS 2 EXCERPT: A Tight Fit in Tyaskin, Md.

This excerpt from Eastern Shore Road Trips #2: 26 More One-Day Adventures on Delmarva features a historical nugget that comes as a bonus section at the end of a chapter called "Wicomico Wanderings," set on the lower Eastern Shore of Maryland. The trip starts at history-laden Pemberton Park outside of Salisbury, Md. and then leads you along backroads and into the Nanticoke River towns of…
August 8, 2017
Quote of the Day

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Head Over Heels for Somerset County

    Somerset County is celebrating its 350th birthday here in 2016, and that is the sort of occasion that can make grown men get a little emotional and go a little over the top. I would doubt, however, that anyone doing any speechifying nowadays will be able to top the writer Clarence Torrence in the Department of Purple Prose. Here is how Mr. Torrence opens his…
September 15, 2016
From the BooksWay Back Machine

How a Construction Mishap Back in 1909 Helped Create Modern-Day Salisbury

This excerpt from Eastern Shore Road Trips #1: 27 One-Day Adventures on Delmarva is comes in the midst of a road trip through Salisbury, starting on the east at the Ward Museum and then running through City Park and into downtown and its Riverwalk. Do you see that giant kidney-shaped thing at the top of this old map of downtown Salisbury? That is the 40-acre Humphrey's Lake that…
May 24, 2016
DestinationsRoad Trips

Salisbury Gems: The Ward Museum and City Park

  “Two dumb country boys.” That’s how Lem Ward liked to describe himself and his brother, Steve. They were born in the last years of the 19th century and lived in Crisfield. Both were barbers by trade, just like their father. They shared a shop, in fact. And for fun, they sang in a little barbershop quartet. Darn if those two dumb country boys didn’t end…
February 10, 2015