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Way Back Machine

Way Back Machine

DELMARVA CLASSIC: The Sweet Strawberry Boom of Days Gone By

The story behind the variety of strawberry we enjoy nowadays is a global affair that stretches across two centuries and three continents. Way back in the 1500s, some French explorer noticed that the wild strawberries of Virginia had bigger fruits and brighter color than their European counterparts. He brought some back to Europe and farmers started playing around with them. But it wasn’t until two…
May 16, 2017
Quote of the Day

QUOTE OF THE DAY: How Royal Oak Became the “Healthiest Place in America”

    The writer Dickson J. Preston got to the bottom of this burning question when he put together a brief portrait of the boom times that came to Royal Oak  during the latter part of the 1800s. This is from Preston's book Talbot County: A History, which was published back in 1983. Royal Oak, an ancient community, gained momentum when the steamboats and railroads began bringing…
April 10, 2017
Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Back in the 1920s, Crisfield Was a ‘Sort of Tiny Vulgar Venice’

Back in 1922, the writer Edward Noble Vallandigham penned this ode to Crisfield for his travel guide, Delaware and the Eastern Shore. "Newest of all the large and active communities on the Peninsula is Crisfield, … has grown into an active little city with a busy main street that looks like that of a raw Western mining village. … One forgets on the sea front, with…
April 2, 2017
Tubman TravelsWay Back Machine

“TUBMAN TRAVELS” SAMPLER: The Miraculous Escape of the Dover Eight

The story of the Dover Eight that follows is excerpted from Tubman Travels: 32 Underground Railroad Journeys on Delmarva, a book by Secrets of the Eastern Shore that tells stories of Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, and many other men and women whose journeys in slavery and out of bondage went through the Eastern Shore and Delaware. BIG PICTURE: The Pressure Cooker of 1857 The lush…
March 1, 2017
Tubman TravelsWay Back Machine

TUBMAN TALES: Young Fred Bailey Gets His First Taste of Freedom

    My latest writing project is something I'm calling "Tubman Tales," though it focuses on more than just Harriet Tubman. Case in point: This chapter is about the life of a young slave in Talbot County named Fred Bailey, who is better known in the history books as the famous anti-slavery orator Frederick Douglass. Running Free at Holme Hill Young Fred Bailey got his first…
February 8, 2017
Tubman TravelsWay Back Machine

TUBMAN TALES: Young Harriet Goes Down to the Crossroads

    BIG PICTURE: God Works in Mysterious Ways This is the truism that will likely end up first and foremost in your mind on a visit to the little Bucktown Village Store, which stands at the countryside crossroads of Greenbrier, Bucktown, and Bestpitch Ferry roads in Dorchester County--near the farm where  young Harriet Tubman lived back in the 1830s. Have you heard the legend about the…
January 14, 2017
CharactersWay Back Machine

Harrington Character of the Day: The Master Whittler of Delaware

This piece about Jehu Camper, the master whittler of Delaware, is a free excerpt from Eastern Shore Road Trips: 27 One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. t's from a Road Trip that visits a trio of interesting little museums in Dover, including one that features works by Mr. Camper. Here goes: Over the course of a long life stretching across 91 years, Jehu Camper jumped from this to…
December 5, 2016
From the BooksRoad TripsWay Back Machine

Road Trips #1 Excerpt: The ‘Petticoat Regime’ that Ruled Ocean City Back in the Day

This free excerpt about Ocean City's "Petticoat Regime" is from the first Secrets guidebook, Eastern Shore Road Trips: 27 One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. The trip here, from the chapter on beaches & beach towns, focuses on the boardwalk in Ocean City. Other chapters cover small towns, the great outdoors, backroads journeys, interesting museums, and Shore classics, such as lighthouse and skipjacks. Ocean City took its…
November 27, 2016