The installation of a new café in the soon to be completed renovation of Miller Library at Washington College offers an excellent opportunity to recognize two earlier literary figures that were natives of the Eastern Shore and identified with Washington College.
Sophie Kerr, in many ways a woman ahead of her time, significantly enhanced the reputation of Washington College as one dedicated to literary endeavors as well as the renowned award given annually in her name.
Yet only somewhat limited tangible recognition, on the Washington College campus, calls attention to this Eastern Shore native, who remembered the college in her will with the ongoing Sophie Kerr Endowment.
Since her death in New York City in 1965 at age 84, her works; some 23 novels, over 500 short stories, and several screen plays, have been largely overlooked, as has the personal story of this pioneer woman writer. One screenplay was made into the movie “Big Hearted Herbert.”
In 1942 Ms. Kerr was awarded an honorary degree from Washington College, along with Eleanor Roosevelt. The awarding of these degrees celebrated the 50th anniversary of co-education at Washington College.
In 1921, a story Sophie Kerr had written for the Saturday Evening Post, “Sweetie Peachie,” was made into made into a film, In total, M’s. Kerr achieved writing credits for 12 films, from 1916 through 1955.
Ms. Kerr is buried in her hometown of Denton, on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.
Gilbert Byron, author of The Lord’s Oysters, and other books and especially poems, about the Eastern Shore, was born in Chestertown in 1903. He graduated from Washington College, in 1923, with a BA in history.
Byron, who lived to be 88, passed away in 1991 in Easton, Maryland. He and Sophie Kerr certainly wrote during the same period, albeit about vastly different subjects.
Byron concentrated very poignantly and successfully in writing about the Chesapeake Bay and the Eastern Shore. Byron published 14 books and over 70 short stories. poems and articles during his lifetime.
Most of Byron’s working life was spent as a teacher in Talbot County, Maryland and Delaware schools. He resided in a cabin on Pickering Creek, in Talbot County for some 45 years; always near his beloved Chesapeake Bay and sailing his boat, Avalon”.
As a native Eastern Shoreman, I have always been interested by the writings of Gilbert Byron and their descriptions of the Eastern Shore, its people and the environment. The Lords Oysters and Beautiful Swimmers by William Warner, are both seminal literary works about the Eastern Shore and Chesapeake Bay area.
In different ways, Washington College has been impacted by the legacy and largess of these two very different, yet very successful literary figures of days gone by.
The following poem by Gilbert Byron is one of many he wrote about the Eastern Shore.
Eastern Shorman
His speech is slow and thrifty. Like the man
And overlaid with echoes of the past;
His are ancient ways, born of the land
And fostered by the north wind’s forceful blast.
He wears his manners with a courtly grace
That turns his patches into princely cloak;
This is the heritage of steadfast race,
Of men rooted as massive oak,
Of men who love beyond the need of speech
The fruitful promise of their fertile fields,
Who venerate the river and the beach,
And reap from autumn more than harvest yields.
Such love is homage to his place of birth.
As sure as spring, as ageless as the earth.
Gilbert Byron
Nancy Robson says
Amen