Technically speaking, the current Cambridge Lighthouse is only nine years old, but that hasn’t stopped the community from celebrating one hundred years of this kind of lighthouse on the Choptank.

As Jim Duffy, the Cambridge Lighthouse Foundation executive director, freely admits, it’s a complicated history. In his Spy interview, he recounts how important lighthouses have been for sailors and watermen for over a century. Similar in impact to our modern-day interstate highways, lighthouses were critical in getting goods to markets in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

But as technology advanced, Maryland’s historic lighthouses were made obsolete and, in many cases, were left abandoned, falling victim to the unforgiving Chesapeake winter ice or juvenile delinquents using them as party venues. For many, it was a sad end for these cultural icons and their historical ties to the region’s rich maritime life.

This collective mourning for Chesapeake lighthouses ultimately leaded however to their welcomed return when a fledgling Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum was the first to reclaim this important heritage by installing the 1879 Hooper Strait Lighthouse on its dock in 1966. And Cambridge followed that example when its famed “Committee of 100” made a Choptank lighthouse a priority in their master plan to revitalize the community in the early 1990s.

Like all projects of this nature, fundraising was a challenge, lasting a few decades. Still, eventually, a replica of the Choptank Lighthouse was built in 2012 to the thrill and delight of both residents and visitors.

Today, thanks to the Cambridge Lighthouse Foundation, this remarkable monument to Dorchester’s long ties with the Bay serves as the unique vehicle for economic development its founders had forecasted. Beyond its educational role as a first-class interpretive center, staffed by dozens of volunteers,  it has now become that special place where high school graduates and newly-weds are eager to be photographed alongside

The Spy spent some quality time with Jim (the well-respected Maryland writer when not running the foundation) a few weeks ago to catch up on the lighthouse’s history and unique place of Mid-Shore history.

This video is approximately five minutes in length. For more information about the Cambridge Lighthouse and Foundation please go here. Photography by Jill Jasuta.

 

 

On Monday, July 19, the Kent County Zoning Commission Board of Appeals heard a challenge to the zoning status of the Frank M Jarman American Legion Post 36 at 9155 American Legion Dr. in Chestertown. Due to the length of testimony, the hearing will continue next Tuesday, July 27.

More than 100 people attended the appeal hearing.

The zoning appeal was entered by Thomas Voshell and Chesmer Community Association, citing that property, zoned as “nonconforming use” in 1962, is no longer in compliance with that zoning regulation in an area primarily zoned as residential. Under Maryland law, a zoning appeal requires the “party asserting the existence of a nonconforming use has the burden of proving it.”

Daniel Saunders, Attorney at MacCloud Law Group represented Chesmer Community Association. Attorneys Stephen Meehan and Mitchell Mowell represented the American Legion.

The property is currently in the process of being purchased by Minary’s Dream Alliance, Incorporated, a non-profit organization founded by Doncella Wilson and Paul Tue to meet the needs of Kent County youth and families. MDA has been using the facility for services like coordinating the Food for Elderly program, among others.

Typically, a “nonconforming use” property is defined as “as any lawfully existing use of a structure or of land that does not conform to the applicable use regulations of the district in which it is located.

In November, 2020, Planning and Zoning Director Bill Mackey wrote that the Land Use Ordinance had already made a determination of the nonconforming property and that the property had not been abandoned or changed, and that since it was built in 1960 it was a validated nonconforming use.

Monday night’s appeal hearing began with a motion by Stephen Meehan to dismiss the proceedings because of a procedural error in Mr. Mackey’s determination process—that no public notice had been given during his determination process. The Board voted to continue the process and that going back to Zoning Administrator would cause a lengthy delay in the proceedings.

Attorney for the Board, Christopher Drummond, clarified that if the hearing was to proceed, “it would be an appeal of an administrator’s determination.”

“The Board has the jurisdiction on this matter. The Zoning Administrator said you have the right to appeal his determination,” Saunders told the Board.

As per Saunders request for a hearing, “Applicants seek a determination by the Board of Appeals, pursuant to Article VIII, Section 1.7, of the County Zoning Ordinance, that the subject property is not a nonconforming property and that any uses on the property must conform to those permitted uses in the Critical Area Residential zone,” proceedings continued.

Stephen Meehan spent time providing a history of the facility’s use by the American Legion from 1960 to the present. John Diller (not shown in the video clip), an active member of the Legion since 1964 described many of the organization’s functions from social events, hosting other professional organizations, blood-drives, fundraising events to support the facility, and members’ socials. His memory of the facility and the property predated the 1962 nonconformity determination.

Commander Ralph Morgan, USN retired and financial officer for the American Legion, described the long-standing responsibilities met to keep all licensing affiliated with the property current, noting that there had been no lapses over the years. He also reviewed health inspection documents and the replacement of the heating oil storage tanks.

Minary’s Dream Alliance, Inc. co-founder Paul Tue spoke to the activities and services provided by Minary’s Dream at the American Legion facility, including partnering with Washington College and Kent Cultural Alliance for a month-long student project studying the history of Kent County, Kent County football coaches meetings, and GLOW (Girls Learning Our Worth) meetings. Minary’s Dream Alliance, by arrangement with the American Legion, have been on the Legion post premises for two years providing their services to the community.

“We want to continue being a resource for the community,” Tue said.

By 10 pm, both parties agreed to adjourn the meeting and reconvene at 7 pm, Tuesday, July 27. At that time Mr. Saunders will make his presentation on behalf of Mr. Voshell and the Chesmar Community Association.

This summation is a mere snapshot of the two-and-half-hour meeting. The entire meeting may be found on the County website when it is posted.

This clip is approximately eight minutes in length.

.

 

 

 

While Jim Lighthizer resides in a very rural part of Dorchester County these days, quite some distance from the Talbot County Courthouse and the controversial Talbot Boys statue that rests on its lawn, he comes into that debate with significant “street cred.”

For more than two decades, Jim has spent his professional life making Civil War history both prominent and relevant as the president of the American Battlefield Trust. During that time, he and his small staff and board of directors saved 52,000 acres of open space and 130 battlefields in 24 states by raising over $500 million to keep history alive.

Jim’s name might also ring a bell for some Marylanders. Before his involvement in preserving Civil War battlefields, he was a major player in Annapolis politics for most of the 1980s and 90s. First as a Democratic state delegate, then as Anne Arundel County Executive, and finally as the state’s Secretary of Transportation under Governor William Donald Schaefer, Lighthizer gained a real appreciation for preserving history and saving land in those positions.

With that kind of unique background, the Spy couldn’t think of a better subject to interview for our ongoing series entitled “The Talbot Boys Conservation.”

At 75 years old, Lighthizer is enjoying the freedom in retirement to speak one’s mind. With echoes of his friend Donald Schaefer’s famous frank way of speaking, Jim does not hold back in making his argument that the statue should stay right where it is.

In fact, Lighthizer also notes that having the Talbot Boys located just feet away from the Frederick Douglass monument as a contributing factor in not moving the C.S.A. memorial. He makes the case that this unique juxtaposition is just the kind of thing that keeps memory and history alive for generations to come.

We stay down with Jim at the WHCP studios in Cambridge to chat this week.

This video is approximately five minutes in length. 

 

For four weeks, Washington College student mentors and Kent High School students have been meeting at Minary’s Dream Alliance to pluck sound bites out of Kent County’s recorded history and shape them into contemporary collages of music and spoken words wrapped in a hip-hop beat.

Sponsored by Washington College’s Starr Center, the “Hip Hop Time Capsule” is an innovative learning program developed to explore the rich traditions of Kent County’s African American music, culture, and history.

The four-week program immerses students in workshops learning how to research Chesapeake Heartland’s digital archives in search of the perfect spoken phrase or gospel lyric. The collected sound bites, “samples,”  are selected by the students and handed over to WC sound engineers to be “cleaned” and ready to overlay with others. Original student lyrics are sometimes added or snippets from the oral history archives.

To add to the sound lab experience, professional musicians and writers hold workshops to discuss their creative process. Poet and playwright Robert Earl Price recording artist Kentavius Jones (appearing in this video), and Karen Somerville were a few who discussed history through the lens of art.

Faithlin Hunter, a Junior at Washington College and classical violinist, was surprised at how the experience affected her.

Originally not a fan of hip-hop, Hunter began to appreciate the history of Kent County through the discovery of its archives. “I found inspiration in the stories of growing up in Kent County and taking those experiences and sound and making something new. It made me grow as an artist and violinist,” she says.

With one week left in the program, students hope to have a substantial catalog of original sounds to present at the end of the month.

The Spy interviewed Starr Center’s Asst. Director for Programs and Experiential Learning Kacey Stewart and Kentavius Jones about the summer program.

Chesapeake Heartland is an initiative of the Starr Center working in partnership with numerous partners in Kent County (including Sumner Hall, the Kent Cultural Alliance, and the Kent County Public Library), and with the collaboration of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture,

This video is approximately eight minutes in length. For more about Chesapeake Heartland, a collaboration between Washington College and the Smithsonian please go here. For more about Minary’s Dream go here.

 

The Mid-Shore has benefited greatly over the centuries in having folks from the Western Shore not only adopt this rural region as their own but actively engage in the life of the community. From helping local churches to mentoring children, these “Come-Here’s” have played critical roles in the development of some of the Eastern Shore’s most important institutions.

But the story of Cambridge’s Linda Harris is a special one indeed.

Raised in DC, and someone who would grow up to be very successful in property management, Linda’s real vocation, her first passion, was actually music. While she was a consummate professional and delighted in raising a family, she never let go of the absolute love of her life: singing jazz and playing classical piano.

And at 60 years old, she began performing in places like the Mid-Atlantic Jazz Festival, Mr. Henry’s in DC, the Stateside in New Orleans, and abroad in Paris and Goteborg. In fact, she had a full schedule set for 2020 with gigs in Tokyo and Africa planned, but then COVID hit.

Like many performing artists, Linda was staring at an empty calendar when she remembered that her father gave her a book about Harriet Tubman and her life and perseverance. That memory led to gathering a small group of women who all agreed to walk the Underground Railroad trail from Cambridge to Freedom House in Philadelphia last September.

That seven-day trip tested Linda and her middle-aged body far more than she had predicted. On day three, she retreated to a washroom and wondered if she could actually make it all the way. And it was at that moment, as she was looking exhausted into the bathroom mirror, that Harriet Tubman’s image seemed to appear to push Linda to get back on the road.

Linda had decided before the walk that any money she raised would go to the Harriet Tubman Museum and Mural in Cambridge. Still, it was after the hike that she made the bold decision to move to Cambridge full-time and devote her time and energy to help the small education center.

Since then, she has brought together her love of music and added it to museum’s programming in the form of a concert series, entitled “Jazz at the Mural,” which is designed to raise funds but also use her substantial network to bring some of the best names in jazz to town to perform in front of the now famous Tubman mural in downtown Cambridge Saturdays from 6 to 8 pm every other week.

The Spy sat down with her yesterday to discuss the importance of keeping Harriet Tubman’s legacy alive and the role of music in celebrating her lasting impact on American history.

This video is approximately four minutes in length. For more information about The Harriet Tubman Museum & Educational Center please go here.

 

For those who are uninitiated in the world of maritime life, a quick look at Robert Redford’s classic solo film, All Is Lost, is perhaps the best way to remember how quickly things can change on boats.  It Redford’s case, he plays the role of a seasoned sailor where a sequence of events leaves his boat terminally crippled, and the protangant finds himself in the middle of the sea with no help in sight and is preparing for certain doom.

Of course, that is a worst-case scenario of what can happen on boats. But according to Adam Lawrence, one of three captains of Tow Jamm Marine, a towing and salvage company which covers from the mouth of the Chester River to the end of Taylors Island,  there were close to 900 cases in this relatively small part of the Chesapeake where boats needed help of some sort.

In most situations, boats calling for Tow Jamm assistance do so for such things as running out of fuel, having dead batteries, or other equipment failures. In other cases, both sail and motor boats suffer structural damage after hitting trees or branches in the water. And for a handful of others, they are in a real emergency situation, where they have lost their mast or at risk of sinking.

When things get dicey, Tow Jamm transfers those dangerous cases over to either the Coast Guard or local law enforcement departments to handle, but for hundreds of sailors who find themselves in a jam, it is Tow Jamm, with their affiliation with BoatUS, that gets the call.

The Spy spend some time with Adam and his wife and partner, Sarah Lawrence, last week to talk about this unique family business. Started by Sarah’s parents out of Neavitt thirty years ago, Tow Jamm is really the equivalent of the AAA for maritime sailors. For a modest yearly fee starting around $100, Tow Jamm has three boats and crew in three different parts of the Bay that comes to the rescue 24/7.

And over the years, Adam and Sarah have seen it all on the Bay. And most of the time, just like the unlucky car driver calling AAA when a tire goes flat, Tow Jamm quickly responds with fuel, jumper cables, or a quick tow to a local marina for a repair job. But they have also seen some real tragedies during their time.

Nineteen people lost their lives on the Chesapeake last year, and according to Adam, the vast majority of these people could have been saved if they simply had been wearing a life preserver. That is just one of many simple things that boat captains can demand of their passengers to prevent these tragedies from taking place. Another is simply following the weather reports.

Bad luck can always part of any human activity, but the take away from Adam and Sarah as the Chesapeake sees a remarkable surge in boat activity in this post-pandemic world, don’t forget the simple stuff and sign up for Tow Jamm plan just in case.

This video is approximately two minutes in length. For more information about Tow Jamm Marine please go here.