On Maryland’s Eastern Shore, a weekend trip to the towns that ships built
By WP BrandStudio
The Eastern Shore of Maryland has an undeniable sense of identity.
So said Pete Lesher, chief curator for the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, located in Talbot County, a laid-back community in the heart of the Eastern Shore. “You find it in the historical record: Eastern Shore is a place name, capitalized. There’s a sense among people who live here that when you cross the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, the pace slows down.”
This air of serenity has slowly settled into the towns of Talbot County, which boasts over 600 miles of tidal shoreline and a long history of sailing and shipping that dates back to more than a century before the American Revolution. The historic shipbuilding towns of Oxford and St. Michaels, for instance, are about 80 miles from the nation’s capital—making them perfect for a weekend getaway spent exploring the area’s rich maritime history, partaking of wild-caught seafood and enjoying yachting and boating in the Chesapeake Bay.
World-class sailing in a former Colonial port
It’s said that Oxford—one of the oldest towns in Maryland—has more boats than people, many of which are still used by watermen who harvest oysters, crabs, clams and fish from the bay. Formally founded in 1683, Oxford has served as an important boating destination since its pre-Revolutionary War days as a prominent international shipping center. Today, it is one of the premier sailing towns in the world; in October, it will host the prestigious 2018 Star World Championship regatta.
“Oxford has a very strong heritage in both building and servicing yachts,” said Elliot Anderson, general manager of Hinckley Yachts, the company known for pioneering fiberglass boat construction. “It’s a small town, but full of high-end service providers.”
The historic Oxford-Bellevue Ferry is emblematic of a different aspect of the town’s maritime legacy. In operation since 1683, it is believed to be the oldest privately held ferry service in the United States. For the last 17 years, it has been owned and operated by Tom and Judy Bixler, a couple who have turned an icon of Maryland’s history into their dream retirement gig.
The ferry shuttles passengers three-quarters of a mile across the Tred Avon River, from Oxford to the tiny hamlet of Bellevue, in 10 minutes. It’s large enough to carry cars and bikes, allowing riders to take advantage of Talbot County’s many wide bike trails. But the best reason to ride the ferry, said Judy Bixler, is the up-close view of life and activity on the bay.
“The journey is never the same,” she said. “There is always different wildlife, different customers aboard. The tides and currents and boats on the water are different. I say we ‘dance with the watermen.’ It’s always a wonderful experience, being out on the water with all that surrounds us.”
A ride on the ferry is best followed by sampling the region’s diverse cuisine, accompanied by a glass of wine from the region’s many wineries. (Captain John Smith, who explored these waters in 1607, didn’t call it a “fruitful and delightsome land” for nothing.) At the Robert Morris Inn, chef Mark Salter brings modern British flair to classic cooking styles, utilizing ingredients sourced from local farms and fishermen. The inn, which was established in 1710, incorporates part of the home of Robert Morris, a prominent merchant in Oxford during its early days whose son would eventually go on to finance the American Revolution.
The Inn, like the ferry and so much else in this historical town, is both a relic of a bygone era and a vibrant hub of life, a rare combination that gives Oxford its one-of-a-kind vibe. It’s also a symbol of the lengths that Talbot County locals will go to in order to preserving their culture. For instance, just a few minutes from Oxford, on Tilghman Island, the Knapps Narrows channel was recently dredged after being unpassable for nearly a decade; this memorial day, boaters and sailors will finally be able to enjoy sailing through the channel and enjoying all that the shore of Tilghman Island has to offer.
“There’s so much history here, but there’s a real hometown feel, too,” Bixler said. “That’s part of the uniqueness of Talbot County—it has this history that goes back to before the founding of America, but those threads and stories continue.”
A repository of history on the Chesapeake Bay
Founded as a trading post for Colonial-era trappers and tobacco farmers, the town of St. Michaels truly put itself on the map as a shipbuilding hub. Its most famous product was a swift schooner, later known as the Baltimore clipper, that helped the United States win the War of 1812. The town boomed in the ensuing years, a legacy seen in its stately churches and Colonial- and Victorian-style homes.
In recent decades, St. Michaels has turned to tourism to show off its maritime heritage and waterfront culture, and its crown jewel is the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum. With a floating fleet of historic boats, a working shipyard and a cluster of historic buildings on its 18-acre waterfront campus, the museum is the ideal place to learn about the living history of the Chesapeake Bay.
“We tell the stories of the connections between people and nature in the Chesapeake,” said Lesher. “We are about authenticity. We don’t do first-person interpretation—you meet real watermen and see real historical vessels. We’re about the cultural connection, the story of people here.”
The museum’s logo features the Hooper Strait Lighthouse, built in 1879 to guide ships through the shallow shoals of the Hooper Strait, near Tangier Sound. In 1966, the lighthouse was moved to St. Michaels in a first-of-its-kind preservation effort by the museum. The museum also has the largest collection of Chesapeake Bay watercraft in existence—92 vessels in total. Lesher’s favorite is Martha, a 1934 Hoopers Island dovetail with a unique rounded stern that was used for oystering and crabbing.
The collection also includes several log canoes, a traditional sailboat that is now mostly used for racing. The design of the log canoe was influenced by the dugouts carved from hollowed trees by Native Americans; 18th-century American boatbuilders, inspired by this woodwork, had the idea of pinning and shaving several logs together to create a larger, more powerful vessel. According to Lesher, this cross-cultural technology transfer was unique to the region. And the log canoe was the bay’s predominant fishing and oystering boat for years, until it was superseded by the more modern bugeye, and later the skipjack.
An authentic working skipjack, the H.M. Krentz, is docked at the Maritime Museum. Riders can take two-hour tours that provide firsthand experience of the ecology and history of the waterfront. (The boat can also be chartered by private groups.) You can help pull up sails, dredge oysters, and watch osprey and waterfowl swoop and dive, all while feeling the wind and water on your face.
Capt. Ed Farley is the tour captain. A lifelong waterman—he still wakes up early in the morning to dredge oysters and crabs—Captain Ed has lived in the area for nearly five decades. He inherited a boat from his father, which he sailed south from New England one winter as a young man. He reached the Eastern Shore and was fascinated by the watercraft there, particularly the skipjacks. “I thought, ‘I’d better go out on one of those before they’re all gone,’” he says. “That one day of curiosity turned into 46 years of being here.”
On his tours, Captain Ed shares anecdotes from his life and information about the region’s history and ecology. He hopes to create a constituency concerned with the continued health and wellness of life on the bay by showing the very best of what it can offer.
“Being involved with the natural forces and rhythms of this world—that’s my life philosophy,” Farley said. “That’s why I’m still here.”
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