When one thinks of arctic exploration, the state of Maryland does not immediately come to mind. But Maryland’s connection to the history of polar exploration is more than tenuous, as two of its native sons occupy prominent places on the list of travelers to the northernmost point of the earth. When Baltimorean Herbert Frisby flew [...]
…and here are a few images of good cheer from the Maryland Historical Society’s collection of photographs. Happy Holidays!
Like so much of the City of Baltimore, the annual monument lighting bears the stamp of Mayor William Donald Schaefer. Schaefer, mayor from 1971 to 1987, got the inspiration for the idea following a trip to Indianapolis in 1972, when the beauty of the city’s monuments and statues aglow in holiday lights left him in [...]
Many who devote their lives to bringing about social change can recall a single incident or episode that altered their perceptions and determined their path in life. Civil rights activist Rosa Parks recalls that one of the first ways she realized the difference between “a black world and a white world” was when, as a [...]
The process of accepting donations of books, photographs, manuscripts, and other items into the Maryland Historical Society’s collection can be unpredictable. Donations run the gamut from a single postcard, to a family scrapbook, a collection of personal papers, to the entire archive of a business or corporation. Sometimes the entire transaction of accepting a donation [...]
It’s Movember, so here’s a contest! As you may have heard November is Movember, which is national mustache month. The Movember Foundation seeks to raise awareness about prostate cancer and other male cancer initiatives. In honor of Movember and to help raise awareness here in the Fatti maschil, Parole femine (Manly deeds, Womanly words) state we [...]
Busted: the Chinkapin Game Club, 1963 On March 9, 1963, Sgt. Richard T. Davis and his Baltimore County Police force exited Jervis Marshall’s barn having made two arrests, written 67 summonses, and seized 11 dead chickens. The chickens or more appropriately, gamecocks, were the unfortunate victims of the Chinkapin Game Club (CGC), an illegal gambling [...]
The month of October is known for two holidays—Halloween and Columbus Day, as well the 31-day celebration that is National Pork Month. But few outside the archival profession (and probably few within it as well) know that October is also American Archives Month. In commemoration of Archives Month, first celebrated in 1969, here are a [...]
This week, with the final Obama-Romney debate bearing down on us, we thought it would be fun to take a look at some of the more bizarre political and election-related items in our holdings. In doing so we set our sights on Maryland’s own Spiro Agnew, the Nixon administration, and the many products Agnew’s likeness [...]
Welcome to the inaugural post of what will be a monthly series highlighting interviews and other recorded materials from the Maryland Historical Society’s collection of over 1200 oral histories. The collection ranges from interviews with Maryland politicians such as Theodore R. McKeldin, mayor of Baltimore (1943-1947, 1963-1967) and governor of Maryland (1951-1959), to interviews with [...]