July 2020 Tidewater Times

Tidewater Times

July 2020

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Vol. 69, No. 2

Published Monthly

July 2020

Features: About the Cover Artist: Kathleen Rogers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Bigfoot in the Neck District: Helen Chappell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Elephants, Butterflies and Amethysts, Oh, My!: Bonna L. Nelson . . 21 July Tide Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Drawing the Line: A.M. Foley . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 Tidewater Kitchen: Pamela Meredith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 Four Sisters, a Mother and the American Dream: Mike Valliant . 71 Tidewater Gardening: K. Marc Teffeau . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 Tilghman ~ Bay Hundred . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 Queen Anne’s County . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 Caroline County ~ A Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Treasure Hunting in the Rockies: Rick Klepfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 Festival of Trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Changes ~ All American (Part X): Roger Vaughan . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 Anne B. Farwell & John D. Farwell, Co-Publishers Proofing: Jodie Littleton & Kippy Requardt Deliveries: Nancy Smith, April Jewel & Brandon Coleman Social Media Liaison: Mary Farwell P. O. Box 1141, Easton, Maryland 21601 3947 Harrison Circle, Trappe MD 21673 410-714-9389 FAX : 410-476-6286 www.tidewatertimes.com info@tidewatertimes.com

Tidewater Times is published monthly by Bailey-Farwell, LLC. Advertising rates upon request.

Subscription price is $30.00 per year. Individual copies are $4. Contents of this publication may not be reproduced in part or whole without prior approval of the publisher. The publisher does not assume any liability for errors and/or omissions.

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About the Cover Artist Kathleen Rogers

The winner of the Tidewater Times Plein Air Cover Contest is Kathleen Rogers with her painting, Oyster Baskets.

Kathleen has dabbled in art for many years but she became serious when she retired in 2014 and moved to Easton from Virginia. She was excited to be juried into Plein Air, Easton! Local Color her fi rst year in town. Soon after, Louis Escobedo accepted her into his mentoring classes that met once a week. Her work progressed from that point and she began to grow as an artist.

Unfortunately Escobedo moved to Santa Fe, so she began new mentoring classes with Nancy Tankersley who is an equally superb teacher.

Rogers has also taken classes at the Academy of Arts with such excellent teachers as Katie Cassidy, Brad Ross, and Bernie Dellario. Occasionally, she will model for the Monday portrait class.

Last Fall, the Academy sponsored a program called “Art in Three Acts.”

Four artists were chosen, along with four writers, and four musicians. She was lucky enough to be one of the artists. It was a magical evening that combined all three genres.

Her memberships include the Academy of Arts, St. Michaels Art League, and the Working Artists

Sunset Forum (which is a juried artist group).

Her honors and awards include Fairfax Art League Spotlight Show Honorable Mention, 2013; second place St. Michaels Annual Show, 2016; third place St. Michaels Art League Annual Show, 2017; juried into Easton’s Local Color 2014, 2015, and 2017.

Her goal as an artist is to see the beauty and color in ordinary things and translate that onto the canvas for you, the viewer, to enjoy and interpret in your own way.

To view more of Kathleen’s work visit kathiemrogers.com.

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Bigfoot in the Neck District by Helen Chappell

So, a couple or three weeks ago, my brother drops me an email: “Do you know that our father had an encounter with Bigfoot, or whatever you call it in Maryland?”

Of course, I remembered. In fact, I’d thought about it for the first time in years a couple of months before Ed brought it up. Great minds. And, of course, this all happened about the time JFK was president, so we were teenagers, and, being teenagers, totally self-occupied.

“I remember Dad said it was very hairy,” my brother typed. “It really freaked him out (no sh#t) he bought that 9-shot .22 pistol and put on the flood lights that you could turn on without leaving the car. Have you heard any stories about it?”

Neither Ed nor I was there the night The Thing turned up on the front porch of The Farm. I’m not even sure our mother was there, although if she was, she would have denied any sort of foolishness, real or supernatural, because she was an absolute realist. My father, on the other hand, could be a bit of a storyteller, and he could do it with his tongue so firmly planted in his cheek you’d believe every word he said.

But the next weekend, when

we came down to The Farm, there was evidence. Paw marks and claw marks on the white-painted pillars of the front porch. There were mud and clumps of dried soil in the brickwork of the floor. The paw prints, or whatever they were, went about four feet up the wooden pillars ~ four or five pads with claw prints. Something had been there.

Some backstory: Until about 1965, my father owned a good-sized farm on Ross Neck, near Hudson, below Cambridge.

During the Depression, when he was young and single and just starting to practice surgery, he’d bought up three small adjoining farms and turned them into one property, which he called Ross Range Farms.

Here he could hunt and fish and run 9

Bigfoot

a hobby farm where he first bred pigs (yeah, I know) and, later, Hereford cattle.

The pigs were long gone before he and my mother got married and had Ed and me, but the cattle were there until the day they sold up and moved to a smaller place in Talbot County.

In those days, the Necks were sparsely populated and mostly farms. Our house was pretty isolated from the neighbors, which gave it, to my kid imagination, a ghostly, eerie feel from babyhood until the day we left. I always felt as if there was something supernatural there, even though the rest of the family relentlessly mocked me for it.

So that night, according to my father, he was sitting at the kitchen table reading, and he heard a scraping and snuffling out on the front porch, where he’d left the overhead light on. He said he got up and went to see what was going on, and there

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all day operating on people. It just wasn’t his nature.

was this big, brown hairy thing out there scraping at the porch pillars.

Here, the details get a little sketchy, but I seem to recall, as he told it, he looked at The Thing, and The Thing looked at him, and he went to get a gun from the gun case. When he came back, The Thing was gone, leaving paw prints and mud behind.

The thing is, I saw those prints, and that mud, and those claw marks, as did Ed. This wasn’t something my father was making up to entertain himself. He wasn’t the kind to stir himself to rig up paw prints and all that foolishness after a hard day of standing on his feet

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Bigfoot

was not one for foolishness. That’s my job.

Some readers will remember about a decade ago, we had a wandering black bear on the Mid-Shore.

A juvenile had wandered down from Pennsylvania in search of a mate and some new territory not occupied by old alpha bears. He was spotted everywhere, until finally he was trapped and released over in Western Maryland.

So, I got to wondering if The Thing had been either a stray black bear or a captured cub some idiot had brought down here from a hunt up north, and then set free because some people are stupid. It would have been attracted to our front porch by the insect bounty swarming around the porch light. All of those bugs would have been quite

what a raccoon looked like, and The Thing was not a raccoon. Or a dog.

Or a deer. Or any of the other fauna that roamed the Neck District in those days. The lights were on, he’d gotten a good look at it, and it was none of those things.

While he was an intern and a resident, my father had traveled to a lot of places and had a lot of adventures, being quite the outdoorsman, so if he said he didn’t know what The Thing was, he didn’t. And, as I said, he wasn’t making it up.

The thing is, my brother is considered the sane and sensible one it the family. He’s a retired commercial pilot who volunteers for the Coast Guard Auxiliary, so you don’t have to take my word for it that Dad

The Farm 16

17

Bigfoot the feast for a young black bear. It would explain the paw prints and claw marks as it rose on its rear legs to grab those delicious moths and mosquitoes.

It certainly would have been large and hairy. And a bear can move around comfortably on its rear legs ~ which is why so many people mistake a bipedal bear for a humanoid creature. I’m no expert on cryptozoology, but it seems to me a bear cub, or even a yearling, would attract some notice, even in rural farmland and woodlands.

Ed was having none of this. He shot back with a list of alleged Bigfoot sightings around Maryland, including a photo of an alleged Sasquatch over in Laurel, documented in The Washington City Paper.

Unsurprisingly, there have been a lot in Western Maryland, up in the mountains, but none on the MidShore. Just one in Wicomico County, and knowing Wicomico County, I have to wonder about that one.

But my brother wants to believe what our father saw was Bigfoot, and who am I to disagree with him?

Our father, to the best of my recall, never said he thought it was a Sasquatch. I believe you can believe whatever you want, as long as you’re not bothering someone else with it, and honestly, I wasn’t there.

I saw some muddy prints and claw marks, and I just don’t know.

To my mind, that place was creepy enough to have Bigfoot, Count Dracula, Frankenstein and the Wolfman all hanging around.

I do not know. I was not there when The Thing came, but it remains a puzzle.

Helen Chappell is the creator of the Sam and Hollis mystery series and the Oysterback stories, as well as The Chesapeake Book of the Dead. Under her pen names, Rebecca Baldwin and Caroline Brooks, she has published a number of historical novels.

Editor's Note: USA TODAY named our own Helen Chappell’s book Oysterback Tales, the best book about Maryland. The May 27th edition chose it as the best regional fiction about her state. We are so proud of your accomplishment! Helen is one talented lady!!

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Elephants, Butterflies and Amethysts - Oh, My! by Bonna L. Nelson

I am so fascinated by the Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) collections in Washington, D.C., that I visited twice last year. The first trip in early summer was with our daughter, Holly, a girls’ weekend for her birthday. The second visit was a day trip with my husband, John, and our granddaughter, Bella, for her birthday. Since it was Bella’s first trip to the city, we added a bonus ~ a bus tour of the Capital area, stopping last at the NMNH.

Bella’s face was glued to the window of the bus as we passed sites that she had only seen online, on television or in books: the Washington Monument, the White House, the Lincoln Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the Martin Luther King Memorial and the Capitol Building.

Quite curious, she asked and we answered pertinent questions as we passed some of our nation’s most important and recognizable structures. It was wonderful to revisit the Capital through the eyes of a child,

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Elephants and Butterflies

located prominently on the National Mall near the Smithsonian Castle and other Smithsonian museums.

According to the NMNH website the museum’s mission is “to promote understanding of the natural world and our place in it.” It contains approximately 146 million artifacts and specimens in its collections, which “tell the history of the planet and a record of human interaction with the environment and one another.”

The free museum offers accessible insight into our natural world w ith galleries of specimens, interactive exhibits and multimedia displays on topics such as animals, insects, dinosaurs, fossils, marine life, ancient Egypt, gems, minerals, meteorites, plants, human history and other aspects of life on Earth.

Additionally, NMNH offers tours, lectures, scientific demonstrations, films and experiences that “spark curiosity, and illuminate the beauty and wonder of the planet” for all ages and interests.

The museum’s iconic centerpiece, an African Bush elephant specimen, standing proudly on a high pedestal with his trunk raised in a salute, greeted us in the NMNH’s soaring first-floor rotunda. I clearly remember when I first spotted the mammoth 12-ton, 14-foot-tall elephant on my elementary school visit to the museum. I was enthralled with the gigantic mammal surrounded by two stories of elegant balconies with intricate architectural features and

the wonder, the awe. We promised a return trip to stop at some of those sites, but we were headed to the Smithsonian’s NMNH, where the elephants, butterflies and amethysts would surely amaze her.

The NMNH is one of the most visited and popular museums in the world, attracting approximately five million visitors a year, according to the Smithsonian Institute. The museum is housed in an opulent Neoclassical, Beaux Arts-style structure with a granite façade, a massive columned portico and an iconic green dome. The building opened in 1910 and, with additional expansions since, now incorporates approximately 132 million square feet. It is 24

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Elephants and Butterflies

floors house research wings for some of the 450 researchers and scientists supporting the NMNH research and laboratory programs.

Both of our girls were as excited as we were to explore the treasures of the museum. Our daughter and granddaughter both had particular exhibits that they were interested in touring, as did I. We began our visit with Bella on the first floor, starting with an exhibit of utmost interest to her, the special temporary feature, Narwhal: Revealing an Arctic Legend. Narwhal specimens hung over our heads as if they were swimming, and other mounts were encased in glass.

It was our lucky day; a Smithsonian Institute scientist was on site to discuss the fascinating narwhals and shared a narwhal skull with spiral tusk intact. She let Bella touch the skull and tusk and explained that the narwhal tusk is really a tooth and that some, though rarely, have two tusks, as did one on display. We learned that narwhals, sometimes called the Unicorns of the Sea, are in

doorways leading to collections of mysteries and wonders from around the world. I learned from the signage that the elephant is the earth’s largest land mammal. I was in awe then and still am, and so were our girls.

The NMNH’s world-renowned collection gallery halls include the Fossils (with a newly renovated dinosaur exhibit and a special narwhal exhibit), African Voices, Human Origins, Ocean Voices and Mammals on the first floor surrounding the rotunda. The second-floor gallery halls include Geology, Gems and Minerals (display ing the Hope Diamond), Bones (Anatomy), Mummies, a Live Insect Zoo and a Live Butterfly Pavilion. Like the ground floor, these two 28

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Elephants and Butterflies

the whale family, have mottled gray and brown coloring, grow up to 10 feet and can hold their breath for up to 25 minutes.

Scientists think that the male narwhal tusk is used for attracting females, fighting off competitors and stunning prey. The Narwhal Exhibit also included panoramic views of the narwhal’s landscape in the Arctic bays and estuaries and titillating soundscapes of shifting ice, f low ing water and nar whal vocalizations making us feel as if we were swimming with these nearmythic creatures that travel in herds of up to 100. We also came across an inspiring Inuit legend about the magical narwhal as retold by an Inuit elder living in the Arctic area.

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Elephants and Butterflies mounted in an upper wall alcove.

Bella moved ahead, and we found her with her head inside a large hippopotamus’s mouth. While we watched a film about mammals, Bella sat next to a bronze chimpanzee sculpture.

Displaying an incredible array of mammals, from the largest to the tiniest, the Mammal Hall is pure delight for kids.

After looking at mammal specimens, we examined their bones. The centerpiece of the Hall of Fossils, newly reopened after a five-year, $125 million renovation, is a 35-footlong Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ~ the chairman of the board of 700 other specimens, including mammal

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Elephants and Butterflies

mans’ positive and negative impacts on the world and climate). The highlight of the Hall of Human Origins is a complete Neanderthal fossil. All of these galleries are on the first floor.

As with any large museum, more time is always needed to absorb the exhibits and information presented.

You could easily spend hours, maybe days, in each Hall.

Accessible by both stairs and elevator, the second-floor exhibits include a particular favorite of Holly’s and mine, the Butterf ly Pavilion.

Tickets are required for this timed experience. Well, we could have stayed there all day! Oh, the wonder of butterflies. The intricate beauty and delicacy. The iridescent shades of purple, blue, green, orange, red, yellow, gold, silver, black and white.

The small, temperature-controlled enclosure includes tropical plants and trees and stations where butterflies feed on pineapple and other fruit chunks.

skeletons and 46 complete dinosaur specimens. The NMNH states that the exhibition tells the story of 3.7 billion years of life on Earth, “highlighting the connections among ecosystems, climate, geological forces and evolution…encouraging viewers to understand how the choices they make today will impact the future.”

Bella solemnly mentioned how her family is trying to help the planet by recycling and using less plastic.

Holly was intent on reading the exhibit inscriptions and graphs on her visit.

We nex t strolled through the Ocean Hall (674 models and specimens), A f r ican Voices (ex hibits related to African history, culture and global influence) and the Hall of Human Origins (exhibits following 6 million years of evolution and hu-

The pav ilion enables v isitors to observe live butterf lies f lying, fluttering, flitting, resting and eat34

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Elephants and Butterflies ing and explains the butter f ly’s sy mbiotic relationship w ith the plant world. The baby blue morpho butterflies from Central and South America were my favorites. They seemed more extroverted than the others and rested marvelously on our shoulders and arms, a unique experience that’s no to be missed.

On both visits, I took John, Bella and Holly to the Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals. The collection is considered one of the most significant in the world. The exhibit is one of my favorites due to my fascination with collecting and understanding rocks and gemstones. Although the highlight for most visitors to the Gem Hall is the famous blue Hope Diamond, my favorite specimen is a boulder-like amethyst rock that visitors can touch. The purple quartz gemstone has been prized since ancient times. The darker the purple, the more valuable the stone.

I like to place my hand, adorned w it h my a met hy st a n n iver sa r y ring, my favorite gemstone, on the amethyst rock and see and feel a connection with nature.

The displays of agates, crystals, diamonds and meteorites (45,000) and discussions about volcanoes and

Not being a big fan of insects landing on her, Bella was not interested in the Butterfly Pavilion. She was, however, curious about the live Insect Zoo exhibit. Insects were okay as long as they were behind glass, so we observed live cockroaches, cutter ants, spiders, flies and other critters in natural habitats. Bella surprised us when we encountered a scientist with a large brown and black tarantula resting on his arm and surrounded by a group of amazed kids.

She joined the crowd and was one of several kids who, very tentatively, touched the hairy spider that was the size of a man’s fist.

36

37

Elephants and Butterflies

Minerals Store is a must-stop for me to select a new agate, my favorite rock, and new gemstone jewelry to my collection.

The family was not as keen on The Eternal Life in Ancient Egypt Hall as I was and am. We have a trip planned to Egypt in 2021. I was all in to see the three human and 16 animal mummies (snakes, birds, etc.) featured along with artifacts such as jewelry, sculptures, statues, pottery, hieroglyphic documents, tools and others excavated from Egyptian tombs. This Hall also includes an interactive touchscreen film about the mummification process and exhibits on facial reconstruction. The exhibits reveal how Egyptians lived and prepared to die. Amazing!

Nearly out of time, we practi-

earthquakes explain mysteries about our solar system and how the earth was formed. The NMNH’s Gems and

38

39

Elephants and Butterflies

cally ran through the Hall of Bones, which displays a variety of vertebrate skeletons grouped by their evolutionary relationships. We want to go back to learn more about the skeletons of various animals such as f lying fish and sea turtles, snakes, giraffes and monkeys. How do they compare and contrast? How do they explain where and how the animals live and what they eat?

There is so much more in life to learn about. The NMNH is a good place to spend time learning more about ourselves and the world we have been gifted. It is there that the connections between elephants, butterflies and amethysts can be made.

If you get hungry, NMNH dining options include the Atrium CafĂŠ

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detector and bag inspection at all entrances. Plan for and allow time for that requirement. When operating, the museum is open every day except Christmas from 10 a.m. until 5:30 p.m., sometimes later in the summer months. Go early and wear comfortable shoes to see all the wonders in this love letter to the world.

For more information about the museum, collections, visit planning, or to discover ways you can explore the NMNH online offerings during the pandemic, visit naturalhistory. si.edu.

on the ground f loor where we ate with Bella. The Café was cafeteria style, no waiting, clean and suitable for kids. We did not try the Ocean Terrace Café on the fi rst floor, but it looked delightful. There is also a Garden Lounge for meditating or relaxing on the second f loor. You may not bring food into the museum.

As of this writing, the Smithsonian museums were closed indefinitely due to the social distancing requirement during the COVID-19 pandemic. When they reopen, know that nearby free parking is ver y limited. An advance reservation at a parking garage is recommended.

Check the museum website for more parking information.

Security is tight, with a metal

Bonna L. Nelson is a Bay-area writer, columnist, photographer and world traveler. She resides in Easton with her husband, John.

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TIDE TABLE

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Drawing the Line by A.M. Foley

In 1631, Virginian William Claiborne’s claim on Kent Island was a far distance above the VirginiaMaryland boundary line across Chesapeake Bay, but it wasn’t the last dispute to end in violence.

Fences may make good neighbors,

but they can’t divide the Bay waters. From time to time, the two governments turned their attention to the unresolved question, but nothing definitive resulted. As onshore land and islands eroded and subsided, and nomenclature

A map of Virginia, Maryland, and the improved parts of Pennsylvania & New Jersey, 1685 map of the Chesapeake region by Christopher Browne.

45

Drawing the Line

Depositions given authorities in the 1870s enumerate issues that touched island lives before the mid-1800s, such as minor spats over gunning rights. John Spence created one such dispute “at the time of the British war” [1812]. He

changed over centuries, the precise location of the boundary became hazier and hazier.

Until the post-Civil War boom in oyster values exacerbated earlier problems, lawmakers above and below the elusive line weren’t compelled to face the issue. Certainly, the line ran through Smith Island, and likely Fox Island too, but relatively few islanders actually lived with the consequences of the failure to come to a precise line. One 1870s deponent, John Marshall, testified, “The officers of Virginia have always neglected to come on here for any purpose except when they wanted us to vote.”

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47

Drawing the Line

Marylanders from skiffing and gunning in Virginia.

“Several old people were called together to say where the line was.

Richard Evans, who was called King Richard (because he was best off I suppose), John Parks, an old man, Jacob Bradshaw, who was quite a young man then, met at old Uncle John Parks . . . and Uncle John Parks said that the South line ran between his dwelling and his kitchen. . . . ” A line run between the dwelling house and the separate “summer kitchen” put the boy in the wrong. His elders shot from fixed positions thought to be in Virginia, so John Spence had to curtail his gunning to appease them. “My

lived with his parents on Smith Island, near where the state line was thought to run, on land owned by his maternal uncle. Ref lecting back on his teenage years, Spence testified, “I followed the water and loved gunning.”

He harbored a skiff off Hog Neck at a place he called Head of Creek, and he liked to go out gunning from there. Neighbors, including the island’s most prominent citizen, came to his Uncle John Parks complaining about the youngster and his gunning skiff, saying, “the noise scared the geese and other wild fowl of a night. . . . They said that the law of Virginia forbid

John Smith’s map draws the line straight across from Watkins Point to Cinquack. Later maps have the line in a zig-zag pattern to give Virginia rights to prime oystering beds.

48

uncle got mad about my skiff,” he said. “Jacob Bradshaw had a fowling point called Goose Harbor and King Richard had a fowling point called Foggs Point.”

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*** At “British war” time, oysters were hand-tonged and commercially insignificant. Even fifty years later, when the Civil War theoretically split Smith Island in two, little had been recorded of oystering disputes, much less political loyalties.

As Spence testified, “When I first began the boating business, there was but very little trouble about the place where we oystered.”

John Marshall said, “When I lived up on Smith Point, I didn’t know in which state I lived. I voted in both states. I pay the oyster tax in Virginia. Many of the people on Smith Island pay the tax on the oyster license in both states.”

Post-Civil War, dredges came into wide use, canneries sprang up, and railroad and steamboat networks developed nearby to carry oysters to far-off markets. Regulations on oystering conf licted between the two states, so the Oyster Wars were on.

Not for the first time (or the last), the 1872 Commission was appointed to blow dust off Captain John Smith’s 1608 map, along with assorted earlier Spanish and later English maps depicting fea-

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Drawing the Line

from both Maryland and Virginia.

When Henry Dies was deposed, he agreed with Spence: “Mr. John Parks lived on a place called Hog Neck. I have heard in times past from the old people on Smith Island that when the people on that island desired to be married from the state of Maryland that the Reverend Joshua Thomas, who was in those days a Methodist local preacher, would meet them and marry the couples of Maryland in the dwelling house of my [great] uncle John Parks, and when any couples from Virginia desired to be married he would meet them at the same place and marry them in the kitchen, that being then considered in Virginia. . . . The house and the

tures whose names had morphed from phonetic Native spellings into pseudo-English. Conf licting claims and charters from assorted European kings were scrutinized in various translations from Latin into English.

The commissioners had their work cut out for them, and interviews did little to clarify the dusty documents. Interviewing islanders for first-hand knowledge and traditional lore, they found that residents had formerly taken little interest in boundaries, coping among themselves with minor inconveniences and civic niceties, sometimes confounding authorities

Watkins Point and MD-VA boundary, as drawn by John Senex in 1719.

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Drawing the Line

to Smith Island and said, “I was, when a small boy, shown a gum tree, which stood on Old Orchard or Cow Ridge. I have often swung in a swing on that tree when quite a small boy, and was always told when swinging one way that I was in Virginia, and when the other way I was in Maryland.”

Confusion was inevitable for the commissioners, as well as for tax collectors. Surnames on the island were few, given names fewer yet, thus John Parks and Old John Parks and Uncle John Parks. Names for locations were multiple choice.

Evans had recently moved from Horse Hammock to Rogues Point.

“On Horse Hammock,” he said, “I paid taxes once in Maryland to Mr. Roach, the sheriff of Somerset county, and he paid them back to me. There was another John Evans.

He meant to collect from him. I now live north of Horse Hammock on a part of Orchard Ridge now called Rogues Point and the deed will be recorded in Accomack County, Virginia. The Rogues Point where I live . . . has always been taxed in Maryland, though it is, I know, recorded in Virginia.”

kitchen were from twenty to thirty feet apart.”

John Spence said of his uncle’s Hog Neck property, “I lived North of [Uncle] John Parks’ dwellinghouse and always paid taxes in Maryland. I don’t remember that John Parks ever paid taxes. He could go from one house to the other, so they told me.”

Other depositions muddied the waters further. Islanders held offices and attended school in different states, and switched from state to state when voting in elections. In his 1873 deposition, Smith Islandborn Johnson Evans declared, “Since I bought Horse Hammock I have paid taxes in Maryland and my son John, who was joint owner with me of the place, paid his taxes in Virginia. . . . [Former owner] Peter Evans, I am told, paid his taxes in both states. . . . I have heard that Horse Hammock was always considered in Virginia until John (called Jacky) Tyler, was appointed a justice of the peace in Maryland.”

Thirty-four-year-old John W. Evans testified to being native

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Drawing the Line

whipped and one or more of them ducked, to make them remember it as a boundary stone. A boundary of what I don’t know; whether of two states or two owners of land.”

John Marshall agreed on the location of the stone. William Tyler had shown it to him fifteen or maybe twenty years earlier, saying it divided the two states. “He was carried to that stone and whipped by his grandfather . . . whipped there to make him remember,” Marshall said.

The consensus of those deposed was that two of the three boys were whipped to impress the stone’s importance on their memory. The third Tyler boy was considered too young to whip, so was “ducked,”

Deponents agreed on one point.

All remembered a stone said to be a marker, though some were hazy whether it pertained to the state boundary or merely two pieces of property. In any case, a certain Butler Tyler had successfully etched the boundary stone on many minds, especially his grandsons’.

Johnson Evans testified, “I have heard for many years of a stone on the east side of Smiths Island about three-quarters of a mile or a mile north of this house at Horse Hammock, at which children John L. Tyler, William Tyler, and Thomas Tyler had been taken when young, one or more of them

54

ging across the Chesapeake bears little resemblance to the straight line, initially drawn eastward on Captain John Smith’s map in 1632, from the village of Cinquack to Watkins Point on the Wigloo River.

that is, thrown into water over his head to fear drowning.

Grandfather Butler Tyler successfully imprinted the stone on the boys’ memories, as they all related the incident and pointed the stone out to others in years to come. Beyond the three Tylers’ lifetimes, witnesses in 1873 could tell the commissioners where the stone was currently located, still distinctive, though ice had moved it a few feet off an eroding shore and broken it in two.

Fast-forward to 1958, when a presumably final compact brought peace in our times, nailing down a line that bears witness to three hundred years’ worth of pushing and pulling. The line now zigzag-

After co-writing pictorial histories for Arcadia Publishing with Gloria Johnson (Cambridge and Dorchester County), Ann Foley wrote Having My Say: Conversations with Chesapeake Bay Waterman Wylie “Gator” Abbott; A Dorchester County Scrapbook: “That Reminds Me of a Story” (with Terry White); and, most recently, Holland Island: Lost Atlantis of the Chesapeake (with P. Smith Rue).

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Herbs for All Reasons Dill is one of the most versatile herbs in the garden. It has been used to combat witchcraft, hush a baby’s cry and spike a love potion.

Dill found its way into a cook’s cauldron in the Middle Ages, and we have happily been adding it to recipes ever since.

A member of the parsley fam-

ily, dill originated in the Mediterranean. Its meaning comes from a Nordic word that means “lull” or “dull.” The definition refers to dill’s early medicinal uses as a means of inducing sleep and soothing indigestion.

Dill comes in several forms. Dill weed is the airy foliage of the dill

57

Tidewater Kitchen

r Fo lity l i l Ca ilab a Av

plant. Dill seeds boast a more pungent and bitter flavor. We also use dill weed in a dry form. One teaspoon of dried dill weed may be substituted for one tablespoon of fresh.

The best way to ensure a fresh supply of dill is to grow it at home.

After it f lowers, you will also have seeds.

Dill is not suited to growing in pots. If you buy a transplant and set it out, it will often f lower, set seeds and die very quickly. For the best results, sow seeds directly into the garden. Snip the foliage with scissors, rather than a knife.

Just don’t trim more than half of the plant’s foliage at once.

Another herb that contributes tons of f lavor to your cooking is chives. One bite of cheesy chive-

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Tidewater Kitchen

have chives growing in your garden, you can purchase the herb in dried form.

Rosemary is another amazing and versatile herb. The carnosic acid found in rosemary helps protect the brain from degeneration.

Rosemary also has high levels of antioxidants and anti-inf lammatory properties.

stuffed potatoes and you might think they are f lavored with onion.

The familiar f lavor actually comes from chives, an herb akin to the onion. It is used to season vegetables and delicately f lavor egg and seafood dishes.

Chives are easily grown in the garden or in a container. The more you clip them, the more their growth is encouraged. You can begin them as seeds, but the easiest way is to buy a small pot of seedlings, space them 8 inches apart in a sunny spot and watch them fill in.

Since chives go dormant in winter, you can freeze cut chives during their growing season. If you don’t

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Rosemary and thyme go well together to f lavor homemade pita chips or roasted chickpeas. Rosemary is also a fun way to add more f lavor to cocktails, pizza and even French toast!

Helpful hint: firmly grab a branch by the stem, pinch the top with your other hand and run your fingers down to the base. The rosemary leaves should easily peel off for all your cooking needs!

1/4 cup chopped chives 2 T. melted butter 1/4 t. sea salt Freshly ground pepper to taste

CHEESY CHIVE-STUFFED POTATOES Serves 6 3 baking potatoes - uniform size Extra-virgin olive oil 1/3 cup buttermilk salad dressing 1 cup cheddar cheese, grated

Wash potatoes and rub skins with olive oil. Bake at 400° for 1 hour. Allow potatoes to cool, cut in half lengthwise and carefully scoop out pulp. Coarsely chop

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Tidewater Kitchen

Cook potatoes in boiling salted water to cover for 15-20 minutes.

Drain and cool. Peel and cube potatoes.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter in an 8-inch omelet pan or heavy skillet; add potatoes and cook over medium heat until potatoes are browned. Remove potatoes.

pulp. Combine potato pulp with the salad dressing, half the cheese and the rest of the ingredients; stir until blended. Stuff shells with potato mixture. Top with the rest of the cheese. Bake at 300° for 10 minutes or until thoroughly heated.

COUNTRY OMELETS Serves 3 3/4 pound new potatoes 4 T. butter, divided 6 eggs 3 T. water 2 T. chopped chives 1/4 t. sea salt 1/8 t. freshly ground pepper

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Combine eggs, water, chives, salt and pepper in a medium bowl. Stir briskly with a fork until blended.

Heat omelet pan; pour one-third of egg mixture into pan. As mixture starts to cook, gently lift edges of omelet with a spatula and tilt pan so uncooked portion f lows underneath. Spoon one-third of the potatoes over half of omelet. Loosen omelet with spatula; fold omelet in half and transfer to serving plate.

Repeat procedure to make the rest of the omelets.

8 chicken breast halves, boneless and skinless 1 t. salt 1 cup celery, chopped 3 hard-boiled eggs, chopped 1 (3 oz.) package cream cheese, softened 1/2 cup mayonnaise 1/4 cup sour cream 1-1/2 T. chopped fresh dill weed 1 t. dry mustard 1/4 t. sea salt 1/8 t. freshly ground pepper Lettuce leaves

CHICKEN SALAD with DILL Serves 8 For a luncheon, stuff this chicken salad into avocado halves.

Place the chicken breasts in a large pot with a tight-fitting lid and add enough liquid to cover. Season with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, cover and lower heat slightly

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Tidewater Kitchen

DILLED CUCUMBER CASSEROLE Serves 4-6 Flavored with dill, this cucumber casserole satisfies that craving for new taste combinations.

4 cucumbers 3 T. butter 4 T. fresh dill weed, finely chopped Sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

so it stays at a rapid simmer. Depending on the size of the chicken breasts, they should simmer for about 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, remove one piece from the pot and check for doneness. The internal temperature should be 165°.

If they need more time, check every 5 minutes. Don’t let them overcook or they will become rubbery.

Drain the chicken, reserving and freezing the broth for other uses.

Cut chicken into bite-sized pieces.

Combine chicken, celery and eggs and set aside.

Combine cream cheese and next 6 ingredients. Add to chicken mixture and toss well. Cover and chill.

Serve on lettuce leaves or in avocado halves.

Peel the cucumbers and cut in half lengthwise. Remove all the seeds with a small spoon and cut the cucumbers into 1/2-inch-thick slices. Put them into a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil for 1 minute. Drain.

In a skillet, melt the butter, add the dill and cucumbers. Season with salt and pepper. Sauté cucumbers for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Serve hot.

Note: If cucumbers are bought in the store, they have wax on them.

Always peel with a vegetable peeler.

CREAMY DILL DIP This dip is great with both veg64

1 t. Beau Monde seasoning Stir all ingredients together in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight before serving.

FRENCH TOAST with FRESH ROSEMARY Serves 4 1 loaf challah bread 8- to 9-inch fresh rosemary stem 1-1/2 cups milk 1/4 cup half-and-half 1 T. vanilla extract 2 T. butter, plus a little extra to coat fry pan 1/4 cup maple syrup, plus more for serving at the table 4 eggs

etables and chips.

1 cup sour cream 1 cup mayonnaise 1 T. dried dill weed 1 T. minced onion

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Tidewater Kitchen Cut the challah bread into 8 3/4-inch-thick slices. Feel free to use the heels.

Strip the rosemary off the stem.

Finely mince a little rosemary and set aside.

Combine the milk, half-and-half and rosemary stem in a medium saucepan. Heat over medium heat, stirring, until little bubbles appear.

Take off the heat and fish out the rosemary stem with tongs and discard. Add 2 tablespoons butter to the mixture, stir until melted. Add the vanilla extract and maple syrup. In a separate bowl, whisk the 4 eggs, then blend into the milk mixture. Refrigerate until ready to use.

You can do this the night before.

When you are ready to make the French toast, pour the mixture into a baking dish. Take a slice of bread and soak in the milk mixture, doing each side very quickly. You want to be able to cover the bread, but not so it is soggy and tearing.

Heat 2 teaspoons of butter in your frying pan (I love a cast iron skillet), then add the dipped bread and cook until golden brown, about 4 minutes per side. Repeat until you have cooked all the bread.

Heat the maple syrup and place butter and extra minced rosemary on the table. Plate with 2 slices of toast, a pat of butter, a drizzle of maple syrup and a sprinkle of rosemary. Serve immediately.

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ROSEMARY and PARMESAN ROASTED CHICKPEAS 66

1 t. dried crushed rosemary 1 garlic clove, mashed Kosher salt and pepper to taste Preheat oven to 400° and drizzle olive oil on a jelly roll pan.

Toss the garbanzo beans with the rest of the ingredients in a large bowl until evenly coated. Arrange the beans on the jelly roll pan in a single layer. Drizzle a little more olive oil on top for a bit of crisp.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until they are golden brown and crispy.

Pour into a serving bowl and cool slightly. Enjoy!

2 (14.5 oz.) cans garbanzo beans, drained, rinsed and dried 2 T. olive oil 2 T. shredded Parmesan cheese

ROSEMARY PITA CHIPS 2 large pita breads 2 T. olive oil

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Tidewater Kitchen

32 wedges. Place the olive oil in a large bowl and add the pita chips, rosemary and salt. Mix all together to coat evenly.

Spread the pita triangles on a jelly roll pan. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until crispy and slightly golden brown. Allow to cool and place in a zip-lock bag or airtight container. These will keep for 3 to 5 days, or place in the freezer for up to 3 months. Just pull them out when you want them.

BLUEBERRY-ROSEMARY MOCKTAIL Serves 2 1 cup fresh blueberries 4 handfuls of mint leaves 1 stem of fresh rosemary 2 t. sugar Juice of 2 limes Club soda Crushed ice Garnish: 2 rosemary stems, blueberries, extra mint and lime wedges

1/2 t. dried rosemary (you can use 1 t. fresh if you prefer) 1/2 t. kosher salt Preheat oven to 375°. With a pizza cutter, cut the pita bread into 8 wedges, and then separate the two sides of the pita so you have

Puree the blueberries in a blender and set aside.

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In a cocktail shaker, muddle mint leaves, rosemary leaves from 1 stem and sugar. Add lime juice and pureed blueberries. Shake well.

Pour mixture into two tall glasses (you can strain if you wish). Fill glasses with crushed ice, top with club soda and stir. Garnish with a lime wedge, blueberries, mint and a sprig of rosemary.

A longtime resident of Oxford, Pamela Meredith, formerly Denver’s NBC Channel 9 Children’s Chef, now teaches both adult and children’s cooking classes on the south shore of Massachusetts.

For more of Pam’s recipes, visit the Story Archive tab at tidewatertimes.com.

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Four Sisters, a Mother and The American Dream by Michael Valliant

Generosity ~ helping your neighbors and community ~ is one of the pillars Shahida Perveen has instilled in her four daughters, and also her businesses, Four Sisters Kabob and Curry and Halal Meat and Groceries. Giving back just seems like the right thing to do when her life and those of her daughters are a piece of the American dream.

Shahida’s father, Muhammad Khan, worked as a personal chef for an American diplomat in Pakistan.

The couple he worked for liked his

food so much, and thought so highly of him, they offered to bring him to America to continue to cook for them. Khan ultimately retired to Easton, where he opened a business providing in-home care for seniors.

In 2000, it was not a great time to live in Pakistan. The economy was struggling. Shahida had been working as a midwife but had three daughters to care for, and two were very young. At the urging of her brother, Shahida and her daughters were sponsored by her father and

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Four Sisters

us and go to parks in Easton or Oxford,” Shahida said. “It was quiet and beautiful in Oxford. We would get there after 2 p.m., and we would get ice cream and take the ferry on our way home.”

She also worked side jobs catering. Cooking has always been Shahida’s passion and something she has been good at ~ a talent she got from her dad. At parties, her cooking was sought after and talked about.

“My dad was a chef. I got everything from him ~ I learned the dishes from my dad,” she said.

The first thought for a food truck came in 2007, which is also the year Muhammad died. As they looked into turning a passion for food and cooking into a business, things stalled when they realized they first needed a truck to be inspected before they could begin the permitting process. The cost was too much, so

came to America in February 2001.

When they got to Easton, Andleeb, the oldest daughter, was in fourth grade. They had to learn English, and Shahida had to learn to drive. She got a job working at KFC on Kent Island, so she found her family a place to live in Grasonville, near work.

She always worked multiple jobs.

She would go between KFC and 7-11. It was normal to work 13- to 14-hour days, getting up at 5 a.m., working until 2 p.m., coming home briefly, then working her next job until 10 p.m. But she made sure to have her weekends off so she could spend that time with her daughters.

“Saturdays, I would wash clothes and clean the house, and then we would go out. On Sundays, we would make lunch and dinner to take with

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Four Sisters

In 2018, she and her daughters opened Four Sisters Halal Meat and Groceries on Dover Road.

“Our American customers were very supportive, but they didn’t know how to prepare the foods or how to use a lot of the spices we sell, so we thought, what if we let them sample cooked meals so they could see and taste everything,” Andleeb said.

Word spread quickly. Friday nights when they would do sample platters, demand sky-rocketed just

they put their dreams on hold.

As she worked, Shahida got the idea to offer something in Easton where she could share some of her culture with the community.

Shahida and Andleeb. Chesapeake Blooms recognized Four Sisters as a business who is going above and beyond to better our community during uncertain times.

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Four Sisters Kabob and Curry celebrated its grand opening in August 2019. They just wanted to give away free samples to celebrate.

But more than 100 people came out, customers insisted on buying meals and they served 240 pounds of chicken alone at the event.

Their food and their hospitality have earned them a quick following. Each meal is prepared when it’s ordered, fresh and on site. The food truck is perfectly outfitted with all the equipment and facilities they need. And they have many regular customers.

Less than a year into their business, the COVID-19 pandemic hit Maryland and stay-at-home quarantine began. Soon after, a man

from word of mouth, friends telling friends. But in order to be able to make and sell food, they would need to prepare it on site. And the idea of the food truck came back.

Their business neighbor Tim Cureton at Rise Up Coffee Roasters had a food truck and was very supportive of their business. He was able to connect them with someone selling a truck. So Shahida and her daughters worked to bolster their savings, took out small loans, asked family if they could help, and ultimately worked out a deal on the truck. Then came the long process of working with the town and the health department.

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“Mom didn’t hesitate: he needed food and she gave it to him,” Andleeb said. “And we said, if it happened to him, it must also be happening to other people. So we made Thursdays the day we feed the community ~ anyone who needs food.”

In Islam, Thursdays and Fridays are days of giving back. Fridays are one of the busiest days at the market and food truck, so Thursdays became the day. They found they were feeding as many as 20 people who would come by, but they wanted to do more. So Four Sisters would take meals to the emergency rooms in Easton and Queenstown.

They have also taken meals to different departments within the Easton Hospital.

Chicken chapli kabob came to the truck asking for food.

He had lost his job when quarantine started. He hoped to be able to pay them back when he got a job.

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Four Sisters

degree in public health. Areej, who is 20, received a full scholarship and is a full-time student at Washington College, where she is studying political science. Bushra, the youngest daughter, attends school in Queen Anne’s County.

Andleeb is 28 and has focused mostly on making sure her sisters have what they need and running the business with their mother. A

Generosity and hospitality start with Shahida.

“Our mom has such a big heart,” Andleeb said. “Humanity always comes first. Money will come and go, but how we treat people is the main thing. And there have been times, even when we were struggling and didn’t have much, Mom would have us taking food to our neighbors, and she would find ways to send money back to Pakistan.”

In addition to her generosity, Shahida has passed her work ethic to her daughters. Shanza, who is 21, received a full scholarship to University of Maryland, where she recently graduated with honors and a

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something more ~ being together and seeing each other happy.

“To be able to have a successful business with your mom at 28, and a business that Easton has never had before, feels like an accomplishment in itself,” Andleeb said. “But I think the biggest accomplishment is seeing my mom happy and getting her through those struggles. I always tear up when I talk about my mom.”

few years ago, Shahida had a stroke and Andleeb took over the shifts at her mom’s jobs while she recovered.

Even still, Andleeb just finished her liberal arts degree at Chesapeake College, making dean’s list, and is continuing for her nursing degree.

“Our mother struggled to bring us here. We have to give her something, we have to give her a degree.

That’s the least we can do,” she said.

“She gave up her everything for us ~ she left her work as a midwife back home and came and worked at minimum wage jobs so we could have opportunities.”

Making the most of opportunities is maybe something of what the American dream might mean to people. But with family, there is

Michael Valliant is the Assistant for Adult Education and Newcomers Ministry at Christ Church Easton and has worked for non-profit organizations throughout Talbot County.

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TIDEWATER GARDENING

by K. Marc Teffeau, Ph.D.

July Pests, Problems and Practices In July, homeowners may encounter diseases and insect pests in the landscape and vegetable gardens. While some of these require control, others do not. In some situations, the damage they cause is tolerable as long as it doesn’t get out of hand.

Slugs are pests we don’t often see, but they can do insidious damage to plant leaves. They feed at night, which is why we don’t

see them. These slimy fellows can severely damage seedlings as well as established annuals, perennials and vegetables. The most effective control approach is to practice proper sanitation in the garden and around the landscape. Clean up places where slugs like to rest and breed, such as loose boards, bricks, stones, weeds and excessive mulch.

Slug baits can be purchased at

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Tidewater Gardening

beer attracts the slugs, and they fall in the pan and drown.

Sucking insects are abundant in July. These include aphids, spittlebugs, scales, whitef ly, leafhoppers and mealybugs. A telltale sign of aphids is the presence of honeydew secretions, especially on the car parked in the driveway. Another sign of aphids is a steady parade of

local garden supply stores and placed in ornamental f lower areas.

Do not use them in the vegetable garden. You can also control slugs by trapping them. Set out boards or burlap bags in the evening. Wet the traps and the immediate surroundings. Remove trapped slugs the next morning and drop them in the trash can. Another way to trap slugs is to bury a shallow metal pie pan in the ground so that the pan edge is level with the soil. Fill the pan with stale beer. If you have redneck slugs, they will go for Bud or Bud Lite. If they are classier slugs, you’ll need an IPA, a craft beer or Guinness. The smell of the

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especially on needled evergreens like yews. Plants in hot, dry locations are particularly vulnerable to this pest. To check for spider mites, hold a piece of white paper under a branch and then lightly tap the branch. Check the paper carefully for anything that’s crawling. Sometimes you’ll also see larger preda-

ants that “milk” them for their sugary secretions.

In the garden, you can scout for aphids by looking for them on the undersides of leaves. They come in all colors but do the same type of damage: sucking plant juices from the leaves and stems, resulting in deformed and off-color foliage. Soap sprays or summer oils are effective in controlling sucking insects without harming beneficial insects that feed on aphids, like ladybug beetles and lacewings. If you notice ladybug beetles on plants where aphids are feeding, don’t spray. A few lady beetles will clean up an aphid population in no time.

When the weather turns hot and dry, look out for spider mites,

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Tidewater Gardening

tory mites (who eat other mites) on the paper. Don’t be too anxious to spray the plants with a miticide. The most natural control for spider mites is a strong, directed spray from the garden hose. This will wash them out of the plant.

Be sure to direct the spray to the undersides of the leaves or needles where the mites are located. Avoid using Sevin insecticide, as this will kill beneficial insects that feed on mites and make the problem worse.

Tomatoes are susceptible to several diseases that show up this time of year. On susceptible tomato varieties, early blight can be seen on the oldest leaves. Early blight is a fungus disease that produces large brown spots, typically with

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Tidewater Gardening

black spots at the stem end. You can control this disease by using chlorothalonil or mancozeb fungicides. An organic approach might entail using a copper or wettable sulfur spray. Only apply these materials when temperatures are below 80 degrees F. They can burn tomato plant foliage when sprayed during the high heat of the day.

Anthracnose can also spoil your tomato crop. Favored by wet weather or frequent overhead watering, this disease causes sunken dark spots on the fruits as they turn red. The same sprays used for early blight will control anthracnose if sprayed on the plants before the symptoms appear.

We all grow squash in some

alternating light and dark brown concentric ring patterns, on the leaves and stems.

Once it becomes established, early blight can cause premature defoliation of the plant and spot the fruit with large dark brown to Goebel Architect

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Tidewater Gardening

wet root to develop. The fungus growth, which resembles numerous small pins stuck in a pincushion, can completely cover the fruit.

Blossom blight is favored by high humidity and ample water, which home gardeners tend to provide. Chemical control is difficult because the f lowers need to be protected with a fungicide spray soon after opening, and new blossoms open daily. The best way to try to control this disease is to rub off the fading blossoms and remove any infected f lowers as soon as they are seen. Mulch the plants with straw or newspapers to prevent the soil from splashing on the fruit. Avoid overwatering the plants and getting water on the f lowers. Space

form, and we all experience blossom blight, a bread mold-like growth on newly opened squash f lowers. The fungus infects the f lowers and then grows into the developing fruit, causing a soft,

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many trees and shrubs, but azaleas and rhododendrons seem to have the most problem with this pest.

Lace bugs hammer azaleas that stand alone in the landscape or are exposed to full sun all day long.

Avoid lace bug problems from the beginning by not planting these shrubs in full sun. Lace bugs feed on the undersides of leaves, causing whitish-yellowish f lecks called stipples on the upper leaf surface and depositing black fecal spots on the lower leaf surface. Try controlling these pests first with horticultural oil or soap. Very heavy infestations may need treatment with a systemic insecticide.

July is the time to renovate your strawberry planting. Select

your squash plants out so that adequate air circulation can get to the f lowers and fruit.

If you have azaleas or pyracanth in the landscape, look out for lace bugs. They feed on the leaves of

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the most vigorous plants for next year’s crop, and remove others, including runners, that have developed over the past year to ensure all the plant’s energy goes into developing the primary plants. Cut the foliage 1 inch above the ground to eliminate insect and disease problems. Be careful not to cut the crown of the plant, however. Fertilize and water regularly so the plants will set the f lower buds for next spring’s crop.

In the landscape, be sure to deadhead or cut off the spent blooms of rhododendrons, lilacs and other spring-f lowering plants.

Deadheading will allow more of the plant’s energy to go into the production of next year’s f lower buds.

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of your annuals have died, pull them out and add them to the compost pile. Get a second bloom from faded annuals by cutting back to approximately half their height, then fertilize with liquid fertilizer or 1/2 cup of 5-10-10 per square

July is an excellent time to divide and transplant iris, saving only the most vigorous ones. Discard any with root or iris borer damage.

You can also divide and replant crowded early-blooming perennials now. Be sure to stake tall perennials to keep them from falling over. Cut the first flowers of lavender to encourage a second crop.

Also, try rubbing your hands with lavender leaves to remove strong odors such as garlic or onion. Cut back and fertilize delphinium and phlox to encourage the second show of bloom, and stake tall perennials to keep them from falling over.

Remove faded blossoms from annuals and perennials to keep them producing f lowers. If some

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Tidewater Gardening

ters back halfway to encourage fall blooming. If you don’t trim them back now, they will bloom later in July and early August and not in the fall.

In the vegetable garden, seed more plantings of green beans for a late summer harvest. It’s also not too late to plant early maturing varieties of sweet corn so you can extend your corn harvest season past Labor Day. Make a second planting of summer squash to extend the season and to replace plants damaged by squash vine borer. Cucumbers can also be planted for a fall harvest at this time. It is important to harvest vegetables on a timely basis.

Don’t let the green and yellow

yard of the planted area and apply a generous layer of mulch. In midJuly, cut chrysanthemums and as-

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squash, cucumbers and eggplants get too large on the plant. Growing baseball bat-sized zucchini might look impressive, but their taste and texture will be diminished. The smaller, the better. It is also important to harvest smaller squash more frequently to keep the plant producing. Also, a good rule of the green gardening thumb is to collect your vegetables in the early morning before they have time to absorb the summer heat. They will store better.

I have sometimes found it challenging to find fall transplants for sale, so you usually need to grow your own. Broccoli and caulif lower, especially, do better in fall than in spring. In the third or fourth week

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of July, you will need to sow seed for fall transplants of broccoli, kale and caulif lower in peat pots, containers or f lats to have them ready for transplanting in September.

Wait until August to start lettuce transplants. If you haven’t done so already, mulch the garden with straw to control weeds. The soil is plenty warm enough now, and the

mulch will provide some cooling to benefit the plant roots.

Happy Gardening!

Marc Teffeau retired as Director of Research and Regulatory Affairs at the American Nursery and Landscape Association in Washington, D.C. He now lives in Georgia with his wife, Linda.

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Tilghman’s Island “Great Choptank Island” was granted to Seth Foster in 1659. Thereafter it was known as Foster’s Island, and remained so through a succession of owners until Matthew Tilghman of Claiborne inherited it in 1741. He and his heirs owned the island for over a century and it has been Tilghman’s Island ever since, though the northern village and the island’s postal designation are simply “Tilghman.”

For its first 175 years, the island was a family farm, supplying grains, vegetables, fruit, cattle, pigs and timber. Although the owners rarely were in residence, many slaves were: an 1817 inventory listed 104. The last Tilghman owner, General Tench Tilghman (not Washington’s aide-de-camp), removed the slaves in the 1830s and began selling off lots. In 1849, he sold his remaining interests to James Seth, who continued the development.

The island’s central location in the middle Bay is ideally suited for watermen harvesting the Bay in all seasons. The years before the Civil War saw the influx of the first families we know today. A second wave arrived after the War, attracted by the advent of oyster dredging in the 1870s. Hundreds of dredgers and tongers operated out of Tilghman’s Island, their catches sent to the cities by schooners. Boat building, too, was an important industry.

The boom continued into the 1890s, spurred by the arrival of steamboat service, which opened vast new markets for Bay seafood. Islanders quickly capitalized on the opportunity as several seafood buyers set up shucking and canning operations on pilings at the edge of the shoal of Dogwood Cove. The discarded oyster shells eventually became an island with seafood packing houses, hundreds of workers, a store, and even a post office.

The steamboats also brought visitors who came to hunt, fish, relax and escape the summer heat of the cities. Some families stayed all summer in one of the guest houses that sprang up in the villages of Tilghman, Avalon, Fairbank and Bar Neck. Although known for their independence, Tilghman’s Islanders enjoy showing visitors how to pick a crab, shuck an oyster or find a good fishing spot.

In the twentieth century, Islanders pursued these vocations in farming, on the water, and in the thriving seafood processing industry. The “Tilghman Brand” was known throughout the eastern United States, but as the Bay’s bounty diminished, so did the number of water-related jobs. Still, three of the few remaining Bay skipjacks (sailing dredgeboats) can be seen here, as well as two working harbors with scores of power workboats.

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O PE N F O R

HAPPY CAMPERS Rediscover the simple joys of a rural getaway.

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Caroline County – A Perspective Caroline County is the very definition of a rural community. For more than 300 years, the county’s economy has been based on “market” agriculture.

Caroline County was created in 1773 from Dorchester and Queen Anne’s counties. The county was named for Lady Caroline Eden, the wife of Maryland’s last colonial governor, Robert Eden (1741-1784).

Denton, the county seat, was situated on a point between two ferry boat landings. Much of the business district in Denton was wiped out by the fire of 1863.

Following the Civil War, Denton’s location about fifty miles up the Choptank River from the Chesapeake Bay enabled it to become an important shipping point for agricultural products. Denton became a regular port-ofcall for Baltimore-based steamer lines in the latter half of the 19th century.

Preston was the site of three Underground Railroad stations during the 1840s and 1850s. One of those stations was operated by Harriet Tubman’s parents, Benjamin and Harriet Ross. When Tubman’s parents were exposed by a traitor, she smuggled them to safety in Wilmington, Delaware.

Linchester Mill, just east of Preston, can be traced back to 1681, and possibly as early as 1670. The mill is the last of 26 water-powered mills to operate in Caroline County and is currently being restored. The long-term goals include rebuilding the millpond, rehabilitating the mill equipment, restoring the miller’s dwelling, and opening the historic mill on a scheduled basis.

Federalsburg is located on Marshyhope Creek in the southern-most part of Caroline County. Agriculture is still a major portion of the industry in the area; however, Federalsburg is rapidly being discovered and there is a noticeable influx of people, expansion and development. Ridgely has found a niche as the “Strawberry Capital of the World.” The present streetscape, lined with stately Victorian homes, reflects the transient prosperity during the countywide canning boom (1895-1919). Hanover Foods, formerly an enterprise of Saulsbury Bros. Inc., for more than 100 years, is the last of more than 250 food processors that once operated in the Caroline County region.

Points of interest in Caroline County include the Museum of Rural Life in Denton, Adkins Arboretum near Ridgely, and the Mason-Dixon Crown Stone in Marydel. To contact the Caroline County Office of Tourism, call 410-479-0655 or visit their website at www.tourcaroline.com.

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Treasure Hunting in the Rockies by Rick Klepfer

In 2012, or thereabouts, I read a magazine article about a treasure that a New Mexican art dealer had hidden in the Rocky Mountains in 2010. This fellow, whose name is Forrest Fenn, decided he would hide a chest full of gold and jewels and encourage people to search for it.

He had the money, had just survived cancer, and I think he wanted the notoriety of being an 80-year-old eccentric. He claimed that he would

offer folks the pleasure of the “thrill of the chase� as he had enjoyed himself in his lifetime of collecting art and artifacts. Somewhere around a half-million treasure seekers took him up on the offer ~ I became one of them.

The key to finding the loot was a simple six-stanza, 24-line poem that seems straightforward enough on the first read but proves on subsequent readings to be the most con-

Photo by Forrest Fenn

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Treasure Hunting voluted, obfuscated, contradictory piece of literature you’ll ever read.

Although Fenn claimed the puzzle could be solved by the poem alone, he did offer some additional help in the form of a map, a book, some hints and some interviews. The map was of little help since it only reduced the search area from the whole country to just the U.S. Rocky Mountains; only getting it down to about a measly 100,000 square miles.

The book was helpful, if only to provide the searcher with a glimpse of Fenn’s thinking and his use of words. Some people thought the whole thing was a hoax designed to sell his book. This couldn’t be right,

though, because he turned the rights of the book over to a bookstore in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and had the profits given to a cancer fund. The interviews and hints were mostly helpful, but he was careful to be as devious in these as he was in everything else.

Estimates of the value of the chest varied. Fenn published photographs of the treasure and a description of the contents. The chest itself was an antique bronze box with relief carvings on all sides. It weighed 20 pounds, and Fenn claimed that it alone was worth $25,000. In the box were 20 troy pounds of solid gold with a scrap value of around $900,000. The gold wasn’t just scrap, though. There was also a

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Oxford is excited to welcome you back!

Our restaurants and unique little shops and businesses are open to serve you…. The Inns and B&B’s are taking reservations, the Ferry is running, the marinas are launching and maintaining boats, the Community Center is presenting virtual programs and outdoor exercise classes, and Ice Cream is being served! (July 15th is Ice Cream for Breakfast day at Scottish Highland Creamery - come in your jammies!!)

Our local eateries have setup outside dining following health guidelines to ensure you can enjoy their delicious dishes and service safely outside.

Prefer to eat at home? Grab carry out to support local restaurants.

Come stroll our quaint streets and view the painted fences of Oxford, or visit during Plein Air Easton – Oxford Days, enjoy a meal with a view, and search our shops for the perfect item or book.

Check out portofoxford.com, TourOxfordMD on Facebook or individual business websites and Facebook pages for up to date information and to make reservations.

We look forward to seeing you soon!

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Treasure Hunting gold nugget weighing over a pound, Spanish coins, a pre-Colombian frog carved from solid gold, jewels, gold dust and even Fenn’s 20,000-word autobiography. This was something worth figuring out, and I set to it with gusto, spending too many hours poring over the poem, perusing maps and paging through the book. I spent hours on Google Earth, bought more maps, and endured countless hours of YouTube videos published by other seekers.

This effort turned up little useful information, and I set the whole thing aside for a few years. My mind apparently kept a back-channel musing on the problem, however,

The raging Gardner River boils below us.

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Treasure Hunting and every few years it would prompt me to take another look at the data.

Since I was confident that the puzzle was not going to be easily solved, I shared it with some of my friends to see if they could figure out some useful part of it ~ we would work out how to divide the treasure when we found it. No one ever gave me any useful insight to the meanings of the cryptic poem.

Eventually, it became clear that any highly promising solution I worked out would require a visit to the search area; “boots on the ground,” as the cadre of Fenn treasure seekers called it. My wife and I made a fall trip out to Wyoming

and Montana a few years back to see if my then-current solution made sense. When we arrived at the location, which was on an island in the Snake River, we were shocked to see an older gentleman, outfitted in waders, walking sticks and a lifejacket, who had apparently made the same assumptions that I had. We managed to wade out to the island while he still nattered around try to marshal enough courage to ford the river. We beat our way through the tangled brush, clamored over the upstream pile of trees that had drifted onto the island and checked every rock and tree for the elusive “blaze” that would mark the end of our search ~ we found nothing.

We did get a substantial education

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on the ruggedness of the terrain in that part of the world, though. We also had the opportunity to experience some beautiful country, to walk through the amazing water formations at Mammoth Hot Springs and to see a lot of fascinating (and dangerous) wildlife.

We returned home, and I wisely kept any new thoughts on the treasure to myself for a few years. But my brain kept working on the matter and eventually nudged me to take another look at the problem.

On a walk along the Choptank River, I had an aha moment: the poem was a metes-and-bounds description of a simple two-line, three-point geographic course! All I had to do was apply that shape to the appropriate

At Mammoth Hot Springs, even stone bears are safety conscious. portion of the map and I should be very close. The more I worked on this concept, the more sense it made ~ another trip west was the only way to prove it.

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Treasure Hunting risky undertaking ~ I planned accordingly. I devised a plan in which I would drive the 2,000 miles, sleep in the truck, take all my own food and drink and avoid socializing with anyone. The most dangerous component of the plan was refueling the

The rugged trail continues up for several miles.

truck; for this I carried a bottle of 70 percent alcohol hand sanitizer to negate whatever germs I might have picked up from handling the nozzle.

Another hazard was the matter of highway toll-takers. The method of toll-paying varied from state to state, from a “drive through, we’ll bill you” Pennsylvania, to a “push the filthy button to get a paper ticket” Indiana.

There are too many states between Maryland and Montana. The trip out took almost three days of long driving hours. Once there, however, the scenery was magnificent and the mountain air relatively crisp, with nighttime temperatures dropping into the 40s. I set a rigorous schedule of climbing steep trails to check out my hunches. The first two days were spent on a trail so rugged that I had to admit the 80-year-old Fenn could never have carried 40 pounds of gold up it. It was sobering to realized how inadequate 3-D GoogleEarth is in showing terrain.

Then I spent another two days on a much easier trail, one that Fenn could have managed, although it

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Treasure Hunting still rose some 1,500 feet from the river below. I was confident of this trail, mostly because it had both a 100-foot-tall waterfall and a set of powerlines ~ both of which might fit well with the poem. At the end of five days, and with destroyed boots and complaining knees, I realized that I was missing something in the poem ~ some cleverly obfuscated phrase that held the key to the solution of the puzzle and that I had overlooked.

I decided to bring my quest to a semipermanent conclusion. I would take what I had learned and give it to my children to work through. I would provide technical support and my interpretation of the poem’s

meaning, and they could provide the driving duties and knee cartilage.

There was plenty of time ~ people had been searching for this for a decade, and nobody was going to find the treasure anytime soon.

But on my way back home, a friend sent me a text with a link to a news article that said the treasure had been found ~ and on the very day that I had been on the trail searching for it! I couldn’t believe it.

All the article said was that the finder wished to remain anonymous and that his home was an ambiguous “back east.” Well, I was from back east ~ that should have been me in that news article.

I am not disappointed to have not solved the poem. I would just like

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Treasure Hunting to know where it was found ~ to see how close my calculations came. But the reality is that we will probably never know. The treasure could only have been hidden on Federal, State, Indian or private land; any of these would likely want a cut of the booty if it was shown that it was found

The 100-foot waterfall that I hoped would mark the treasure.

on their property. I understand the finder’s desire to remain anonymous, too; the tax bill on the find will be close to 50 percent, and why share the remains with pesky friends and relatives? I have heard that a few people have since had the gall to sue Fenn, saying they had solved the poem, too, and thus deserve a cut of the loot. If the real finder is smart, he will keep his head down for a long time.

In the end, the quest was unique in the history of the country. It is improbable that we will see the likes of it again. I don’t regret a moment of the time I spent poring over the poem, the maps and the endless commentary of other searchers. I had the opportunity to get out in some exquisitely beautiful country and to inhale some truly crisp, clean air. Fenn said he wanted people to get off their couches, put down their phones and immerse themselves in the wonderful natural world ~ I think this was accomplished for many people, and I was happy to be one of them.

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Festival of Trees Retooled for 35th Anniversary This year’s Festival of Trees theme, “The Red, The White, and the Blue,” will be a celebration of an American Christmas. Friends of Hospice and the Festival of Trees founders, Leslie Ware and Midge Menzies, have returned to chair the 2020 Festival of Trees in honor of the fundraiser’s 35th anniversary.

“Since 1985, Friends of Hospice has raised more than $3.5 million for Talbot Hospice by sponsoring the annual Festival of Trees,” said Ware.

“Even during these uncertain times, Friends of Hospice is still committed to raising money to help provide quality care for the terminally ill and their families in our community.

“Midge and I, along with the Friends of Hospice Board and Talbot Hospice, have been monitoring the COVID-19 situation and how it may affect the annual Festival of Trees, the Preview Party, the 35th Anniversary Gala, Carols by Candlelight, poinsettia sales and the Hospice 5K Santa Run” said Ware. “All these events historically attract large groups.” For this reason, and for the safety of our community, the Festival Trees will take place in a new format.

The Festival of Trees will not take place in the Gold Room of the Tidewater Inn this year. Instead, it will

be celebrated with an All-American Crystal Ball non-event in November.

Poinsettias will be sold through a mailing, the Talbot Hospice newsletter and at talbothospice.org and festival-of-trees.org.

Christmas Trees ranging from 12” to 36” will be beautifully decorated and sold at a designated location.

If large outside gatherings are once again deemed “safe,” Carols by Candlelight will be held on Sat., Nov. 28, beginning at 6 p.m. in front of the Tidewater Inn. Complimentary candles will be given, and an All-American 20’ Christmas tree will be lit to

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welcome the holiday season and to celebrate the coming together of our community and country. The Hospice 5K Santa Run will also be held on Saturday, November 28 from 8 to 11 a.m. at Idlewild Park, with an entry fee of $30 per participant.

Check the Festival of Trees website for more information. “It is our hope that our generous sponsors, volunteers and community will consider supporting us as they have for 34 years,� said Menzies and Ware.

For more details or to support Friends of Hospice, visit festival-oftrees.org or call 410-819-3378.

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Changes:

All-American Part X of a novel in many parts

by Roger Vaughan Previously: The year is 1988.

Andy Thomas made an ill-advised tactical call during a race in 50-foot sailboats that nearly caused a dangerous collision. His father, Mitchell (at the helm), was livid. Later, at the awards dinner, a drunken Andy delivered a public declaration that made it virtually impossible for Mitchell Thomas, a wellknown amateur sailor, not to mount a Whitbread Round the World Race challenge. Mitchell is CEO of Moss Optical, a company inherited by his wife, Deedee Moss. Thomas was thoroughly outraged by his son’s gaffe. At a board meeting held in Moss’s planetarium-board room, a proposal for the company to sponsor the first American boat in the Whitbread Race was presented, and accepted, much to Deedee’s delight.

Colorful two-time America’s Cup winner Jan Sargent held one of his high-intensity press conferences to announce he had been asked by Mitchell Thomas to skipper the Moss boat, All American. In his office at Moss, Andy is distraught, having learned his father has made

him part of All American’s crew.

He agonizes over this to his friend Jeff Linn, a Moss opticist. Linn jokingly suggests Andy shoot himself in the foot. Gloria, Andy’s secretary, buzzes to tell him his father wants to see him. After an unpleasant meeting with his father, who is adamant about Andy going on the race, he drives to see his mother, Deedee, on the Long Island estate, hoping she will intervene. Andy has a very pleasant sail with his mother ~ her favorite thing to do ~ but is distraught to find her conviction about him going on the Race is set in concrete. When pressed, Ossie, the old Norwegian who has run the family’s boathouse for 40 years, says Andy’s mother has very good reason for insisting he go on the race. Andy spends two weeks with the crew doing an Outward Bound course for training and bonding. He is subjected to hazing from this fraternity of professional sailors, and he hits back. At home, seated at his powerful telescope, Andy’s proclivity for astronomy is revealed. Isha is discovered being nosy about a secret

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was amazingly thin, with the bulb fastened amidships. Twin rudders. project of Andy’s. A visit with his At first glance, the boat looked exmother Andy hopes will result in tremely fast ~ in flat water. The lack her reneging her wish for him to go of buoyancy forward was startling. on the Race reveals family secrets. It definitely didn’t look like a vessel one would chose for crossing *** ndy was standing with the oceans. Of course, if comfort and rest of the crew looking at the big safety didn’t matter, well, that was computer screen that designer something else: call it a Frey 60.

“So, Gibb, what’s the top speed Gibb Frey was using to illustrate the points he was making about the for this baby. Can she hit 30? Maybe 60-footer he had drawn. Frey might 35? More?” It was navigator Pehave been everyone’s number-one ter Dimaris, asking what everyone draft pick as a designer, but as a wanted to know.

“In the right conditions, we’re talker this beanpole of a guy with the wire-rim glasses had one set- getting indicators from our modting: drone. Andy figured Frey must els and other testing that this boat could hit 40 knots,” be a good salesman, having convinced This boat can hit 40 knots Frey said. There was ~ but the crew cannot quite a long pause. both Mitchell, the The boys waited. owner, and Sargent, the skipper, that a 60-footer ~ or, “But the crew cannot.”

There was silence, then Sartechnically, 63 feet and a few inches ~ was the way of the future. According gent laughed to break the spell. to Frey, the maxis that had recently Forty knots. The boys’ feet shufruled the race were dinosaurs, on fling around on the concrete floor their way out. The 60s were the new was the sound of anxiety. Several Formula 1 sleds: fast, efficient and of them exchanged little grins that ensuring one bone-shaking, very were meant to be brave.

“What conditions?” It was wild ride for the crew, with occasionCrouse, the Olympic rower. al terrifying moments probable.

“You don’t want to know,” SarThe Frey 60 was flat bottomed, as oceangoing monohulls go, with gent said. “Am I right, Gibb?”

Frey just smiled and moved on hind quarters tapering just a little from the maximum beam to a wide to film clips from previous races. transom. The new look. A long One clip showed a crew duct-taping narrow section extended from the a large crack in the side of the hull max beam forward, and it was very caused by a collision with a whale. shallow. And flat. The keel cord The next clip showed a boat hove-to

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volume of the river is diverted on a daily schedule. The tunnel ends at with men overboard working near a power station. The next shot was the transom. Caskie Koligeri, the of a welded stainless steel structure Finn sailor, chimed in. built to hold a full-scale hull section “This boat of yours will be imper- containing the rudder. The rudder vious to whale attacks?” was submerged into the immense “No, man,” Dick Hooper said. volume of water rushing past at the “We’re just meant to bring extra rate of 63,000 cubic feet per second. duct tape.”

The rudder was turned at a good anLaughter. gle of resistance. The disturbance it Frey smiled, focused on the was causing left a 30-foot plume of rudder repair video clip that was white water. still playing. “There will be extra “We figured why build a test stastress on the rudder with the high tion when Ontario Power built this speeds expected,” he said. “Rudder one in the 1950s,” Frey said. “We problems are no fun. We’re work- just had to convince them we knew ing hard on everything concerned: how to manage what we wanted to shape, stock, comdo. Luckily, the O.P. position, post, hull The disturbance caused a boss has one of my 30-foot plume of reinforcement. . . boats. This immense Doing a lot of testvolume of water is white water ing, both theory moving at about 60 and with actual rudders we’ve had miles an hour, we figure. A couple made. We’ve tested how many to de- weeks in this tunnel, turned at 15 struction, Bradley?” Frey aimed the degrees, tells us a lot about a rudquestion at a heavy-set man with a der’s strength and endurance.” ruddy complexion. “Six as of yesterAndy had to admit it was impresday,” he said. sive. Certainly the incredible tun“Do we have that film?” Frey asked. nel, 40-some feet across, funneling Bradley punched a code into the all that water into the hydro-station active laptop. Suddenly an image of and turning it into electricity, was Niagara Falls burst on the screen in impressive. A hundreds-of-milall its gorgeous power, a spectacu- lion-dollars test station. And legal, lar sun-drenched drone shot that in “All-American” parlance, beslowly pushed into, then up, over cause officially the Niagara River and beyond the Falls into a sec- is shared between Canada and the tion of the Niagara River before the United States. The boss has a Frey drop. The film cut to a shot inside an boat. What a laugh. How the world enormous tunnel into which a large works.

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campus to Andy’s laptop, drawings that showed an interlocking series Andy’s phone vibrated in his pock- of low, dark buildings with no hard et. He slipped out of the room to an- edges. The outer-spacial landscapswer. It was his coworker and friend ing was more like set design, with Jeff Linn passing on a message from a moonscape here, Mars around the people working on his Mountain corner, Saturn looming in the backView project. Jeff knew about Andy’s ground and so on. There would be a secret project. He would be very planetarium. Guest rooms would be much involved when the time came. named for galaxies. Live star patBut Andy was puzzled. terns would be broadcast upon the “Why didn’t they call me?” rooms’ ceilings at night. The dining “Actually, I asked them that,” Jeff room would feature dishes named said. “They said it was safer to put for the constellations. Drinks would the call through your office phone. range from a Black Hole (DiploIt was lunchtime. Gloria was out. I matica Reserva rum, dark Belgian picked up.” chocolate and coffee), to a Silver Andy left the building, sat in the Moon (Monkey 47 gin, saguaro bitPorsche and dialed ters and Meyer Lemthe number Jeff had The outer-spacial land- on juice). given him. Soon he scaping was more like Details included was in deep discusall exterior doors a set design sion with Selwin being equipped with Hooper, his main contact for Moun- air-lock sound effects. Guests would tain View. The idea that had been have to apply months in advance so presented to Andy was for a grand they could be approved. Children hotel built around the theme of as- over age six would be admitted only tronomy. Andy had jumped on it. after an interview with a psycholoHe’d soon become Mountain View’s gist indicated they would make major investor and champion. The agreeable guests. Children under 12 centerpiece would be a high-end would eat in a special dining room telescope several stages more elab- and attend special programs. orate than the one in his house, deAndy eagerly consumed the new signed by Jeff Linn and supervised drawings on his laptop. Many of the by professional astronomers. Time ideas were his. It was taking shape, at the telescope for hotel guests and that was very exciting. “This would be apportioned in half-hour place is gonna make Disneyland segments. look like a Model T Ford,” he said Selwin Hooper had sent new ex- to Hooper. “One question about the terior drawings of the expansive telescope, is it. . .”

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lot of boring days, and some damn fine days. One could get into the Andy was startled by Mitchell rhythm of it after a while. knocking too hard on the car win“Mr. Moss, what can I get you?” dow. Andy rolled it down. Mitchell’s “Hi, Milton. Tequila, please. Got normally unpleasant expression any of that good stuff on the top was extra fierce. shelf?”

“I can see you don’t give a crap “Yes, sir.” Milton pulled over a about the boat,” Mitchell said. “You ladder and ascended to the top of think we put this little act together the middle cabinet above the rows for Mr. Frey’s ego? You wanted to of bottles. He opened a door and exmeet me at the club for dinner? Six tracted a bottle of Milagro Reposao’clock. Be on time. I have an early do, the one with the blown glass morning.” cactus bud inside it. Even the bottle Mitchell turned on his heel and was a work of art. walked away.

“Rocks, extra lime. Can’t wait.”

At quarter to six, Andy walked Andy took a seat at one of the into the bar at the New York Yacht bar tables where he could see Don Club’s Harbour Demers’ painting of Court Station in Mitchell's normally un- Bolero, one of the Newport, R.I. It was pleasant expression was great old yachts that early. The crowd was had raced in the ’50s extra fierce thin, no one he knew. when wealthy ownEarly, because he needed to take ers laid $10,000 bets on the table the edge off if he were going to sur- over dinner; when $10,000 was vive another goddamn dinner with worth around ten times that today.

Mitchell. But he had to see him. He The former owner of this grand had to admit, there had been a few house that had become a yacht club moments when the idea of getting had comissioned, owned and raced away from it all, going to sea for Bolero. John Nicolas Brown, a man nine months like some shanghaied who had inherited a slave trade fordrunk, had had a lot of appeal. tune. Great philanthropist. Good Away. Just freaking away. It didn’t man by all accounts. His family had matter where. There were days started Brown University. Brown when Andy felt like one of Joseph had Bolero launched in 1949: 73 feet Conrad’s sorry blokes. Life ashore of pure naval architectural beauty always turned them into drunks by Olin Stephens, the great one. and brawlers. At sea they became Black. Gold cove stripe. Bolero, dacalm, reasonable men. There were da-da-da – da -- dunt. And Demers some tough days at sea, a hell of a had painted the boat. The painting 136

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All American

Milton gently set Andy’s Milagro on the table. was called Bolero off Bermuda.

There had been several times Andy had never seen a painting of Andy had driven to the club just a yacht in full fly that expressed such to have a few moments with this power. The club’s photographer, Dan painting. He’d thought about offerNerney, had provided the image De- ing to buy it one time. But it should mers had used. The perspective of stay here. John Brown’s boat. John Bolero blast reaching from the lee- Brown’s house. He sipped the iceward side was from the low angle cold Milagro. More perfection. of a small boat, with this lithesome “Andy Moss!” creation harnessed perfectly to the Two older gentleman he’d seen a wind, crew at full attention, solid dozen times at the club were on him white spray shooting up from the like locusts. They were such habow inside the big genoa as the boat bitual flies at the club bar, and with lifted above hull speed, tearing past such one-track conversation, they less than 100 feet away. Nerney had had acquired nicknames: Whit and nailed it. Demers’ challenge was to Bred. Andy cursed his bad luck as capture the moment, he watched Bred nod enhance the power, Andy had never seen a at Milton for their and he’d done it. painting of a yacht that usual.

Never mind that the “So great to have expressed such power water wasn’t exactly a boat in the race at the color of the sea off Bermuda. last, an American boat,” Whit said.

Never mind the lighthouse in the When we did the race in ’81 with background looked more like Mo- Conny van Rietschoten, we got a hegan than St. David’s. Never mind lot of heat about no USA boat . . .” the main boom was a foot or two too “I mean heat,” Bred said. long. The power was there.

“What a race, nine months, Those moments when he could 30,000 miles. . .” lose himself in this painting, Andy “You know we won every leg. . .” could almost hear that eerie sound “First to finish. . .” of a large, proper sailing yacht pass“First on handicap. . .” ing, if one was lucky enough to be “It was Conny’s second win. . .” close to it; the smooth whoosh of “We had the maxi. You know what water a well-formed displacement he said about getting the maxi?” hull creates when it parts the waves.

“When money is no object, why The wind would add a barely dis- not?” cernible top note to the passage: the “What a guy. . .when money is no violins trilling at triple “p.” object. . . Ha ha.”

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All American

Mitchell was already studying the menu as Andy got to the table.

“Whoa, here he is, Mitchell Moss, He had barely gotten seated when the man of the hour, the man be- a couple approached and hovered. hind the first American boat in the Friends of Mitch come to heap Whitbread.” praise on him for putting a boat in Andy couldn’t ever remember be- the race. Another old Whitbread ing relieved to see his father arrive, racer whose life had never been the but there he was, an on-time guy, same. His wife was enthusiastic, now bearing the full brunt of Whit having long been resigned to living and Bred’s inane conversation. Does with the endless reruns of the stothis happen to everyone who sails the ries, having learned to pitch in, in race, Andy wondered as he watched fact, add those details that her mate the antics of these two aging clowns might have forgotten. But he was who had somehow made fortunes in launched, and this time Mitchell the bond market. was a prisoner, literally backed into He remembered seeing an ESPN a corner of the dining room with no T-shirt: “Once you’ve been touched place to go, no place to hide. by the Whitbread, Andy stood by life is never the "Once you've been touched politely, amused by same.” He chuck- by the Whitbread, life is Mitch’s dilemma, led to himself as he waiting for the inevinever the same." quickly drained the table diversion, the delicious Milagro that was begin- pass off to him, and here it came, ning to put a very agreeable soft- the introduction, my son Andy, who focus filter on the scene. He caught will be going on the race because I’m Milton’s eye for a refill, then stopped busy running the company and all on Bolero, which was still cutting a that, and Mr. and Mrs. Dougherty ~ swath through the ocean. or was it Commodore and Mrs., no Mitchell had quickly dispensed matter ~ saying what a wise deciwith the old ocean racers and was sion that was, that the race was for making for the dining room at a younger men, then turning to him, good clip. Andy followed before mouths agape, so proud to meet one Whit and Bred had a new chance to of the crew, how marvelous, what attack. He saw Mitch seating himself a great experience lies in store for at “his” table by the window, a great you, what a lucky fellow, my, my, spot overlooking Newport Har- and hullabaloo. Andy worked on bor with the lights on the bridge to preventing his smile from melting.

Jamestown jutting their familiar bo“Ever cross the equator, son? No? somy outline into the darkening sky. Ah ha, you’ll enjoy that little cer140

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All American

“It’s not a 60, but it’s a good trainer. The 60 sounds like a handful.” emony. Better hide your boots, aha “Sargent sent me some videos. I ha ha.” like the numbered shirts.”

“Now, Howard. . .”

“His idea. Everything we do on “But seriously, rounding Cape board is taped. Maneuvers, sail Horn, now there’s something I’ll changes, short-handed stuff while never forget. Not many of us have one watch is below, moving sails done that, you know, on a sailing around. Everything. At meetings yacht. It blows a gale down there Sargent runs the video in slow moone day in four, you know. You must tion and critiques it, rescripts the watch Irving Johnson’s film. That moves like a football coach. Next will get you ready. But what a mag- time we’re better, we cut our time nificent journey, the Whitbread, down, improve the safety. following the routes of the great “You’re a driver?” explorers, trapped in the doldrums “Seems so.” ~ “water, water everywhere and all Mitchell smiled, shook his head. the planks did shrink” ~ ahh, and “That’s amusing. They’re that desthe roaring 40s. . .” perate?”

He met Mitch's cold, Bless the waiter Andy sipped his for arriving with vicious eyes. They were drink. some warm rolls.

“The reason I demonic - they burned.

“Howard, we rewanted to talk is I ally must not interrupt their meal. went to see Mum a few days ago.”

Come, darling, it has been such a “The doctors think it’s Epsteinpleasure to have met you. . .”

Barr.”

Mitchell’s smile was broad for the “Yeah, I know, but I have to say farewells and disappeared faster she doesn’t seem that sick to me. than a thief with a purse. He was Maybe just depressed, I dunno, I’m buttering a roll by the time Andy got no doctor, but she can be quite with seated. Milton arrived from the bar it at times, you know?” with the refreshed Milagro.

“Not much of the time.”

“How many is that? Two? Three?

“If she only did something.”

I thought you were in training.”

“Don’t, just don’t go there.”

“All part of training,” Andy said “Okay, okay, old story, I know, lightly. but she went to get dressed for some “Boat’s coming along, according doctor who was coming to see her to Frey. Damn near done. I plan to and I was just pacing around the go have another look next week. room, and for the hell of it I picked How’s the trial horse working out?” up her bottle of green medicine.

142

Just curious, I guess. I smelled it.

Nothing. Then I tasted it. It’s vodka, vodka with food coloring. Did you know that? Pure vodka! How long has she been doing that?”

“Oh, for crissakes, Andy. Your mother’s been an alcoholic for as long as I’ve known her. You didn’t know that? You should. You’re following in her footsteps. It’s not just vodka. Dr. Marshall prescribes it, puts other stuff in it, says maintaining a certain alcohol level isn’t bad for her. Keeps her happy.”

“Happy?! Jesus, you think your wife, my mother, is happy? Does she look happy to you? Maybe you don’t even see her any more.”

“You listen: that side of your mother’s life is none of your god-

dam business, nor is it for discussion or speculation. Got that?”

Inside, Andy was reeling. He met Mitchell’s cold, vicious eyes and held on for as long as he could.

They were demonic. They burned.

Then he picked up the Milagro, took a generous sip and gently replaced the glass on the table.

“Enjoy your dinner,” he said to Mitch with all the cordiality he could muster. Then Andy got up, calmly pushed in his chair and left the dining room.

Roger Vaughan lives and sails in Oxford. Previous chapters of All American are available at tidewatertimes.com.

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