Generation to Generation
How did you get here? Are you a ninth-generation Marylander, tracing your emigrating ancestors back to the Ark and the Dove? Or a first-generation transplant, here for new opportunity?
With a few indigenous exceptions, all of us Marylanders — regardless of how recent or how ancient — are immigrants, refugees, explorers or colonists.
This weekend, celebrate our shared stake in the territory and body politic planted 383 years ago on March 25, 1634, when Lord Baltimore’s colonists made land on a tiny island in a big river in an unknown world: Maryland Day. This year’s events celebrate all that’s Made in Maryland.
Celebrate the 383rd anniversary of our state this weekend, visiting historical and cultural sites in Anne Arundel and St. Mary’s counties. Many activities are free or only $1.
Annapolis Maritime Museum
Did you know that most of the oysters we eat are Made in Maryland? Learn how oysters go from creek to plate with hands-on activities. Plus crafts for kids, like exploring, shucking and dissecting.
March 24-26, 11am-3pm, 723 Second St.
Anne Arundel County Farmers Market
Anne Arundel County’s oldest farmers market is year round. Browse and buy products that local farmers and producers grow, make or produce: fruit, veggies, meats, cheese, eggs, plants, soap, honey, flowers, baked goods, jams, jelly, herbs, furniture, milk, yogurt, butter, ready-made food, and more — all made in Maryland. Meet the farmer, and watch Chef Helen’s cooking demonstrations.
Saturday, March 25, 7am-noon, 275 Truman Pkwy., Annapolis
Anne Arundel County Libraries
Crofton: March 24-26: Crab craft and puzzles in children’s area.
Edgewater: March 20-26: See books about or set in Maryland or by Maryland authors. Trivia games for teens and adults.
Eastport-Annapolis Neck: Sat. March 25, 10am-4pm: Crab crafts.
Odenton Regional Library: Mon. March 20, 6pm: Maryland History Trivia. Sat. March 25: Learn about the lives of notable women from Katherine Kenny and Eleanor Randrup, authors of Courageous Women of Maryland.
Bates Legacy Center
Trace your legacy with a genealogy workshop co-hosted by the Banneker-Douglass Museum. Friday (2pm) watch the PBS documentary JFK and LBJ – A Time for Greatness, about the 1965 Voting Rights Acts, and featuring three graduates of Wiley H. Bates High School: Geraldine Whittington, President Johnson’s secretary, plus Alma H. Wright Cropper and Gladys Holt Peevy. Saturday (2pm) see the film Getting to Know Wiley H. Bates, plus a living history portrayal by David Sommerville.
March 24-25, 10am-3pm, 1101 Smithville St., Annapolis, $1 workshop
Brewer Hill Cemetery
Take guided tours and learn more about the people interred here, including city and county founders, casualties of the Revolutionary War and the Civil War and members of the African-American community. Learn more about research and preservation efforts. Descendants please bring photos, Bible records and oral histories for a memorial website.
Saturday, March 25, tours on the hour 11am-3pm, 802 West St., Annapolis
Captain Avery Museum
Celebrate the opening of the emergent III [sic] exhibit. Curated by Southern High School’s Art Department chair, portraitist Michael Bell, this year’s showcase features over 40 works from Southern’s rising stars. Plus, hear very cool alt-acoustic music from SHS Tri-M virtuosos. Refreshments served.
Sunday, March 26, 1-4pm, 1418 East West Shady Side Rd., Shady Side
Charles Carroll House
See art created by St. Mary’s Elementary fourth-graders and join the scavenger hunt, finding your way through the house to discover how the Carrolls made their fortune in Maryland.
March 25-26, noon-4pm, 107 Duke of Gloucester St., Annapolis
Chesapeake Children’s Museum
Play all day in the museum and attend a Maker workshop (2-4pm). Try your hand at creating and inventing, using your imagination to turn bits and pieces into something new (ages 4-10). Saturday, children (ages 9+) join the evening program Lead On, Harriet! and ride to freedom with the legendary Underground Railroad conductor (rsvp: 410-990-1993).
March 24-26, 10am-4pm and 7-9pm Sa, 25 Silopanna Rd., Annapolis, $1
City of Annapolis Scavenger Hunt for History
Take a two-mile walking tour of Eastport, a neighborhood dating to the 1650s. The peninsula’s early maritime and industrial base has evolved into a collaborative maritime, commercial and residential community. The walking loop is illustrated on a map that features site descriptions and word clues to keep kids and adults hunting.
March 24-26, 11am-3pm, pick up maps at Annapolis Maritime Museum, 723 Second St., Eastport
Discovery Village
Explore the site of Anne Arundel County’s next public boat ramp, joining Shady Side’s public kayak launches, public wharf and hiking trails.
Sunday March 26, noon-4pm, 4800 Atwell Rd., Shady Side
Galesville Community Center
Explore your genealogy in Family Tree Explosion exhibit and workshops.
Sunday, March 26, 1-4pm, 916 West Benning Rd., Galesville
Galesville Heritage Society
Learn the history of boat building on the West River. From Native American dugout canoes to Steward’s Shipyard in colonial times to 19th century log canoes and today’s modern techniques, the West River has been a center of boat building in Maryland.
Sunday, March 26, 1-4pm, 988 Main St., Galesville
Gone But Not Forgotten Walking Tour
Our capital city has changed a lot over three centuries. Explore some history-making sites in the historic district and Naval Academy yard.
Sunday, March 26, 2:30pm, Visitors Center booth at City Dock (bring photo ID)
Greenstreet Gardens
Join a seminar on planting and growing Maryland Native Plants to sustain our vegetable heritage.
Saturday, March 25, 11am, 391 Bay Front Rd., Lothian
Hammond-Harwood House
The Family Haversacks program includes activities on Maryland-based artisans John Shaw, Charles Willson Peale and William Buckland. Join a brief opening ceremony (2pm) for the family program, garden signage donors and partners including the Four Rivers Heritage Area, Four Rivers Garden Club and Maryland Green. Mansion tours (rsvp: 410-263-4683 x10) at 1 & 3pm; free children’s activities in the garden 2:30pm-4:30pm.
Saturday, March 25, 1-4:30pm, 19 Maryland Ave., Annapolis, $1 tours
Historic Annapolis Museum
See and hear the story of resistance to servitude and slavery in Chesapeake Country in the interactive exhibit Freedom Bound: Runaways of the Chesapeake. Historic Annapolis guides lead hands-on activities and thought-provoking debates.
Saturday, March 25, 10am-5pm, 999 Main St.
Historic Annapolis Hogshead Living History Center
Consider the working class life of 18th century Annapolis with historic interpreters and hands-on activities; hear tales of travel to the not-so-distant western frontier.
Saturday, March 25, 10am-4pm, 43 Pinkney St., Annapolis
Historic Annapolis James Brice House
Glimpse life in Annapolis as James Brice experienced it in the year 1767. Learn about this year’s theme, Made in Maryland, by meeting women and men who worked in town.
Saturday, March 25, 10am-4pm, 42 East St., Annapolis, $1
Historic Annapolis William Paca House and Garden
In the 1765 house and gardens, see what life was like for a wealthy Annapolis family during the years leading up to the American Revolution, and meet men and women who would have lived, visited and worked there.
Saturday, March 25, 10am-4pm, 186 Prince George St., Annapolis, $1
Historic London Town & Gardens
Generation meets generation in oral history interviews at stations throughout the gardens and historic area.
Friday, enjoy a special Colonial Rum Tasting with Blackwater Distilling (7pm, $40 w/discounts). Saturday and Sunday, try your hand at chopping wood and making rope and talk old times with costumed interpreters and Oldton’s Baltemore [sic] Rangers, 17th century reenactors. Meet the Scottish Appin Regiment and the First Maryland Regiment. Kids dress up in colonial-style clothing.
Saturday, culinary historian Deborah Peterson discusses seasonal colonial foodways (11am). Friday, Satuday March 24-25, 10am-4:30pm, Sunday, March 26, noon-4pm, Edgewater, $1
Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts
ArtFest Open House brings creative fun to all ages with performances, art demonstrations, hands-on projects, community art and gallery events. Popcorn and ice cream served at this all-ages event with all things Made in Maryland. See guest cartoonist Steven Fischer at work.
Sunday, March 26, 1-4pm, 801 Chase St., Annapolis
Maryland State Archives
If your family was Made in Maryland you’ll want to attend the Archive’s Vital Records Workshop to learn about the Archives and how to find aids and use the vital records collections, including birth, death and marriage records. Get tips for using Archives’ catalogs and computer systems to find vital records and request and print birth, death and marriage certificates. Seating limited, rsvp: 410-260-6400.
Friday, March 24, 10am-noon, 350 Rowe Blvd., Annapolis, free (bring photo ID)
Maryland State House
Tour the oldest state capitol still in continuous legislative use, explore the history made here and see the new exhibits, including the beautifully restored Old Senate Chamber.
March 24-26, 9am-5pm, 100 State Circle, Annapolis, free (bring photo ID)
Maryland Theatre for the Performing Arts
The All Children’s Chorus of Annapolis sings at noon. At 2:30pm, gear Baltimore-based band Bumper Jacksons whose “roots jazz, country swing, street blues” sound was recognized as the 2015 Artist of the Year and Best Folk Artist at the Washington Area Music Awards.
Kids climb on Oyster Recovery Partnership’s Lil Nippers model oyster boat to tong for oysters and learn about oyster restoration in the Chesapeake. Plus crafts for all and Maryland-themed cuisine sold by Azure at The Westin Annapolis.
Saturday, March 25, noon-5pm, Stage One, Park Place, Annapolis
Our Legacy Tour
Walk Annapolis on this award-winning tour to explore the history of captured Africans and indentured English and Irish in America.
Captured Africans have lived in Maryland, Anne Arundel County and Annapolis for over 300 years. During colonial times, the labor of captured Africans, who were called slaves, free Africans (also called free Blacks) and indentured servants was the cornerstone of the tobacco economy. When the American Civil War began, Maryland was home to more free blacks than any other state. On this tour you’ll meet Sall Wilkes (portrayed by Scotti Preston) and learn about William H. Butler, who in 1873 was the first African American elected to the Annapolis City Council.
Saturday, March 25, 10:30am-noon, Susan Campbell Park at City Dock
Susan Campbell Park
Start off Maryland Day with a spirit-lifting flag raising ceremony by the award-winning USNA League Cadets of the Training Ship Mercedes, with music by the Annapolis Drum and Bugle Corps.
Saturday, March 25, 10am, City Dock, Annapolis
U.S. Naval Academy
Take a guided tour of the Armel-Leftwich Visitor Center for a glimpse into life as a midshipman, then visit the Academy Museum in Treble Hall to see two floors of exhibits about the history of seapower, the development of the Navy and the role of the Naval Academy in producing officers capable of leading America’s sailors and marines and the famous Rogers Collection of antique ship models. See up close historical artifacts combined with video and audio to bring to life the stories of the men and women who have served their country at sea.
Guided walking tours also visit the sarcophagus of John Paul Jones, the Revolutionary War naval hero buried at the Academy.
March 24-25, 9am-5pm, March 26 11am-5pm, tours run 10am-3pm, Su noon-3pm, Armel-Leftwich Visitor Center, 52 King George St. (enter Gate 1, Randall St., with photo ID) Annapolis, $4, www.usnabsd.com/for-visitors/public-tours
Visit Annapolis and Anne Arundel County
Get expert help and maps for your Maryland Day adventures.
March 24-26, 9am-5pm, 26 West St. and City Dock Information Booth, Annapolis
Maryland’s First Places
Historic St. Mary’s City — Trace Maryland history to its roots at the Maryland Day celebration at our state’s first capital. Gather on the lawn of the reconstructed State House of 1676 for the opening ceremony (1pm) and a welcome from Francis Gray, tribal chair of the Piscataway Conoy. Sen. Stephen Waugh commemorates, then students from all 23 counties plus Baltimore City present the county flags. Make a visit to the museum, where admission is free.
Saturday, March 25, 10am-4pm, Historic St. Mary’s City
St. Clement’s Island Museum — Maryland’s first English colonists celebrated their safe landing in the new world at St. Clement’s Island. The St. Clement’s Island Museum tells their story. You’ll see them as depicted by local artist George McWilliams, who used contemporary locals as models for his 1999 mural. At Piney Point Lighthouse, Museum and Historic Park you can not only visit a historic Maryland lighthouse but also learn about historic boats from skipjacks to submarines. Commemorate the founding of Maryland on the day at the spot with speakers and a wreath-laying ceremony (2pm).