Tobacco
to Tomcats... St. Marys County since the Revolution
Written by
Sandy Shoemaker
Illustrations by
Mary Lou Troutman
Edited by
Lois Coryell, Karen Boyd,
and Lynn Rudigier
Printed & Designed by
StreamLine Enterprises Leonardtown,
Maryland
Acknowledgements
I owe a great deal of
thanks to a number of
local historians who have gone
before me. Edwin Beitzell, Aleck Loker, and
others have done much in
the research
and preservation
of our
local history. Most
of all,
though, I must thank Regina
Coombs Hammett whose work, History
of St. Marys County,
Maryland 1634-1990, is the definitive
work on the subject.
She has done an exhaustive amount of research and
covers all manner of county
history with a great deal
of interest and scholarship. It
is no
exaggeration to say that my
work could not have been
done without her.
I also wish to
thank those people working to
preserve the rich oral traditions
of our
area. Most notably,
the work
of the
Southern Maryland Documentation Project and
its journals,
SlackWater,
Volumes
I, II,
and III,
are wonderful
glimpse into the often overlooked
history of vanishing portions of our
community. I have relied
on the
work of oral historians for this project, but also
admire their efforts in helping
to save
the words
and thoughts
of fascinating
members of our
community.
Again, I must thank
the members
of the
research staff at
the St. Marys
County Public Library in Leonardtown-Lois Coryell, Karen Boyd, and
Lynn
Rudigier-for working for
the funding
for this project and for editing
the work
and offering
valuable suggestions and direction.
They also had the added burden
of securing
photographs for this work and
did so
admirably. For
the photos, we must thank Carol
Moody at the St.
Marys County
Historical Society, Carolyn
Laray at the St. Marys
County Office of
Tourism,
and John
Romer at the Patuxent River
Naval Air Station.
Thanks also
go to
Genie Posnett, Norma Durkin, and
Janeen Grohsmeyer for permis- sion to use their art
work and, of course, to
our illustrator,
Mary Lou Troutman. Once
again,
Mary Lou handled every
request thrown her way with
professionalism and her
patented sense of humor. She
has been
a joy.
Thanks also go to Ronnie
and his
staff at
Streamline
Printing for production of the work.
Finally, I wish
to thank
my very
supportive family, including
our newest
addition, Jacob, who watched me finish this work from a bouncy chair and was always the best company I<
