Tyaskin, Maryland, In Photos and Documents
The Story of a Little Town on the Nanticoke River Near the Chesapeake Bay
By Barbara Marhoefer. Each copy is $30 ($25 plus $5 shipping (Order Form)
A Lens to Understanding Maryland’s Lower Eastern Shore:
This book is
a new approach to local history – using photos, documents, eyewitness accounts,
letters, a report card, even a recipe for medicine. Barbara Marhoefer wrote
Tyaskin’s story by researching and interviewing, even posting signs in two post
offices, asking for material. The result is a 170-page book with more than 250
photos, many in color. It gives
insight into Maryland’s Eastern Shore through the lens of a small town…from
John Smith’s visit in the 1600s until today.
Tyaskin, Maryland, In Photos and
Documents tells the story of a town that once had
300 people and five stores, a fish-processing plant, a saw mill, tomato and
potato canning house and a ladies hat shop. Then in 1924, the steamboats
stopped calling at Tyaskin Wharf and people moved elsewhere for jobs. Today there are no stores and less than
150 full-time residents.
The Steamboat Tangier at Tyaskin Wharf
The book includes a letter describing Tyaskin at the end of the Civil War, pictures of homes built for black families after the war, a Tyaskin man recalling working on a steamer, a women recalling a showboat stopping at Tyaskin Wharf, a love letter from World War I, death on the cable ferry at Wetipquin Creek, a public subscription to bring a concrete road out from Salisbury, Tyaskin’s shirt factory and items sold at the old Culver store ( including Johnny Cakes, Squirrel Nuts and Hobo Buns).
Cookie and Cracker Display: The Culver General Store had a case like this one.
Tyaskin, Maryland, In Photos and Documents tells the story of Briar Patch, a farmhouse which was the home of a deaf mute couple. James Fred and Emeline Insley met in 1877 when they were children at the Maryland School for the Deaf in Frederick, MD. James Fred and his three little sisters all attended the school, and because it was so far away, they spent the school year there. Their parents sent them fruitcakes each Christmas.
Briar Patch: Once the home of James Fred and Emeline Insley
The book includes short histories of Tyaskin’s three churches and the
Westside Fire Department, and stories about Tyaskin’s Black and White Schools. Research for the book discovered farm
and sewing wages from the 1930s, how crop pickers were paid in “checks” or
tokens, and the wildly fluctuating prices for oysters in the 1930s Depression.
Early Morning Mist at Tyaskin Methodist Churchyard
Tyaskin, Maryland, In Photos and Documents includes a translation of the word
Tyaskin in the Nanticoke Tribe language, and photos of Nanticoke Tribe fishing
and farming tools, found locally.
Nanticoke Tribe Campgrounds on Wetipquin Creek: Will Maher paddles past the site.
To buy the book, please fill out the Order Form and send it to the author with your check.
Tyaskin, Maryland, In Photos and
Documents
By Barbara
Marhoefer. Each copy
is $30 ($25 plus $5 shipping)