The Calvert Marine Museum is partnering with the Chesapeake Beach Railway Museum, Calvert Library, and the Bayside History Museum to present “At the Water’s Edge,” a fun and engaging lecture series that explores leisure activities along the Chesapeake Bay in Calvert County from 1890 to 1970. The series kicked off in September and runs through April, 2018. Upcoming lectures at the Calvert Marine Museum include “The Happiest of All Showboat Stories: The James Adams Floating Theatre” on January 18, “Gambling” onMarch 22 and “Boats, Roads, Trains and Planes: A Look Back in Calvert County” on April 12. All lectures are in the Harms Gallery and begin at 7 p.m. FREE.
On Thursday, January 18, Dr. Patricia Samford will present “The Happiest of All Showboat Stories: The James Adams Floating Theatre” at 7 p.m. in the Harms Gallery. In the days before television, computers, and the internet captured imaginations and free time, residents of coastal Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina impatiently awaited the arrival of the best entertainment: the James Adams Floating Theatre. In operation from 1914 to 1941, the showboat was an opportunity for an evening of diverting musical and theatrical entertainment. Patricia Samford first became interested in the James Adams Floating Theater while serving as director of Historic Bath, the first incorporated town in North Carolina. This little town is where novelist Edna Ferber boarded the Floating Theater to conduct the research that would form the basis of Showboat, her most famous novel (later turned into a musical and three movies). Samford is currently the director of the Maryland Archaeological Conservation Laboratory at Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum, and is an archaeologist by training. She received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and has formerly worked as an archaeologist for the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.
Other lecture venues include the North Beach and Chesapeake Beach Town Halls and the Calvert Library in Prince Frederick. For more information about each program, visithttp://www.calvertmarinemuseum.com/446/At-The-Waters-Edge-Lecture-Series.
The museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $9.00 for adults, $7.00 for seniors, military with valid I.D. and AAA members, and $4.00 for children ages 5 – 12; children under 5 and museum members are always admitted free. For more information about the museum, upcoming events, or membership, visit the website at www.calvertmarinemuseum.comor call 410-326-2042. Like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.