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That was then ... this is now
Museum exhibit shows how Solomons has changed
Friday, March 6, 2009
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photos by DARWIN WEIGEL
The Calvert Marine Museum is opening the "Solomons Then and Now" photography exhibit this evening during the museum's First Free Friday event.
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The staff of the Calvert Marine Museum is looking to the community to help write history.
Opening tonight during the museum's monthly First Free Friday event, the latest exhibit, "Solomons Then and Now," features nearly 100 photographs depicting the last 100 years at various locations around Solomons Island.
According to Sherrod Sturrock, deputy director of the marine museum, the idea for the exhibit came about after Richard Dodds, curator of maritime history at the museum, published a book on the history of Solomons and Broomes Island areas of Calvert County.
"A lot of the photos in the book are from our archives," Sturrock said. "The exhibits department came up with idea to do ‘Solomons Then and Now.' They came up with the idea to go to a location and take a current photo of same spot, and then mount them side by side" so visitors could see how Solomons looked years ago and how it looks now.
"The exhibit travels from Solomons proper and Avendale [the residential area on Solomons Island], and on up to what used to be farmland that is now commercial up Route 4," she said. "We wanted to show how Solomons has changed and how it has stayed the same; it is striking to see" the differences.
According to a press release, the exhibit includes images of the "construction of the [Gov.] Thomas Johnson [Memorial] Bridge, Webster's Store, sailing schooners in the harbor, Model-T Fords parked in front of the Rekar's Hotel and the Evans Moving Picture & Amusement Pier, now the Solomons Pier Restaurant."
The marine museum is asking visitors to view the photos and share their related memories, also to be included in the exhibit. The exhibit will remain on display for about six months, Sturrock said, but will be displayed permanently on the museum's Web site, complete with the memoirs, as the museum is "working to make our Web site more interactive," Sturrock said.
Jim Langley, the curator of exhibits at the museum, said the exhibit was also born out of the hard work of museum volunteers Tommy and Sandy Younger, lifelong Solomons Island residents, who helped cull the archives for the photos displayed in the exhibit.
"[The Youngers and I] have all lived here [in Solomons] our entire lives and watched the community change from what we remember to what it is today. Residents who were born and lived their entire lives in Calvert County are a very low percent," Langley said. "Our idea was to bring back some memories about some of the changes over the last 75 or 100 years."
Langley said that while putting the exhibit together, he had a rather fond memory of Evan's Moving Picture and Amusement Pier.
"Solomons Pier, which was Evan's Pier at the time, I remember in the mid-'50s, I was about 8 years old, and my sister would take me to see fright movies there, and it was a perfect place to see fright movies, with it being dark and that pier stretching out over the water that was [splashing underneath]. And going to the bathroom was something of an experience. The bathroom was simply a board in a room with a hole in the floor; you would look down that hole and see the dark, sloshing water and it was [frightening].
"I remember growing up in Solomons that we didn't keep much food around because we relied on the market right down the street … You didn't plan on hoarding up a bunch of food when you had Woodburn's Food Market right there. … The [exhibit] will show some people how we have had change over time and hopefully it will spark interest with other people who remember and [we hope] they will share their photos with us and their memories."
In addition to the exhibit, marine staff will be available during the First Free Friday event, and Dodds will be on hand to sign his book, "Islands in a River: Solomons and Broomes Island, Maryland."
To get involved
The museum is open free from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on First Free Fridays. To share your memories, send letters to Calvert Marine Museum, Solomons Then and Now Exhibit, P.O. Box 97, Solomons, MD 20688, or e-mail langlejf@co.cal.md.us and put "Solomons Then and Now" in the subject line.
