Temperance 1908 March 21. Worcester County Library Historic Slide Collection, WR 53 Pocomoke128, via Flickr.
Women were politically active since before the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920, which granted women the right to vote. One of the political movements they were deeply involved in, and in most places led, was the temperance movement. Women were drawn to the movement to limit the overindulgence of men who drank too much alcohol and then would become violent, addicted, and/or die because of it.
Worcester County, Maryland women were no strangers to this movement. The above photograph shows March 21, 1908. Women were using politics to appeal to their husbands to pass a law making Worcester County a “dry” county. They gathered, used signs to convince men of the importance of this, with one sign saying “Fathers Vote For Me”.
Each Worcester County district voted whether to go "dry" or to continue allowing the sale of alcohol. With a huge temperance movement in the community, led by women, Worcester County voted to go dry in every part of the County.
The People Have Spoken. The Democratic Messenger. 1908 March 28.
Ocean City, Maryland, 1946. Worcester County Library Postcard Collection, WR 52 Postcard442.
We often forget how involved women were in World War II. Annie G. Bunting grew up in Ocean City since the early 1900s. Once World War II came around, she decided to help out and became a Spotter. A Spotter was someone who would watch the sky for enemy planes to make sure they did not make it onto American soil. This job was common during WW II along the East Coast beaches. Read some of her transcript below about being a Spotter in Ocean City.
INTERVIEWER: That was it. Now during WWII you were a spotter?
ANNIE: Yes
INTERVIEWER: What did you do as a spotter?
ANNIE: Well we had a little house with a walk all the way around.
INTERVIEWER: Ok
ANNIE: A stove and a phone and a ledger.
INTERVIEWER: Ok, where was this?
ANNIE: It was up well uh just where the carousel is wasn’t it?
MAN: No that would above the (unintelligible) station where the carousel is now. You were between uh
ANNIE: It was all bushes and brambles and you didn’t know where you were you just went.
INTERVIEWER: Ok
MAN: You were at 25th street.
ANNIE: Yes you didn’t have a light. You couldn’t have a light on a car.
INTERVIEWER: Oh you couldn’t could you?
ANNIE: No
MAN: Everything was black.
ANNIE: You couldn’t have a light on a car. You couldn’t have a light so when you went to print your ledger instead your stuff in your ledger you had a flashlight light you held it there. You wrote down your report on the ledger.
INTERVIEWER: And you used blackout curtains and things in your house and everything?
ANNIE: You put your lights out on your gas stove.
INTERVIEWER: Oh even that little?
ANNIE: Oh yes a lot people would use black curtains but I didn’t. No you didn’t have no light.
INTERVIEWER: And you would run regular shifts as a spotter?
ANNIE: Yes you took shifts sometimes you take somebody else’s if you had time. I didn’t have any time. I had more time than I needed because all my folks were in the service. It was just me and my dog.
INTERVIEWER: Well then you did have time to do it?
ANNIE: I would go somebody Annie Krilling, Ms. Sacker, Estelle Powell and like that we would go every night. We went every night and these Army were stationed in here.
INTERVIEWER: They were?
ANNIE: They were brought in here 4’ o’clock every afternoon and stay late till the next night.
INTERVIEWER: I didn’t know that.
ANNIE: They slept in a church in Berlin in the Methodist church.
INTERVIEWER: Oh ok
ANNIE: Yes and they ate out of the Forman’s kitchen. They’d cook it the food and pass it them out the window. They couldn’t come in because it was a small place.
INTERVIEWER: Alright oh ok, how long were they stationed here?
ANNIE: For years, the duration of the war but not the same group of men. They were transferred. Everybody in the United States knows me (laughs) they’d come from Tennessee or Kentucky a lot of these people would come down here and wanted to know they were here didn’t they? And there is a boy and a girl still living and married and they live in Florida and they stopped last summer to see me. His name is Bud Shoot and he was I believe he was lieutenant and uh Betty was here with her father and mother and these boys were from all over the United States.
Listen to the Oral History of Annie Bunting below! She discusses growing up in Ocean City and the changes she has seen.
Enjoy these photographs of women's fashion in Worcester County, Maryland.
Ocean City Boardwalk 1905. Worcester County Library Historic Slide Collection, WR 53 Ocean City130, via Flickr.
Women on the Ocean City boardwalk wearing their full Victorian gown, holding umbrellas to protect themselves from the sun. It was proper for women to only wear their dresses in Ocean City in 1905. Irma Jester discusses bathing suits around 1905 in her oral history: "My mother would put an old dress on me and an old pair of panties and I would go bathe in that. I didn’t have a real bathing suit like they have today, but you could wade way out in the water." (Jester).
Millinery 1908. Worcester County Library Historic Slide Collection, WR 53 Pocomoke188, via Flickr.
Many women all over Worcester County had owned and operated milliners, selling hats and other stylish accessories before they had the right to vote. R. Belle Wilson owned and operated their millinery in Pocomoke City in the early 1900s.
Former Slaves 1900. Worcester County Library Photograph Collection. Contact Library for more details.
Pictured here are three former slaves from Pocomoke City in the very early 1900s. The women are wearing their Victorian clothing that is seen often during this time period.
Two women and two children 1900. Worcester County Library Photograph Collection. Contact Library for more details.
This photograph shows two women and two children. The style is much like the other ones we have seen of women in the early 1900s. The shoulder pads of the women were very popular from the 1890-1905 era. Also of interest is the baby. Very young children would always wear dresses regardless of sex during this time.
Greetings from Showell 1908. Worcester County Library Postcard Collection, WR 52 Postcard267.
Postcards are great ways to see the fashion of women in the early 1900s. This postcard has a woman with a very colorful dress and a large hat.
Woman Bathing Suit 1900. Worcester County Library Photograph Collection. WR 51 Photograph176.
Photograph of a woman wearing a bathing suit. This is what women would change into at Ocean City and Public Landing in the early 1900.
Hester Derrickson 1940. Worcester County Library Photograph Collection. WR 51 Photograph396.
Moving into the WWII era, women started wearing pants at a higher rate. This was due to them joining the workforce at a higher rate than ever before.
Newark School 1908. Worcester County Library Historic Slide Collection, WR 53 Newark007, via Flickr.
School teachers have served a fundamental roll in educating children for a long time now. Enjoy two stories bellow of teachers in the earlier 1900s. Flossie Douglass was a black teacher for the "colored" Box Iron and Snow Hill schools. Irma Jester was a white teacher for schools around the Berlin area.
Douglass was the school teacher for the "colored" Box Iron School, which was about 4 miles from Snow Hill. The school was a small one room framed building located on the county road leading to Box Iron to Truitt’s Landing by Girdletree. The building had no lights and only a small wood burning heater for cold weather. The fire had to be taken care of everyday and sometimes the larger boys and other people in the community, who lived near the school, would help with the fire. The enrollment from November to March was 68-70 people with people sitting two in a seat. The enrollment from September- November was an average of 34-38 pupils.
After 5 years of teaching at Box Iron School, the Worcester County Board of Education moved Flossie Douglass to the Snow Hill School. The Snow Hill School had a very small four room building with no light and very small blackboard space. Two of the rooms upstairs were used for the high school and the other two elementary classrooms were moved across town to the old Odd Fellows Hall. This was the only high school for Black children in all of Worcester County, Maryland. They had a pot belly stove in each classroom and coal was used and the fires were kept overnight. The school was located on Collins Street across from the Cemetery (no longer there).
In 1960, Flossie Douglass retired from teaching. Though, she continued to help children. From 1968-1972 she worked with the Head Start of Worcester County.
Listen to an Oral History with Flossie Douglass below. She discusses her early life as a Black educator in Worcester County, Maryland.
IRMA: "I graduated when I was 18 and at that time a teacher student did not have to go to college. I graduated in June and I was given a school the following September. I went to summer school that summer at Ocean City and at that time you were issued certificates if you took certain courses you would get a third grade certificate and if you took music and art in addition to the other courses you’d get a second grade certificate. I wasn’t that well educated in music. I always liked art but I decided to take the exam because I wouldn't lose anything if I failed but I passed and I was issued a second grade certificate. I started teaching at West Ocean City School in September 1918. I had 50 pupils in one room school and I had grades from 1 to 6. It was very difficult but most of the children were very cooperative and I taught there for 2 years.
When I first went into school, in the back of the room was a shelf with a pail and we had to go out back of the school and pump water and take it in the school in the pail and there was one dipper and everybody used the same dipper. I was not satisfied with this so I had an ice cream social one night. I made ice cream and all the parents came in and I made about twenty dollars on the social. I took that money and bought a little fountain. It was a five gallon glass jug turned upside down on a little instrument or something and you could press the bottom and water would come out and I insisted that every child bring in his own cup to school and we had nails on the wall and the children hang their cup on that. Then I also answered an advertisement for soap and I had 50 little cakes of soap given to me so I had the children to wash their hands and drink out of their own cup and the pump was in back of school and we had to prime it so you always had to leave a little bit of water in the bucket to pour down the pump so it would catch the water and it catches water and it had to be primed."
Listen to an Oral History with Irma Jester below. She discuses her own education, and talks more about being an educator in the early 1900s.
One of the Special Collections in the Worcester County Library is WR 21: Snow Hill Woman's Club records. The Snow Hill Woman’s Club records documents the meeting minutes, community engagement, financial, and membership of the Snow Hill Woman’s Club. The club only met on January-March and September-December on each given year. The meeting minutes are especially useful as they document activities the club was involved in.
Meeting Minutes 1928 March 7, WR 21: Snow Hill Woman's Club records, [Box 1, Folder 2,] Worcester County Library, Snow Hill Branch, Snow Hill, Maryland.
The Snow Hill Woman’s Club was first founded on March 7, 1928. The honorary president of the Worcester County Woman’s Club, Julia Mathews Robins (1857-1941), called a meeting to establish a local chapter for Snow Hill. To make sure the club was able to flourish, Julia M. Robins (1857-1941) was the first president. The objective of the Snow Hill Woman’s Club is “to unite the women of Snow Hill and vicinity for purposes of individual, social and civic improvement.”
By the second meeting on March 20, 1928, a total of fifty-eight women had joined the Snow Hill Woman’s Club. The club had multiple different committees. One such was the garden committee which sought to make the community of Snow Hill as beautiful as possible by bringing plant life into town. There was also a library committee dedicated to raise money for the local Snow Hill Library, which had only been in operation since ~1915. In March 1931, the Snow Hill Woman’s Club was officially certified as belonging to the General Federation of Women’s Clubs.
On March 17, 1941 the Snow Hill Woman’s Club had its final meeting. Due to a lack of funding and other issues hitting the county, the club was unable to continue. There were pushes to get the club to May 1941, but it was not able to last until then.
Interested in learning more? View the Finding Aid HERE.
Local History, Special Collections, and Genealogy