Moving to Maryland - Baltimore, Annapolis, Bethesda, Columbia.
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Maryland, one of the
Middle Atlantic states of the United States, ranks 42d among the states
in area, 19th in population size, and is a leading state in population
density. Chesapeake Bay, the largest bay in the continental United States,
almost severs the state, dividing the Eastern Shore--which is located
on the Delmarva Peninsula (shared by Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia)--from
the Western Shore. Maryland is irregularly shaped, with a maximum east-west
extent of 320 km (199 mi) and a north-south extent that ranges from about
3 km (2 mi), near Hancock, to a maximum of 201 km (125 mi). The straight
northern boundary with Pennsylvania is part of the Mason-Dixon line, which
was established in 1769; the southern and western boundary with Virginia
and West Virginia follows the Potomac River except where the District
of Columbia intervenes; Delaware lies to the east.
One of the 13 original states, Maryland was named for Queen Henrietta
Maria, wife of Charles I of England. The area was first colonized in 1634
and played a major role in the nation's early history and struggle for
independence. During the Civil War, Maryland was divided on the issue
of secession and was placed under military rule to keep it within the
Union and protect the nation's capital. The state capital is Annapolis,
which lies within the metropolitan area of Baltimore, Maryland's largest
city.
LAND AND RESOURCES
From east to west, Maryland cuts across the major physiographic divisions
of the eastern United States--the Coastal Plain, the Piedmont, and the
Appalachian Mountains. The Coastal Plain occupies all of eastern Maryland,
including both shores of the Chesapeake Bay. It is underlain by sedimentary
rock, and elevations are less than 30 m (100 ft) on the Eastern Shore
and less than 60 m (200 ft) on the more rolling Western Shore. Along the
Atlantic coast a series of low, sandy barrier islands and vast stretches
of swampy and tidal wetlands surround Chesapeake Bay. The Coastal Plain
is bounded on the west by the fall line, which extends roughly from the
head of Chesapeake Bay southwestward through Baltimore to the boundary
between Prince Georges and Montgomery counties in suburban Washington,
D.C.
West of the fall line is the Piedmont Plateau, which is part of the Appalachians
and underlain mostly by igneous and metamorphic rocks. Elevations rise
to 400 m (1,300 ft), and the rolling surface is well suited for agriculture
except where cut by steep-sided valleys. The Blue Ridge Mountains begin
west of Frederick, and they extend southwest-northeast across the state
as a prominent, forested ridge, with summits reaching about 520 m (1,706
ft). West of the Blue Ridge lies the Great Valley, an elongated plain
extending from Virginia into Pennsylvania that has provided easy northeast-southwest
access since colonial times and was part of the Cumberland Gap route to
the Middle West. Most of Western Maryland consists of a series of parallel
ridges and valleys, part of the Ridge and Valley section of the Appalachian
Mountains. In the far west is a tiny portion of the steep hills and winding
valleys of the Appalachian Plateau where Backbone Mountain, Maryland's
highest point, reaches 1,024 m (3,360 ft).
Soils
The best agricultural soils occur on the Piedmont and in well-drained
areas of the Coastal Plain. Soils in the Great Valley and western areas
are of poorer quality and used largely for dairying and livestock production
and for fruit growing in some protected valleys.
Drainage
About 184 km (114 mi) of the 309-km-long (192-mi) Chesapeake Bay are within
Maryland's borders. Widening from less than 5 km (3 mi) in the north to
over 40 km (25 mi) in the south, the bay, together with such broad indentations
as the lower Potomac and Patuxent river valleys, is part of the lower
Susquehanna drainage system that was inundated when sea levels rose at
the end of the Pleistocene Ice Age (about 10,000 years ago). The Susquehanna
River now enters the northern end of the bay. Major rivers draining from
the east are the Elk, Chester, Choptank, Nanticoke, and Pokomoke; draining
from the west are the Patapsco, Patuxent, and Potomac, which are interrupted,
respectively, by falls at Baltimore, Laurel, and Potomac (to the northwest
of Washington, D.C.), where they cross the fall line. These and other
falls on streams entering the Chesapeake Bay near Baltimore were important
sites for early factories using water power for energy.
Climate
Climatic conditions vary more from east to west and with altitude than
from north to south. The Coastal Plain has hot summers, mild winters,
and a growing season usually longer than 200 days. Temperatures average
above 1 degrees C (34 degrees F) in January, and more than 23 degrees
C (74 degrees F) in July; annual precipitation is generally more than
1,070 mm (42 in), and snowfall is less than 510 mm (20 in). In the Piedmont
temperatures average 1 degrees C (34 degrees F) in January and 24 degrees
C (76 degrees F) in July; the growing season is 160 to 200 days, precipitation
is less than 1,070 mm (42 in), and snowfall is moderate, between 510 mm
(20 in) and 760 mm (30 in). The mountainous west has severe winters, with
temperatures generally below freezing and snowfall totaling between 1,020
mm (40 in) and 2,540 mm (100 in). Summers are cool, with the average temperature
in July less than 21 degrees C (70 degrees F), and the growing season
is less than 160 days.
Vegetation and Animal Life
Forests and woodlands cover about a third of the state, including most
of the western mountains and much of southern Maryland between the Potomac
and Chesapeake Bay. An oak-hickory hardwood forest dominates the Appalachian
and Piedmont areas and is common on the Western Shore. The lower Eastern
Shore has a Southern pine forest, with loblolly, pitch, and Virginia pines.
Occasional bears and bobcats are seen in the mountains, and deer, foxes,
opossums, and raccoons abound all over.
Chesapeake Bay is rich in oysters, clams, crabs, and other marine animals.
The bay is also part of the Atlantic flyway and is visited by numerous
migrating birds, wild geese, and ducks. Game birds in the western uplands
include quail, wild turkey, and ruffed grouse.
Resources
Coal reserves in Maryland's western mountains are estimated at more than
450 million metric tons (500 million U.S. tons), but production has declined
since the early 20th century and is small compared with neighboring West
Virginia and Pennsylvania. The most important minerals are limestone,
sand, and gravel, which are used in the building industry, and clays and
shales, which are used in brickmaking. Extensive underground water resources
are available in the sedimentary rocks underlying the Coastal Plain, but
other regions must depend on surface water from rivers and reservoirs
for municipal and industrial water supplies.
PEOPLE
Maryland had a resident population of 4,781,468 at the time of the 1990
census. The rate of increase from 1980 to 1990 was 13.4 percent, slightly
more than the 9.8 percent growth rate for the nation as a whole. Maryland
is divided into two very different population regions. Large areas of
the state are rural and sparsely settled, and most of Maryland's largest
cities have populations of less than 40,000. About 4.1 million people,
accounting for more than 85 percent of Maryland's population, reside along
the western side of Chesapeake Bay in the Baltimore and Washington metropolitan
areas or in the beltway known as the Baltimore-Washington corridor.
Blacks have lived in Maryland since the colonial period and now constitute
about 25 percent of the total population and nearly 60 percent of the
population of Baltimore. The principal groups included in the white majority
are of British, German, Hispanic, Italian, Polish, and Russian descent.
Asians, with a population growth rate of 117.4 percent, constitute the
fastest-growing ethnic group, followed by Hispanics, with a growth rate
of 93.2 percent. These groups, however, remain small, each comprising
less than 3 percent of the total state population. The population is mostly
Christian, but there is a significant Jewish community.
Education
In 1826 a statewide education system was established, and in 1867 a separate
school system for black students was begun. Black children continued to
be educated separately until the 1954 Supreme Court decision ended school
segregation. Schooling is mandatory for all children between the ages
of 6 and 16, but significant regional variations in the level of education
are discernible. For information on the public institutions of higher
education, see Maryland, state universities and colleges of. The Johns
Hopkins University in Baltimore is the state's most distinguished private
institution; its affiliated institution, the Peabody Conservatory of Music,
is nationally renowned. The United States Naval Academy is located in
Annapolis. The Enoch Pratt Free Library, also in Baltimore, is considered
one of the nation's finest municipal libraries.
Cultural Institutions
Most of Maryland's cultural institutions are concentrated in Baltimore.
The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and the Baltimore Opera Company are both
highly rated nationally. Art museums in the city include the Baltimore
Museum of Art and the Walters Art Gallery. The new National Aquarium is
part of the city's restored waterfront, which includes shops, the Maryland
Science Center, and the historic U.S. frigate Constellation.
Historical Sites and Recreation
Historical sites trace Maryland's important role in U.S. history. St.
Mary's city was the location of the first settlement in the state in 1634.
Chestertown, on the eastern shore, has historic homes, as does Annapolis,
an important colonial tobacco port and the country's oldest state capital;
it also briefly was the U.S. capital. Cumberland, in the west, was the
eastern point of the Cumberland Trail, and Ellicott City was the original
western terminus of the B&O railroad. The National Colonial Farm at
Accokeek is a restored 18th-century tobacco plantation. Nationally maintained
places of interest include Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic
Shrine in Baltimore, where Francis Scott Key wrote "The Star-Spangled
Banner" during the War of 1812; the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National
Historical Park, connecting Washington with the west; and the Civil War
Antietam National Battlefield, near Sharpsburg. The Appalachian National
Scenic Trail crosses the state, and Assateague Island National Seashore
is famous for its herds of wild ponies.
Camp David, the presidential retreat, lies in the Catoctin mountains near
Thurmont. Ocean City is a popular Atlantic Ocean resort, and Chesapeake
Bay offers quality sailing, fishing, and duck-hunting areas. State parks
and forests provide hiking and camping activities. Professional sports
teams include the Baltimore Oriole baseball team, playing in a new stadium
near the waterfront and close to Babe Ruth's boyhood home, and the Washington
Capitals basketball team, in suburban Maryland. Baltimore's Pimlico Race
Course, site of the Preakness, and Laurel have nationally known horse-racing
tracks, and Rosecroft Raceway, near Washington, has harness racing.
Communications
The Baltimore Sun newspaper and Baltimore and Washington television and
radio stations dominate communications in the state. Hagerstown and Salisbury
have television stations, and Hagerstown, Salisbury, Annapolis, and Frederick
have daily newspapers and radio stations.
ECONOMIC ACTIVITY
Maryland's colonial economy was based on tobacco farming around Chesapeake
Bay, with exports often directly from docks on the plantation. After the
Revolution the port of Baltimore grew to rival those of Boston, New York,
and Philadelphia. In the 19th century the building of the Chesapeake and
Ohio Canal and the completion of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad gave
Maryland access to the new farmlands of the Middle West and the Mississippi
Valley. Today, Maryland's economy is dominated by activities in the Baltimore-Washington
metropolitan areas, and these have changed markedly in the decades since
World War II. Baltimore's traditional heavy manufacturing and port and
rail activities have declined. At the same time the growth of the federal
government and government-related activities have spilled from the nearby
District of Columbia to Maryland, including Baltimore. Today, government-related
business is of major economic importance to the state. Federal-government
installations include Andrews Air Force Base, the Goddard Space Flight
Center, the Agricultural Research Service, and Fort Meade, including the
National Security Agency, Aberdeen Proving Ground, and Fort Detrick in
the Baltimore metropolitan area.
Manufacturing
In recent years manufacturing employment has declined in Maryland, but
the value of output has increased. The Sparrows Point steel plant in Baltimore,
once one of the largest in the country, and the city's shipbuilding and
repair and automobile industries have been scaled down. At the same time
high-tech industries, producing computer software and biotech products,
have grown rapidly. The Baltimore-Washington metropolitan areas are among
the leading U.S. high-tech regions. Many of these regional firms supply
the needs of the federal government with computer software and biotech
research.
Agriculture
Maryland ranks only 35th among the states in agricultural income from
farm marketings (1989), but farming continues to be an important activity
on the eastern shore and in the counties between Baltimore and Cumberland.
The eastern shore specializes in chickens for urban markets along the
east coast and produces soybeans, corn, and market vegetables. Southern
Maryland produces distinctive high-burning tobacco favored in Europe,
but tobacco production has been squeezed by the spread of suburbia. Horticulture
and mixed dairy and crop farming are important in the Piedmont. Apples
and peaches are a specialty of the valleys of western Maryland.
Fishing and Forestry
Commercial fishing, long a major industry in Chesapeake Bay, has been
hurt by pollution from farm fertilizers and urban wastes, but crabs, clams,
and oysters remain important catches. Since 1984, Maryland has worked
with the federal government and Pennsylvania and Virginia--the other Bay
states--to clean up the Chesapeake. Forests are today more important for
recreation purposes than for wood products.
Mining
Only a small part of western Maryland lies in the Appalachian coal-mining
area. The most important mineral industries produce building materials--stone,
sand and gravel, and cement.
Transportation
The links between the Baltimore-Washington corridor and Philadelphia,
New York, and Boston are the busiest passenger routes in the United States,
served by more than a dozen passenger trains each way per day, by shuttle
air service, and by Interstate 95, the busiest U.S. highway. The state
operates commuter service between Baltimore and Washington. Baltimore,
the closest Atlantic port to the Middle West, now has modern container
shipping facilities and is a major port for the importing of foreign automobiles;
it has been losing business, however, to the Port of Hampton Roads, in
Virginia, at the mouth of the Chesapeake. The Baltimore-Washington airport
serves the entire metropolitan corridor in the state and has international
connections to Europe and Latin America.
Energy
Maryland is linked with the power grid of the eastern United States and
derives its electrical energy from petroleum, coal, natural gas, nuclear
power, and hydropower sources. Nearly all of the generating capacity is
privately owned. Maryland's two nuclear power plant units produce about
20 percent of the state's net generation of electricity.
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
Maryland's constitution was adopted in 1867 and is now much amended; earlier
constitutions were adopted in 1776, 1851, and 1864. The 1867 constitution
provides for a bicameral General Assembly with a 47-member Senate and
a 141-member House of Delegates. Members of the assembly are elected to
4-year terms and meet in annual 90-day sessions. The chief executive is
the governor, who is popularly elected for a 4-year term and is limited
to 2 consecutive terms. Counties provide basic services such as road construction,
schools, and police and are the principal form of local government. Most
of the 23 counties are headed by from 3 to 8 elected commissioners. Maryland
sends to the U.S. Congress 2 senators and 8 representatives. Long considered
a Democratic stronghold, Maryland can no longer be counted on to vote
for Democratic candidates in state and national elections. Demographic
and social factors affecting the vote are the large numbers of blacks
in the state; the first- and second-generation ethnic groups; the fast-growing,
wealthy, and well-educated suburban population spilling over into Maryland
from Washington, D.C.; and the traditionally conservative elements in
the Eastern Shore and southern Maryland.
HISTORY
Giovanni da Verrazano is thought to have visited the Atlantic coast near
Chincoteague Bay in 1524. In 1526, Spanish explorers sailed into Chesapeake
Bay and called it Santa Maria, a name that appears on a 1556 map. In 1608,
Captain John Smith of Virginia became the first authenticated European
visitor. In late 1631, William Clairborne established a fur-trading post,
which is regarded as the first permanent European settlement, on Kent
Island (opposite Annapolis). At the time of early European settlement,
the principal Indian groups were three Algonquian tribes--the Piscataway
on the Western Shore, who left the area in 1697; and the Nanticoke and
Pocomoke-Assateague on the Eastern Shore, who migrated westward in the
1740s. The Susquehannock also inhabited the area, but in 1675 they were
carried into captivity by the Iroquois Nations.
In 1632, King Charles I of England granted George Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore
(see Calvert, family), settlement rights to lands between the 40th parallel
and the south bank of the Potomac. Calvert died before the papers were
complete, and the charter passed to his son Cecilius (Cecil) Calvert,
2d Baron Baltimore. In November 1633, 200 colonists set sail from England
in the Ark and the Dove, which landed on Mar. 24, 1634, at Saint Clement
(now Blakistone) Island at the mouth of the Potomac. They purchased the
Indian village of Yaocomico, which they renamed St. Mary's (now St. Mary's
City) and used for 60 years as the capital and center of the colony. Lord
Baltimore, a Roman Catholic, sought religious freedom for the colony,
and in 1649 the Colonial Assembly passed the Act Concerning Religion,
the first statute in the colonies to provide freedom of worship for all
Christians.
From 1692 to 1715, Maryland was a crown colony, ruled by royal governors.
During this period the Church of England was the official religion, and
in 1694 the capital moved to Annapolis. The Baltimores regained control
in 1715. At first the colony had a diversified agriculture, but by the
end of the 17th century tobacco was the staple crop.
In the Revolutionary period, Maryland was one of the first colonies to
repudiate the Stamp Act (1765). Early in the colonial resistance to British
rule, Marylanders had their own "tea party," in 1774 in Chestertown when
the tea-carrying ship Peggy Stewart was burned in Annapolis harbor. On
July 3, 1776, the state disavowed its allegiance to the king, and 4 months
later was the first of the former colonies to adopt a state constitution.
Marylanders were active in both Continental Congresses and in the signing
of the Declaration of Independence. During the Revolutionary War, Maryland
troops distinguished themselves in battles outside the state, but no fighting
took place in the state. In 1788, Maryland became the 7th state to ratify
the U.S. Constitution, and in 1791 it ceded to the nation 174 sq km (67
sq mi) along the Potomac for construction of the District of Columbia.
Maryland's early years of statehood were spent in developing the state's
resources. Shipping and trade expanded, and families abandoning the worn-out
tobacco farms of the Eastern Shore and southern Maryland migrated westward
into the Piedmont. Baltimore, incorporated in 1797, grew rapidly as a
port, shipbuilding, and industrial center, attaining a population of 26,500
(more than Boston) in 1800 and 169,000 in 1850. New transportation facilities
integrated the growing trade of lands west of the Appalachians into the
region. Among the more important routes were the National Road (1818);
the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (1829) across the Delmarva Peninsula;
the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal along the Potomac River to Cumberland and
the coalfields of western Maryland; and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad,
the first U.S. passenger railroad, begun in 1828.
At the outbreak of the Civil War, Maryland had almost equal numbers of
slaves and free blacks, and the state was sharply divided in its sympathies
to North and South. However, when neighboring Virginia seceded, Maryland's
presence within the Union became vital to the defense of Washington, D.C.,
and President Lincoln was forced to prevent secession by imposing military
rule. Fierce battles fought on Maryland soil included the battles of South
Mountain and Antietam (both in 1862) and Monocacy (1864).
After the Civil War, manufacturing expanded rapidly, except during the
12-year depression following the Panic of 1873, and eventually emerged
as the mainstay of the economy. Thousands of Greek, German, Italian, Russian,
Polish, and other immigrants, together with blacks migrating from rural
counties, flocked to take jobs in Baltimore's textile and other factories.
From 1870 to 1895 transportation interests, led by Arthur P. Gorman and
I. Freeman Rasin, dominated state politics and kept Democrats in power.
In 1895 the Gorman-Rasin machine was overthrown, but Democrats continued
to dominate state politics and have since lost the governorship to Republicans
only five times. In 1904, Baltimore was devastated by fire but recovered
to grow rapidly as World Wars I and II increased demand for the city's
industrial products. More recently, Washington-related research and other
industries have increased the state's prosperity.
Race relations in Maryland were severely strained by the 1954 U. S. Supreme
Court decision to end segregation, and widespread rioting occurred in
the 1960s, mostly in Baltimore. Spiro T. Agnew, Maryland's fifth Republican
governor since 1895 (1967-69), was elected U.S. vice-president in 1968
and 1972. In 1973, however, he resigned the office during an investigation
of charges of graft while he was a Maryland official. Governor Marvin
Mandel, Agnew's Democratic successor, was indicted on similar charges
in 1975, convicted in 1978 on charges of mail fraud and racketeering,
and sentenced to jail. Forced by Maryland law to resign, Mandel resumed
office for the 45 hours of his remaining term after the overturn on appeal
(later reversed) of his conviction in January 1979. Since then the Maryland
governorship has remained in the hands of the Democratic party.
Robert A. Harper
Bibliography: Andrews, M. P., History of Maryland (1929; repr. 1965);
Barker, Charles A., Background of the Revolution in Maryland (1940; repr.
1967); Bode, Carl, Maryland (1978); Bodine, A. A., Chesapeake Bay and
Tidewater, 3d ed. (1968) and The Face of Maryland, 3d ed. (1970); Brewington,
M. V., Chesapeake Bay: A Pictorial Maritime History, 2d ed. (1956); Brugger,
Robert, J., Maryland, A Middle Temperament: 1634-1980 (1988); Callcott,
George, Maryland and America, 1940-1980 (1985); Carey, G. C., Maryland
Folklore (1989); DiLisio, James, Maryland, A Geography (1983); Federal
Writers' Project, Maryland: A New Guide to the Old Line State (1976);
Footner, Hulbert, Maryland Main and the Eastern Shore (1942; repr. 1967);
Ives, J. Moss, The Ark and the Dove: The Beginning of Civil and Religious
Liberties in America (1936; repr. 1969); Jordan, David W., Foundations
of Representative Government in Maryland, 1632-1715 (1988); Land, Aubrey
G., et al., eds., Law, Society and Politics in Early Maryland (1977);
Mason, F. Van Wyck, The Maryland Colony (1969); Meyer, E. L., Maryland
Lost and Found: People and Places from Chesapeake to Appalachia (1986).
(c) 1996 Grolier, Inc.
The subject of relocating,
or relocation can be intimidating to some folks who have to move for one
reason or another. A large relocation company, when relocating a family
can not always give the kind of personal relocating services that we can.
We hope that when searching for us with a search engine you use some of
the following keywords: estate, real estate, home, homes, house,
housing, realtor, escrow, mortgage, finance, financing, refinance, refinancing,
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Wisconsin, Wyoming
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