Maryland

Completed

Piscataway Park

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This park was founded to protect the view across the Potomac from Mount Vernon, so visitors there can see the Maryland shore as it appeared to George & Martha Washington. Now it is the site of a middle-class Colonial farm, an ecosystem farm, a demonstration farm, a marsh boardwalk, a sacred Native American burial ground, docks and a kayak launch. The park service leases the land to partners and co-manages it. The tobacco barn above and nearby buildings pre-date the USA, and there is actual tobacco drying inside. The crops are heirloom, and the animals are 18th century breeds. While beautiful and interesting, it appears most of the visitors are local hikers, fishermen, school groups and dog walkers. Iridescent barn swallows dart all around the boardwalk. The views are lovelier close up.

Greenbelt Park

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This pretty, wooded park lies within the beltway just across the DC border in Maryland. The photo above is on the Dogwood trail. There are 172 camp sites open year round, and it’s only 10 miles or so to the Washington Monument. The nearest Metro is UMD/ College Park, about a 2 mile walk. Due to the unusually high winds recently, there were a number of downed trees, but the trails were all clear.

Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine

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Major Armistead insisted on a much larger flag to boost morale. The one he bought was nine times bigger than the small storm flag above the fort today. So when it was hoisted up at 9 am on September 14th, 1814, everyone could see that Fort McHenry was still in American hands, despite almost 2,000 bombs & rockets fired over the previous 24+ hours, from the grateful city of Baltimore to the frustrated British fleet in the Chesapeake Bay, where a young, detained American civilian negotiator named Francis Scott Key watched hopefully, before writing down the first verses of our National Anthem.

These days, big flags mean car dealerships, but after the British burned DC, whether this particular flag was ours decided the fate of Baltimore and of our nation. The film and ranger tour explain the story in detail. One of the air-bursting, shrapnel bombs, turned dud after flying through the rain, still sits next to the powder magazine in the fort. The fort’s flag had only 15 stars, even though there were more states at the time, because few people were particular about such symbolism at the time. But the multi-year ‘War of 1812’ helped spark America’s national identity, the Battle of Baltimore proved us strong and Key’s anthem stirred a deep, enduring patriotism. This is my favorite patriotic park.