Penman of the Founding

"Early November on the Eastern Shore of Maryland is a fine time of year. The breezes off the Chesapeake Bay are sufficiently cool to turn the leaves vibrant but still mild enough to give hope for an Indian summer. In the 18th century fishermen could catch blue crab for a few more weeks; enslaved people, indentured servants, and farmers sowed the winter wheat; and women poured candles to see them through the impending winter. Although planters had long grown tobacco here, by 1732, the year John Dickinson was born, grains were more profitable as tobacco prices stagnated. Public tobacco houses still dotted the landscape, and the acrid smell of the drying weed seeped from black barns and mingled with the pungent scent of the Bay"--