MARYLAND AT A GLANCE

HISTORICAL CHRONOLOGY

[photo, Frederick Douglass statue, Talbot County Courthouse, 11 North Washington St., Easton, Maryland]
  • 10,000 B.C. - 1599
  • 1600 - 1699
  • 1700 - 1799
  • 1800 - 1899
  • 1900 - 1999
  • 2000 -



    • Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) Memorial statue (2011), by Jay Hall Carpenter, Talbot County Courthouse, 11 North Washington St., Easton, Maryland, August 2016. Photo by Diane F. Evartt.

    Douglass was born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey in Tuckahoe District, Talbot County, on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, February 1818. Although a slave, he escaped north and became an abolitionist and champion of universal suffrage.

    10,000 B.C. - 1599

     c. 10,000 B.C. First humans, called Paleo-indians, arrived around this date in the land that would become Maryland. They lived in small semi-nomadic communities that moved seasonally to hunt large game, such as bison and mammoths, created weapons and tools, and engaged in trade with other groups.

    c. 8,000 B.C. Ice Age animals, including woolly mammoths, became extinct. Early Archaic people used rivers and Chesapeake Bay for transportation and food.

    c. 6,000 B.C. Archaic Period people used stone tools, fished, and hunted small game.

    c. 3,750 B.C. Deer and turkey became important food sources.

    c. 2,000 B.C. Late Archaic Period people began to use advanced fishing techniques, including net weights, and roasting platforms for cooking fish.

    c. 1,500 B.C. Oysters became an important food source.

    c. 1,000 B.C. Woodland Period people created pots for cooking and storage; seed plants became an important food source.

    c. 800 A.D. Native-American introduction of domestic plants, including corn, tobacco, and squash; bow and arrow came into use; animals domesticated.

    c. 1000 A.D. Permanent Native-American villages established near water and wood sources, also in areas with rich soil for agricultural crops. Tribes eventually formed into larger groups known as chiefdoms, each one led by one leader.

    1498. John Cabot (Giovanni Caboto) (c.1450-1499), Venetian navigator and explorer, sailed along Eastern Shore off present-day Worcester County.*

    *The Juan de la Cosa world map (1500) indicated that Cabot, the only explorer sailing the North American coast at that time under the British flag, may have coasted as far south as Cape Hatteras.

    1524, April. Giovanni da Verrazano (1485-1528), Florentine explorer, led expedition that passed mouth of Chesapeake Bay, and explored lower Eastern Shore.

    1562. Diego Gutiérrez, a Spanish cartographer, was the first person to depict the Chesapeake Bay, what he called the Bahia de Santa Maria, on a map.

    1572. Pedro Menendez de Aviles, Spanish governor of Florida, explored Chesapeake Bay.

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