established resort areas, and that's fine. But how do we build up new
ones? If there are no accommodations, no tourists will come. And if
tourists don't conic, who is going to build the accommodations? The
most skillful tourist promotion in the world is a disaster if it induces
people to come to a locality with inadequate facilities. Obviously one
answer to the problem is the businessman with enough vision to take
hold of an area or a tourist facility and build it up by his own efforts
and ingenuity. Sometimes, though, ingenuity is more realistically
spelled M-O-N-E-Y, and there's not always enough of it to keep a
new place going through those slow early years. I understand that
in Rhode Island, for example, there is a special tourist development
loan fund for cases of this kind. Whether such a thing would work
in Maryland or not, I don't know; but it might be worth studying.

I might take this occasion, too, to remind those of you who are
not directly engaged in the tourist business that you still have a role
to play in tourism. The Vermont Life Insurance Company, for ex-
ample, has done a wonderful job in promoting the tourist attractions
of Vermont. I wonder if Maryland banks, insurance companies and
other industries are doing the same?

Another important thing to my mind is the increasing interest
among the citizens of this country in history and historic places. I
would like to urge each of you, no matter where you come from, to
take an inventory of the truly historic places in your area — if you
have not already done so — and then take immediate and positive
steps to see that these places are preserved and made known as tour-
ist attractions. This whole concept is, of course, brought home very
forcefully to those of us who live in Annapolis. Our state capital
should be the cornerstone of a tourist program for Maryland just as
Williamsburg is for Virginia. The simple fact that our State House
is the oldest in the United States in active use is enough to attract
visitors from all over the world. Sometimes I think that as the old-
est Governor in continuous use, I might become a tourist attraction
myself.

This general thought applies to other activities as well as historic
landmarks. The other day I met with a group concerned with doing
more to promote the Preakness. We in Maryland just sort of accept
the Preakness, as well as the International at Laurel, as traditional
events and let it go at that. But obviously the Preakness and Inter-
national have possibilities for increasing tourism in Maryland which
haven't been touched. Why not Preakness Week, for proclaiming that
here is an opportunity to sample all sorts of tourist delights in the

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