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Health Share Holiday Tour

J. Scott Ridgell

Health Share‘s Holiday Home Tour is today.  This year’s tour features homes in St. Mary’s City and St. Inigoes including the State House.  For more info on the tour click here.  (Tickets are available at any house on the tour – $10 per house or $50 for all 7.)  Pam and I will be assisting at Mary’s Hope which will also serve as the “dining home” on the tour.  Kevin’s Cafe will have good things for you to purchase while you conduct your tour.   (Little tip, the tour starts at 1100 and most folks start with the first house and work their way thru the homes in order.  However, if you start at the end, at Mary’s Hope, and then work your way back you’ll avoid some of the cluster.  Of course with today’s weather all this may be a moot point anyway.)   

Yesterday, we took a preview tour of the homes and learned of an interesting background to one of them.   Cardinal Pines on Snow Hill Manor Road was originally built as a Club House for the Slavic community which resided in the St. Mary’s City area.  Current owner Richard Holden informed us that the large Club House/living room was then added onto by subsequent owners.  He also noted that the stone houses located at the end of Snow Hill Manor Road were originally built for members of the Slavic community.  It made me think about the Slavic graveyard on the other side of the College on Mattapany Road.  I found the following discussion from the College’s River Gazette (click here.)
In 1910, the National Slovak Society purchased the former Brome and Howard lands. Jenny Owens Sivak, who has worked at St. Mary’s College for eight years, married into a local Slovakian family and brought her own Native American, German, and Norwegian heritage into the mix. The Sivaks were one of 25 Slavic families who bought land from the Slovak Society’s 2,813-acre parcel. They have been farming it for a century now. Jenny and Bruce grew up working tobacco side-by-side on their family farms, and they were married in 1983. The farms have switched from tobacco to vegetables, and Bruce’s brother now sells the produce from the Sivak’s roadside stand south of Lexington Park.
Jenny doesn’t remember hearing stories about the Slovakian store, meeting hall, school house, and church that once stood along Mattapany Road. But she does remember the 2006 burial in the Slovakian cemetery that’s still part of our north campus landscape. Bodnars, Horaks, Klobusickys, and members of the Demko family rest there. These Slovakian immigrants persevered despite the difficulties posed by differences in language, religion, and politics at the turn of the last century. Their descendants remain a vibrant part of this area. Just notice the names on the mailboxes you pass.

Hope to see you later today at Mary’s Hope.  Bring your umbrella and bundle up.  Wouldn’t be good if you got sick doing the Health Share Tour.

 
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