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On March 25, 1634, the first English settlers under the Baltimore proprietorship sailed to St. Clement's Island on the Ark and the Dove (the Maryland Dove is seen to the right). The 40 acre park contains a memorial cross dedicated to the memory of the first Marylanders. Accessible only by boat.
Boat tours to historic St. Clement's Island are offered on a weekend schedule by the Potomac River Museum. The 26 passenger vessel, The Water Taxi II, is fully insured and a certified tour boat by the U.S. Coast Guard. The Water Taxi II leaves the St. Clement's Island-Potomac River Museum on Saturdays and Sundays at 12:30 p.m. and returns at 2:15 p.m. The second voyage begins at 2:30 p.m. and returns at 3:45 p.m. Passengers are welcome to leave on the early boat and return on the last trip.
The Water Taxi II may be chartered by private parties and commercial tours during the daylight hours throughout the week.
For additional information, contact the St. Clement's Island-Potomac River Museum at 301-769-2222. The St. Clement's Island Museum is open March 25 through September from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays, and noon to 5 p.m. weekends. From October 1 through March 24 the museum is open Wednesday through Sunday from noon to 4 p.m.
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The museum, established in 1975 and currently located in its new home built in 1984, offers the visitor an experience in the first few years of Maryland's beginnings. Exhibits reflect the saga of carving a colony out of a wilderness, and highlights the achievements that would help shape the character of America.
Exhibits identify and interpret the lives of early Marylanders, including:
- Calvert Family, proprietors of the Maryland colony
- Henrietta Maria, namesake of Maryland, wife of Kind Charles I
- Mathias DeSousa, prominent early black Marylander
- Rose Gilbert, widowed and left alone in the wilderness with her two young daughters
- Father Andew White,S.J. Jesuit priest who established the first missions in the new colony of Maryland
- Margaret Brent, first woman to fight for the right to vote in the New World
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