Fun Facts about...

Annapolis and the Chesapeake Bay

• The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in North America, and the third largest in the world.
• The land mass of Delaware plus two Rhode Islands could fit into the Chesapeake Bay’s 4,500 square miles.
• The annual Slaughter Across the Water each November is the longest tug of war over a body of water in the world. It takes place across the Annapolis Harbor (or as Eastport residents like to call it, the Gulf of Eastport). The tug of war between the Maritime Republic of Eastport and Downtown Annapolis features a 1700 foot rope, over 450 tuggers, and more than 1,000 spectators.
• The Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse is one of the most recognized lights along the Chesapeake Bay, and one of only ten lighthouses in the U.S. designated a National Historic Landmark. Built in 1875, the hexagonal screw-pile structure stands just north of the South River, one mile south of Annapolis. It is the only screw-pile light on the Bay that is still in its original location and was built to withstand the fields of moving ice that had severely damaged other screw-pile lights. Seasonal tours of the Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse depart from the Annapolis Maritime Museum.
   

History

• The Maryland State House is the oldest in continuous legislative use in the United States. It is topped by the largest wooden dome built without nails in the country.
• Annapolis became the first peace time capital of the United States after the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Congress met in the State House from November 26, 1783, to June 3, 1784.
• On December 23, 1783, George Washington resigned his commission as Commander in Chief of the continental Army before the Continental Congress in the Old Senate Chamber of the State House.
• Maryland's capital city boasts more 18th-century brick buildings than anwhere else in the country, including the homes of all four of Maryland's signers of the Declaration of Independence. Three of these homes are open to the public.
• The Kunta Kinte- Alex Haley memorial at City Dock commemorates the arrival of Alex Haley's African ancestor, Kunta Kinte to the new world. The story of Kunta Kinte is related in Haley's book, Roots.
• Built by English architect William Buckland in 1774, the Hammond-Harwood House at 19 Maryland Avenue is said to have the Most Beautiful Doorway in America.
   

U.S. Naval Academy

• The Brigade of Midshipmen consumes more than 11,000 meals in a given day. Each mid's daily diet consists of 3,500 to 4,000 calories.
• Amelia Earhart was the first woman to address the Brigade of Midshipmen (1936).
• Alan Shephard, USNA Class of 1945, became the first American in space. The Mercury spacecraft in which he rode is located in the rotunda of the Armel-Leftwich Visitor Center at the U.S. Naval Academy.
• The Wright Brothers B-1 flyer was the first Navy plane flown at the U.S. Naval Academy. A replica of the plane flown in 1911 is exhibited in Dahlgren Hall.
• The original wooden figurehead of Tamanend, off the USS Delaware, is located in the Armel-Leftwich Visitor Center at the U.S. Naval Academy. The bronze caste in front of Bancroft Hall was renamed by the midshipmen because Tamanend was a peaceful Indian chief and Tecumseh was a warrior, a more appropriate symbol for athletic competitions.
• About 1.5 million people visit the Naval Academy annually.