It is finished. Right here and now, we will end the civil debate over whether Maryland is Northern or Southern.
We're neither.
We're both.
We're mid-Atlantic.
We're all of the above.
Confusing? Naturally. But it's been that way around here since the Civil War. Take today's ceremony in Gettysburg, Pa., dedicating Maryland's memorial to the War Between the States. It's the only state memorial that honors both a Union and Confederate soldier.
"We told the sculptors you can't have one soldier dominate over another," says project manager James Holechek.
"We turned down one who had a Union soldier help ing treat the chest wound of a Confederate soldier."
Mr. Holechek had to walk that fine line because the Civil War, after all, is at the root of Maryland's split personality over its Northern/Southern culture. Sure, we stayed in the Union, but we were hardly of one mind about it.
The first blood spilled in the war was shed by Southern sympathizers who ambushed Northern troops on Pratt Street. In more than one battle, Marylanders shot at each other, fueling bitter memories. And, remember, during the war Baltimore was pro-South enough to be briefly occupied by Union soldiers and ruled by martial law.
Last we checked, Maryland is still below the Mason-Dixon line -- the alleged border between North and South. But these days, that often feels like a geographic technicality.
Baltimore certainly doesn't look like the South -- say along the architectural lines of Richmond or Charleston. After the Great Fire of 1904 claimed 1,500 buildings, Baltimore's look became "the husk of a big Victorian City with an Edwardian girdle draped across its middle," former Sun reporter Carleton Jones wrote in "Lost Baltimore: A Portfolio of Vanished Buildings."
Others simply say Baltimore looks like another Philly -- but we have more alleys.
One might assume a black Baptist church in Baltimore would feel Southern. But they have more Northern influence, says the Rev. Dwayne Debnam at the New Psalmist Baptist Church at Franklin and Cathedral streets. The music drives the service. Take "AmazingGrace," for example. In the South, the hymn would be sung slowly, dragging its heels and probably sung without music.
"Very seldom do we do that this side of the border," Mr. Debnam says. They sing "Amazing Grace" up-tempo and with music.
In both cultures, churchgoers put on their "Sunday best" (including hats, of course), but there's another difference. After church in the deep South, folks have dinner or fellowship together.
"Here, they go home and watch their football game," Mr. Debnam says.
Baltimore has Southern ways, however. Southern cookbooks are the trend. We still have beaten biscuits, which are whacked with a club until the air blisters snap. You probably won't find Yankee pot roast by that name in this town. And some folks still have supper, not dinner.
We must be Southerners because we sure don't know how to drive in the snow.
The Blue Book ("Baltimore Society Visiting List") still lists debutantes, maiden names of brides and subscribers to such clubs as the Bachelors Cotillon. "As city and state grew apace, it became necessary to hold our social group together and to welcome to our midst those compatible families that came from elsewhere," the editors wrote in the Blue Book's Centennial Edition in 1988.
Which doesn't bring us to grits. But we should discuss grits, another arbiter in this North vs South debate. Yes, you can get collards and pearl hominy in Baltimore, but grits are a tougher find at restaurants.
"They've quick-gritted the hell out of us. Cooks faster, but half the flavor," says Carleton Jones, 71, who has studied the city's architecture. "It looks to me like a Federal city," he says.
"This isn't the South to me."
Southern Shore
But elsewhere in Maryland, we look distinctly Southern. Namely, the Eastern Shore, with its fried fritters and native tongue. The University of Maryland campus in College Park certainly looks Southern.
In Upper Marlboro in Prince George's County, people say "you all," but just over the river a couple of miles, people say "all you." This is tobacco and horse country in this upscale Mayberry, where a quarter still buys you an hour on a parking meter. People tend to know your business. Pat's Dixie Pig Bar-B-Que is one business here.
And at the Justin Thyme's gift shop, "We serve Savannah Cinnamon 'cause we love the South," says Diana Ferree, whose mother was a Hatfield, "if that tells you anything." Her husband is from North Carolina. As you know, Ferree is a very Southern name, she says.
But there are grumblings. The tobacco barns are vanishing in Upper Marlboro -- no more duck-pin bowling! -- and the city keeps crawling closer and closer into town -- into them, folks here say.
Now, drive northwest from Baltimore and stop at Union Mills in Carroll County. This is Pennsylvania Dutch country, where the local paper features an Amish cooking column. This week's special: apple butter.
Union Mills, which is three miles south of the Mason-Dixon line, is also Shriver Country. The town has teemed with Shrivers for more than a century. During the Civil War, one Shriver son fought for the Confederacy. His brother, who lived across the street, fought for the Union. The family had argued over the issue of states' rights.
Three homes house Shrivers to this day in Union Mills. James Shriver, 66, considers himself a Confederate and counts his two sons as Confederates. His 1994 tally: "Yankees, none. Confederates, three."
To illustrate Maryland's confusing position in the Civil War, look no further than Mr. Shriver's break-down of his family tree:
"The Yankee side of my family were Republicans, Protestants and they owned slaves. The Confederate side were Democrats, Catholics and didn't own any slaves," he says. After the family fallout over states' rights, "It took a generation for us to get along very well together," he says.
To rustle up a North vs South discussion, we cornered two folks from the Maryland Historical Society, where the Shriver family letters are kept.
Reference librarian Francis O'Neill is from New Hampshire, and it's safe to say grits haven't crossed his lips lately. Public programs assistant Donna Williams is from Baltimore, and it's safer to say her membership in the United Daughters of the Confederacy won't be lapsing.
"There is this ambiguity," says Ms. Williams, 49, who enjoys a good mint julep come Preakness time. "We're split down the middle. We have as many pro-Southerners as we do pro-Northerners."
'Dixie' in Northwood
If you want to hear "Dixie," come to her house, she says. By the way, she lives in Northwood (ha!). She has been known to refer to the Civil War as the "War of Northern Aggression." Also, Ms. Williams rather fancies the opening line to Maryland's state song, which goes: "The despot's heel is on thy shore, Maryland!"
The flattering reference to President Lincoln makes Mr. O'Neill smile -- or wince? Anyway, he maintains the cultural line between the North and South in Maryland has been blurred by generations of immigrants, such as the Germans and Poles and later, Koreans. Segregated Baltimore, for instance, had the largest free black population before the Civil War. And their work situation was typically un-Southern, says Suzanne Chapelle, a historian at Morgan State University. "The majority of free blacks were salaried workers. And about the top 5 percent were ministers, teachers and small business owners," Ms. Chapelle says.
During World War II, Maryland's booming defense industries attracted Southern blacks and whites from Appalachia. In short, Maryland had become a melting pot that distilled its distinct Southern or Northern traits.
"It's certainly becoming less and less Southern and more suburban," Mr. O'Neill says. "I never see anything in writing about Maryland being the South. It's just the 'mid-Atlantic state.' "
At the historical society, check out a bound volume called "The Great Baltimore Sun Debate, 1984." A volley of opinions are broken out on the pages of The Sun. The dispute was whether Maryland had a pro-Union majority. Where did Maryland's loyalties lie? (The state's true sympathies may never be resolved to everyone's satisfaction.)
A soldier in this war of words was Jean Baker, a history professor at Goucher College -- where, as she points out, she can get collards. Ms. Baker is a fourth generation Baltimorean, and her great, great grandfather was a Confederate general. She must be a Southerner.
Union identify
"Absolutely not," she says. "I identify with our Union past. I feel FTC there's a mistaken effort by some Marylanders to return Maryland to its Confederate past that it never really had."
Duck, Jean.
Maryland's Confederate past is so healthy it could run a marathon. At the Parkville American Legion, the Baltimore Civil War Roundtable has racked in more 300 members, many of whom are Southern sympathizers. It's the fourth largest round table of its kind in the country.
President Don Macreadie, a 54-year-old from Baltimore, says he sometimes leans toward the North's side to even out pro-South discussions. "But I can't really take sides," he says. "I wear a blue shirt and gray pants."
Although it doesn't inspire much passion or debate, the term mid-Atlantic does describe Maryland these days, Mr. Macreadie says.
"We don't have to pick sides anymore," he says. "I don't think there is North or South thinking."
It would be difficult convincing Gary Beckward of that.
In August, the Allegany County chapter of the NAACP requested the Confederate battle flag be removed from the City Hall in Cumberland because of the flag's association with racism and hatred. The City Council complied.
Mr. Beckward, the NAACP chapter president, says since the flag was removed from the City Hall rotunda, he's been harassed and his Cumberland home has been vandalized a dozen times.
"Someone," Mr. Beckward says, "put a dead 'coon in my driveway."
WAR STORIES
During the Civil War, Marylanders fought for the North and the South. And The Baltimore Sun brought the story to its readers on both sides of the conflict. From The Sun archives, we've obtained excerpts of eyewitness accounts published about the Battle of Gettysburg July 1-3, 1863. To hear them, call Sundial at (410) 783-1800. Then punch in the four-digit code 6162. For other Sundial numbers, see the SunSource directory on page A2. To hear Jason Robards' reading of the Gettysburg Address, from Ken Burns' "Civil War" series, punch in the four-digit code 6161.