Leadership Southern Maryland Board President Samuel C.P. Baldwin, Jr. has been nominated for a St. Mary’s County Historic Preservation Commission Award in recognition of his ongoing John Hanson Briscoe Historical Project. This project began in the summer of 2013 with approximately 40 interviews of the former Speaker of the Maryland House of Delegates and St. Mary’s County Circuit Court Judge, John Hanson Briscoe. After Briscoe’s death on New Year’s Day, 2014, Baldwin amassed approximately 200 oral histories from persons including United States Senator Ben Cardin, Maryland State Senate President Mike Miller, former Maryland Governor Harry Hughes, judges, attorneys, politicians, friends and associates. Topics include an examination of the transition brought upon St. Mary’s County as a result of the location of Naval Air Station Patuxent River in the 1940s; Sotterley, the history of slavery and desegregation in St. Mary’s County; politics and the “New Leadership” ticket of the 1960s.

Over the past seven years, Baldwin has relied on high school interns to assist in transcribing the many oral histories and composing the eventual online chapters of the John Hanson Briscoe Historical Project. His interns have included Leadership Southern Maryland (LSM) Teen Leadership Academy graduates, Faith Davis, Dargenae Somerville, and Jordan Beaton as well as current member of the LSM Emerging Leaders Program (LEAP), John Sterling Houser.

An online event honoring Baldwin’s work will be broadcast by St. Mary’s County at a later date.  The John Hanson Briscoe Historical Project is available for online reading with a simple Google search.