The Train's Done Been and Gone: An Annapolis Portrait, 1859-1910 : A Maryland Photographic Collection

Marion E. Warren settled in Annapolis in 1946; as a professional photographer he documented visually his environment in the present and collected and preserved its images from the past. He received numerous awards for his photography and contributions to the field. Historic Annapolis a one-man show circulated by the Smithsonian Institution for three years was one of his many exhibitions. With his wife Mary he published Annapolis Adventure a photographic essay of Marylands historic capital. His daughter Mary Elizabeth is a native Annapolitan. She holds a degree in English Literature reflecting a continuing interest in Victorian England. It was with great delight that she discovered the charm of her birthplace during that same era. One of the unique distinctions of Annapolis the one that may strike the traveler even before he arrives there is that this city is the one state capital in the nation which cannot be reached by a steam railroad. But it was not ever thus. As a person of color once expressed it to an agitated man on the station platform whose watch proved to be slow Yas suh the trains done been and gone. In the Good Old Days a vague epoch with which this book deals extensively there were two steam railroads. On one of them the startled passenger would have recognized a person the identical image of Rudyard Kipling punching tickets. Strangers fascinated would eye him during the entire journey from Baltimore wondering if it really could be the author incognito. But despite the amazing resemblance - glasses walrus mustache and all - one came to the reluctant conclusion that he must be someone else for he spake neither in prose nor in verse. Only as the little train slid into the station at the end of the route he would open the door of the car and announce the name twice in a mild tone the first with a rising inflection like a question the second as a reply: Nap-liss? Nap-liss. He never varied this formula in thirty years.