Local Book Recommendations
Join the Chesapeake Bay Book Club
An Island Out of Time; A Memoir of Smith Island in the Chesapeake
by Tom Horton
Book a ferry to Smith Island, MD.
Skipjack; The Story of America’s Last Sailing Oystermen
by Christopher White
Book a skipjack tour on the Helen Virginia or the Rebecca T. Ruark. Follow the Last Skipjacks Project.
Chesapeake Requiem: A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island
by Earl Swift
Book a ferry to Tangier Island, VA.
The Last Waterman
by Glenn Lawson
Pages 88-94 talk in detail about Albert LaVallette Jr. and the terrapin farming industry in Crisfield, MD.
Shifting Baselines in the Chesapeake Bay: An Environmental History
by Victor S. Kennedy
Albert LaVallette Jr. is mentioned on pages 58 and 59 in regards to terrapin farming and processing.
Tobacco Coast: A Maritime History of the Chesapeake Bay in the Colonial Era
by Arthur Pierce Middleton
Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay: From the Colonial Era to the Oyster Wars
by Jamie L. H. Goodall
Haunted Lower Eastern Shore - Spirits of Somerset, Wicomico, and Worchester Counties
by Mindie Burgoyne
This author also runs ghost tours all throughout the Eastern Shore. Check out the website for more details.
God, Man, Salt Water and the Eastern Shore
by William I. Tawes
Page 5 tells about the LaVallette house being abandoned in the 1970s.
History of Crisfield and Surrounding Areas on Maryland’s Eastern Shore
by Woodrow T. Wilson
Chapter 28: The Rise and Fall of the Diamond Back Terrapin Industry in Crisfield. This chapter tells the entire history of LaVallette and his terrapin soup recipe page 177-181.
Community, Culture, and Economic Development, Second Edition: Continuity and Change in Two Small Southern Towns
by Meredith Ramsay
A political study of the slow land development of Princess Anne and Crisfield, MD.
John Smith’s Chesapeake Voyages (1607-1609)
by Helen C. Rountree, Wayne E. Clark, and Kent Mountford
The Proudest Day; Macdonough on Lake Champlain
by Charles G. Miller
Albert LaVallette Jr.’s grandfather, Elie, was a lieutenant aboard Saratoga in the Battle of Lake Champlain on September 11, 1814. He was one of the last men standing in their victory over the English. He’s mentioned on pages 198, 318, 324.