Captain Avery Museum

Edgewater, Maryland, is a small town.  A small town located in a cluster of neighboring small towns and just a hop, skip, and a jump from the State Capital, Annapolis.  Location was a primary focus for The Crab Shack, and Edgewater emerged as the perfect place to call home. 

Using the accumulated knowledge of thirty years in the seafood business, The Crab Shack offers the freshest local steamed Chesapeake blue crabs and Cajun Boils that provide you with a combination of any/all of the seafood on the menu to choose from while building your own personalized pot.  Being smack in the middle of the neighboring towns, The Crab Shack provides an escape that is just right down the road.  No more dealing with Bay Bridge traffic trying to get to some other spot three hours away.  There are a number of activities available to take advantage of and turn your dinner visit into a day trip.

Captain Avery

Captain Salem Avery was an oysterman.  He was the captain of his oyster boat.  Originally from Long Island, he moved to the Chesapeake Bay region to test his skills of being a sailor on the bay and to find better opportunities.  After falling in love with the Chesapeake Bay and all that it and the surrounding area, Captain Avery not only chose to build a gorgeous home overlooking the Chesapeake Bay and West River, but he also found love, got married and started a family.

He went on to be an oysterman, harvesting oysters from the bay.  He owned many schooners and was a major contributor to making oyster harvesting a top industry in the state of Maryland.   To say that he was a major contributor to the oyster harvest flourishing is an understatement.  By turning the oyster harvest into a business, he built a stable branch in the state’s economic tree.  This drew even more attention to this beautiful area Captain Avery built from the ground up.

Throughout the years the home was expanded and was acquired by the Shady Side Rural Heritage Society in 1984. At that point, it was turned into a museum for many generations to enjoy.  Although there are many oyster sites, this is the only known home of an oysterman in the United States that has been preserved.

Historic Museum

A historic site, the Avery Home was turned into the Captain Avery Museum.  Walking through the museum you can stroll through the rainscape garden and the recently restored 19^th Century section of the home.  Restored to appear just as it did when Captain Avery called it home, you can see what it was like to be an oysterman in the 19^th Century.  The Captain Avery Museum not only hosts events throughout the year, but the museum and its grounds are available for large events. 

The Captain Avery Museum is a perfect place, right down the road, to spend the day and build up an appetite for dinner at The Crab Shack in Edgewater.  For more information or to see the menu, please visit www.thecrabshackmd.com