The Ocean Pines Association has assembled a historic task group to ensure the community’s past, present, and future is preserved and remembered.
A plaque dedicated to Phyllis East is pictured in front of the East Room in Ocean Pines.
Submitted photo
By Tara Fischer, Staff Writer
The Ocean Pines Association has assembled a historic task group to ensure the community’s past, present, and future is preserved and remembered for years to come.
Board member Elaine Brady, who advocated for the group’s creation, said the idea was conceived when Ocean Pines forum moderator and association homeowner Joe Reynolds contacted her regarding the signage on the East Room at the Community Center.
Reynolds noted that most residents are unaware that the East Room was named after Phyllis East, the longtime executive secretary to the general manager and board of directors before she passed in 2012.
The forum moderator observed that neither the East Room nor the Anna Foultz Room, which honors a dedicated volunteer of the Ocean Pines community, contains information on the women and why they are recognized. The oversight was amended in June with plaques acknowledging the residents’ commitment to the neighborhood.
“His request sparked the need to form the group, as much of the inherent knowledge of the early days of OP will be forgotten,” Brady said.
The club aims to assemble a framework and processes for storing, cataloging, preserving, and obtaining physical and digital historical information. Currently, they are working towards reprinting late resident Bud Rogner’s “History of Ocean Pines” book.
The book provides details about the community’s past. According to Brady, only a few copies remain as Rogner did not supply a reprint. The recount is not copyrighted, so the group hopes to sell bindings to interested residents.
The newly printed volumes are expected to be 5×7 spiraled editions and will go for $20 each. The group intends to acquire 200 additional copies.
The Historic Task Group is also working with OPA General Manager John Viola to obtain a secure storage space to save artifacts properly. Brady said there are original lot pricing, builder, and relator documents that have been stuffed into binders and shuffled from room to room. Their goal is to protect the pages with a dedicated area for filing and storing so they may be protected and well-maintained.
Additionally, the group will work to determine best practices for archiving documents that have already been donated and develop methods for garnering historical information that the association currently does not possess.
Brady said the ultimate goal is to transition the task group into a volunteer Historical Society for the community. “What we do today will be Ocean Pines history in the future,” she noted.
The group is open to all residents. “Anyone can join at any time,” the director maintained. “The goal is to have folks with various interests, ideas, or experience obtaining and preserving historical information and documents.”