Doing Good to Posterity: The Move of the Capital of Maryland from St. Mary's City to Anne Arundell Towne, Now Called Annapolis

The Maryland State Archives is the historical agency for Maryland. It serves as the central depository for state, county, and local government records which are to be kept forever. These include state executive, legislative, and judicial records; county probate, land, and court records; and some municipal records. Any government record created prior to April 28, 1788 (when Maryland ratified the U.S. Constitution), must, by law, be deposited at the State Archives. A multitude of records created after that date are also available either in their originally created form or in microform.Records are stored in a humidity- and temperature-controlled stack area, and preservation requirements, including deacidification, lamination, mylar encapsulation, and archival bookbinding, are carried out by the staff of an in-house conservation laboratory. Records are made accessible to the public in a search room open five days each week, through photocopies produced by an in-house photolab, and through the interlibrary loan of microform. The State Archives also maintains several special collections, including maps, photographs, church records, and newspapers.The books listed here represent but a small selection of Maryland materials published by or available from the Archives. In addition to other works in history, biography, records, and genealogy, the Archives offers historic maps, the state flag and seal in various forms, a paper preservation kit, the complete Archives of Maryland in microfilm, and more."Doing Good to Posterity" places the movement of the capital in its cultural and political environment. The booklet reexamines the motivations to move the capital and appraises the trans-Atlantic influences of baroque town planning on the design of the new city.