SHORE THING: Tom Savage Was a ‘Come-Here’
Somewhere on the Eastern Shore. (Wave photo)
By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Cape Charles Wave
November 19, 2012
Yesterday I became a Native of the Eastern Shore. And I feel incredibly good about it.
All my life I’ve been a “come-here,” feeling somewhat less than a full citizen.
That was certainly the case during the 10 years I lived in various foreign countries in the diplomatic service. But it also applied to my seven years’ residence in Charleston, South Carolina, where I learned the ground rule early on: To be fully accepted in Charleston society you have to either be born there, or have lived there for 75 years.
After Charleston, relocating to Cape Charles was deja-vu. It’s where I first heard the term “come-here.” And I realized that, once again, I was an outsider.
After we started the Cape Charles Wave, a prominent denizen whose family goes back over 300 years in these parts suggested to my wife and me that we certainly had some chutzpah to move into town and start up a newspaper.
To which I had two reactions: first – we wouldn’t have done it if someone else had done it first. But nobody had, and the town was in crying need of a news outlet.
And second — we never would have attempted this by ourselves. It was our co-founder’s idea – as a longtime local reporter she saw the need, she chose the Wave name, and she, by the way, is married to a man whose Eastern Shore family also goes back 300 years. [Read more…]
