The Rural Mural Program

05/31/2026

05/14/2026

George and Margaret Wilmer were enslaved on the Welch Farm on the Upper Sassafras River near Fox Hole Landing. They helped an unknown number of individuals make their way north to freedom in the mid 1800’s.

The Wilmers were manumitted in 1858, and upon arrival to Wilmington were honored for their activities as conductors on the Underground Railroad.

This artist’s recreation of the Wilmers’s (there are no contemporary images of the couple) is one of the dozens of images being created for the Galena Elementary School - Galena, Maryland public arts mural being created by the Eastern Shore community through The Rural Mural Program!

This public arts initiative is fully funded by the Maryland State Arts Council Public Arts Across Maryland Program.

05/14/2026

In early August 1608 John Smith and his small expeditionary force sailed up the Sassafras in small boats. Upon discovering a Tockwogh village, Smith noted in his journal:

“Their pallisadoed Towne is seated on a high cliffe with houses built like our arbours.”

The town - probably near Turners Creek on the Kent County shoreline - appears in description to be very similar to the villages painted by John White, governor of the Roanoke Colony, in late 1500’s in the East Carolina low country of Abermarle Sound.

We took the John White imagery and worked it into one of the 20 or so panels comprising the Galena Elementary School - Galena, Maryland community mural.

We will be creating and painting these modular panels with the community at events across the region over the next 15 months with a planned installation slated at the school in Galena in late summer 2027.