Current Exhibit

Oxford 1964: The Times They Were A-Changin’

This season, the Oxford Museum is celebrating its 60th birthday by looking back to its founding year and wondering what life in Oxford was like back then.

The 1960s were a tumultuous time for America. The Warren Commission released its report on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1964, just before Lyndon
Johnson defeated Barry Goldwater to secure a full term in the White House. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, but race riots spread from the South to Harlem and Philadelphia. Martin Luther King, Jr. was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, while thousands of American troops were being shipped off to Viet Nam.

Meanwhile, the baby boom generation was redefining popular culture. Television and magazines were filled with the latest trends in music, film, fashion, and consumer goods. The Ford Motor Company introduced the Mustang, the Beatles arrived in New York, NASA launched rockets toward Mars, and the World’s Fair opened in Queens—all in 1964.

Oxford’s population in 1964 numbered around 750. White and Black families lived harmoniously here but resided in separate neighborhoods and worshiped in separate churches. Their children could attend Oxford elementary school together, but Talbot County’s middle and high schools were not yet integrated.

Oxford was very much a working community in 1964, still lacking many modern conveniences. The town had just begun to replace its aging outhouses and septic tanks with a municipal sewer system. Twelve acres of open farmland on Jack’s Point sold for $20,000, soon to sprout a new neighborhood, but there was no sign of development yet on Bachelor’s or Morgan’s Point

Oxford’s thriving economy had been based on harvesting and processing seafood, but that was about to end. Two marine parasites (MSX and Dermo) were devastating the Bay’s oyster population and crippling the region’s most profitable businesses. One by one, Oxford’s numerous packing houses shut down, laying off their mostly Black
workers. The results were shattering. Oxford avoided the kind of racial violence that erupted in Cambridge in 1963 and 1967, but it would never again be a “waterman’s
town.”

The Oxford Museum was launched in the midst of all this, with a total of 17 members and a budget of $300. The first exhibit space was in the old municipal building (the current Town Hall). The Museum has only moved about 100 feet in 60 years, but in almost every other sense, it has come a very long way.

Come take a closer look at all that unfolded during these changing times. The Museum is open Friday thru Monday from 10 to 4. Admission is free.