The story of the Oyster Festival, now in its 59^th year, is so interwoven with that of the Rotary Club of Lexington Park that it’s difficult to remember which came first, the hen or the egg.  The idea for the festival was first hatched back in 1967 when the club was looking for a project in which all the members could be involved and would be beneficial for all concerned – the community, the club, participants and attendees. 

In addition to member participation, the festival had three main objectives:

1. To promote a festival celebrating fun, food, and fellowship.
2. To attract visitors from near and far by promoting the bounties of life in this Land of Pleasant Living – especially St. Mary’s County oysters
3. To raise funds to benefit charities that the Rotary Club of Lexington Park supported as well as those of the various service and civic organizations who participated as food vendors at the festival.

The first festival was held on Saturday, October 7, 1967 at the St. Mary’s County Fairgrounds from 3pm until 9pm.  A charge of $2 for adults, and $1 for children was collected and the advertising read: “Delicious bivalves served raw, steamed, scaled, fried with traditional trimmings and all you can eat”.  A little under a thousand visitors came out that first year.  Over the years attendance steadily grew and so did the festival.  In 1974 it was turned into a two-day event and was moved from the first weekend in October to the third.  The later was a result of historical weather data analysis on which weekend in October had the least rainfall.  This study was necessitated after three straight years of inclement weather on festival day.  The analysis showed that the third weekend in October was 32% less likely to have rain than the first.   The festival weekend has remained the third weekend of October ever since, and was cancelled only once – last year due to COVID-19.

In the mid-1970’s, the festival blossomed from expanded public relations campaigns and being managed in a more business-like manner.  By the late 1970’s, attendance averaged about 25,000 for the two days.  The year 1982 saw one of the largest crowds ever with attendance for the first weekend estimated at over 32,000.  Today the St. Mary’s County Oyster Festival averages around 22,000 visitors over the two fun-filled days, and it has become one of the Eastern Seaboard’s leading folk life festivals attracting visitors to St. Mary’s from across the country.

The first Festival was co-sponsored by the St. Mary’s County Watermen’s Association.  David Sayre, their president for more than 15 years, played a big part in helping to get the first event off the ground. As the Festival grew, Rotary and the Watermen’s Association yielded much of their role as food vendors to other civic groups.  Today, there are over 20 civic and service groups participating as vendors in the festival and many of them rely on the festival as their primary annual fundraising event.  The 1999 menu had over 34 lines of foodstuffs.  Oysters are still the main feature – fried, stewed, scalded and “nude”- but crab cakes and soup, clam chowder, shrimp, fish sandwiches, locally famous St. Mary’s County Stuffed Ham, barbecued beef, chicken and pork, and even polish sausage make it a difficult for even the pickiest eater to not find something to please their palette!