The Miles River Yacht Club Foundation of St. Michaels recently honored Langley Shook, President of the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, with its Distinguished Service Award. The afternoon ceremonies were held in at a Bayside reception at the Harbourtowne Resort in St. Michaels.
Mr. Shook is the fifth recipient of the MRYC Foundation’s Distinguished Service Award, established in 2011 to honor distinguished Chesapeake Bay citizens or organizations involved in competitive water sports or youth-oriented maritime educational activities. Previous award winners have been Gary Jobson, America’s Cup winning sailor, President of U.S. Sailing, and famed yachting author and television commentator; Marc Castelli, distinguished Chesapeake artist and chronicler of the log canoes; Matt Rutherford, the first yachtsman to sail single-handed non-stop around North and South America; and Adam Werblow, America’s winningest collegiate sailing coach and varsity sailing coach at St. Mary’s College of Maryland.
The event benefited the newly-established Langley Shook Scholarship Fund, a permanent fund of the MRYC Foundation Endowment, to be used for scholarships for in-need children to attend non-profit swimming, sailing, rowing, boating and maritime exploration programs on the Chesapeake Bay.
Shook joined the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum as its President in 2009 after a distinguished nearly 35 year career as a Partner at Sidley Austin, a Washington-based law firm. Shook was previously a member of the Board of Governors of CBMM, and Secretary of the USS Sequoia Preservation Trust working to save the Presidential Yacht.
According to the MRYC Foundation’s citation, Mr. Shook has transformed CBMM in his five years into one of the pre-eminent maritime museums in the United States, and dramatically increased its public visibility nationwide. During his tenure, Shook has managed the Museum successfully through the nation’s recent major recession, restored CBMM to fiscal health, significantly increased its membership and donor base, raised millions of dollars of support, re-invigorated the Museum’s planned giving program, and made The Boating Party the most significant fundraising event on the Eastern Shore. On his watch, the Museum has preserved, restored and added to the largest Chesapeake Bay collection of historic boats, mounted outstanding exhibits, broadened the diversity of the Museum’s following, built an experienced and motivated staff and volunteer cadre, and increased its educational outreach.
The MRYC Foundation, founded in 2010, is a tax-exempt organization dedicated to promoting and supporting youth-oriented competitive water sports and maritime educational activities in the Chesapeake Bay region. It has so far donated $101,022 to 18 Chesapeake Bay area non-profit organizations, including CBMM. It makes grants twice yearly for facilities, equipment, scholarships and general support.
