Chestertown Rotary Presents Their Titsworth Award Posthumously to Tom McHugh

On Tuesday September 7, 2021, the Chestertown Rotary presented their Dr. Paul Titsworth
award posthumously to Tom Mchugh. Club President Dr Lisa Webb presented the award to his widow, Peg McHugh. Dr Titsworth, the 18th President of Washington College, was a founding member of the club and its first President.

Washington College’s Chief of Staff, Vic Sensening, presented a brief history on Dr Titsworth. Betsy Durham, the Mainstay’s Board President, Larry Wilson, Sumner Hall’s Board President, and Kent County Public School’s Gina Jachimowicz each gave short remarks. The Mainstay was found by McHugh in 1997. McHugh assisted Sumner Hall in Presenting a Concert Series and has worked with the Public School System’s Arts program for several years.

Tom McHugh first came to the area in the late 60’s as a professor at Washington. Even after he left to join the faculty as a Professor of Education at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, Maryland’s Eastern Shore was a part of his life. Upon his retirement he made Rock Hall his home.

In many ways being a teacher is being a performer. As a performer he took it to another level. He loved music of all genres and was a natural storyteller. In 1998, even after being told it would never succeed, he started the Mainstay, a place which has brought Jazz, Blues, Folk and many other types of music to the small Eastern Shore town. That same year he and other Mainstay Volunteers organized the first Rock Hall FallFest. This year’s FallFest, the 24th, will be honoring him at 12:40 at the Bayside Stage.

Shortly after his retirement, as Executive Director at the Mainstay, at the end of 2015, he began working with the Public School System and the Fine Art teachers. He regularity performed with and for the students at Rock Hall Elementary. There he helped formed the school’s Kazoo Band.