Paul Callahan is a native of the town of Oxford, located in Talbot County, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. During his summers after his sophomore and junior years of college, he earned the title of “Marine” by successfully completing Marine Corps Officer’s Candidates School in Quantico Virginia. Upon graduation from the Catholic University of America, he was formally commissioned as an officer in the United States Marines and assigned to naval flight training in Pensacola, Florida. Upon earning his wings in 1988, he was selected to fly the F/A-18 aircraft. In between flying tours, he was an Arms Control Treaty Planner with the On-Site Inspection Agency located in Washington, D.C. Working within the arms control arena, he spent significant time within the countries of the former Soviet Union. During the summer of 1992 he participated in Operation Provide Hope II, working both in Moscow and Baku Azerbaijan to coordinate the delivery of humanitarian aid from the United States and its allies. With this assignment he had unfettered access to the people and physical locations within these countries. Later he would work with the Cuban migrants held at Navy Base Guantanamo Bay Cuba in assisting in their migration to the United States or, for those not qualified, their repatriation to Cuba. These were the Cubans that had left Cuba by placing their families on makeshift rafts and unseaworthy boats to escape Fidel Castro’s totalitarian regime.
Through his time within the former Soviet Union and working with the people of oppressed regimes, Paul witnessed firsthand the social, economic, and environmental impact caused by totalitarian political regimes. This real-world experience caused an “awakening” as to the privilege Americans have by our freedoms and liberties guaranteed by our Constitution while at the same time realizing the complacency and neglect most Americans have toward the same.
After his military service, Paul worked at a major U.S. airline. In early 2021, he went on a multi-year medical leave of absence while undergoing treatment for cancer. Having additional time on his hands, he turned his attention toward an interest in Maryland history and for local historical figures of Talbot County, Maryland, in particular. In his research of Maj. Gen. Tench Tilghman, he discovered the 1861 internationally disseminated newspaper articles detailing how General Tilghman was to lead a rebel army up the Delmarva in a coordinated attack upon Washington. In uncovering this significant piece of history, Paul realized that he could not limit himself to a short book about General Tilghman but needed to take on the task of comprehensively documenting the history of the Federal Government’s manipulation and control of Maryland during the Civil War, a task that had never before been accomplished.
In light of the current political challenges facing our nation’s democracy, this history, more than ever, needs to be told. The division of the people, extreme political divides, mistrust and control of elections, fake news and extreme media, each used by the respective political parties to gain the sentiments of the people to forward political objectives, is not new to modern times, but was the reality in 1861,—when Maryland’s democracy fell.
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