Unusual Nicknames: Crisfield Crabbers

The city of Crisfield, Maryland, makes no bones about its most prized export, which is fitting considering that export doesn’t have any.

From the town seal to the water tower to the numerous seafood restaurants and annual festivals, the renowned Atlantic blue crab – a staple of the Chesapeake Bay area – is plastered everywhere throughout Crisfield, which sits at the Bay’s southernmost tip.

By the early 1900s, Crisfield’s booming seafood industry had become so robust that the city grew to become the state’s second-largest behind Baltimore. As the population increased and a need for more land arose, a new downtown district was constructed on top of an old waste area for oyster shells, further intertwining the community with its economic heartbeat.

In the midst of this crustacean craziness, the Crisfield Crabbers were born, although not originally as the moniker for Crisfield High School (now Crisfield Academy and High School) (CAHS). The first iteration of the Crabbers came as a minor-league baseball team, which played as an inaugural member of the Eastern Shore Baseball League (ESBL) in the 1920s.

It’s not clear exactly when CAHS adopted the name for its athletics department, but since the ESBL team was defunct following the 1937 season, the school has done a more than respectable job of carrying on the Crabbers tradition alone.

That tradition has shown up the strongest on the hardwood, where the Crabbers boys basketball program has made the semifinal round of the Maryland Public Secondary School Athletic Association state tournament 17 times since 1956, including eight state championships.

Crisfield’s crab-themed events are headlined by the National Hard Crab Derby, a festival that has been held annually over Labor Day Weekend since 1948. In addition to a carnival, a parade and several concerts, the Derby brings a variety of unique happenings including crab races, crab cooking and picking contests and a beauty pageant, featuring the coronation of the community’s “Little Miss” and “Mr. Crustacean.”