Bayshore, MV-It’s a funny name for a town because there is neither a bay nor a shore within a hundred miles of Bayshore. But this little town still has a character all it’s own. The people and their goats all live on a bluff overlooking a chalk quarry which, for some unknown reason, was filled with sand in 1978. City Council Person, Michael R. Cook, told me that the residents call it as the “sand pit.”
“For the kids,” he said “the sand pit’s been there their entire lives, it’s what they know about Bayshore. It’s a source of pride. We even renamed the high school mascot the Sand Pitter. What puts Bayshore on the map is our big door bell museum.” Of course, I just had to go.
The International Doorbell Museum features over thirty thousand door bells. The prize of the collection in the seventy foot tall, doorbell commissioned by Louis XIV for Versailles. It features life-size clockwork grenadiers who smack a giant bell with brass antelopes while little frog fountains gush water. Curator Hammond Flap let me ring it and yeah, it’s a heck of a doorbell. Since I didn’t wear the ear plugs they gave me, I may have permanent hearing loss.
The museum also features doorbells from pop culture; including the doorbells from the sets of Family Ties, Maude and Seaquest. My favorite parts were the Doorbell Chamber of Horrors, which has Jeffrey Dahmer’s doorbell and the Doorbell Fun Zone, where kids, and even grown up kids like me, can have doorbell fun. There are buttons and lights and even a doorknob you can turn, but it doesn’t really open a door.
Bayshore’s definitely a fun place to visit. I even tried to build a sand castle in the sandpit. And guess what, it was in the shape of a doorbell. Now, off to more adventures across this great country. Wonder where we’ll be next time. Better check back in and find out.
