Located on Hillen Street, the Null House is a rare eighteenth century home dating from around 1782. Once common throughout the city, only a handful of these small wood frame houses remain, largely in Fells Point. Named for the antique shop that occupied the property from 1929 through the 1970s, the Null House itself was nearly demolished to make way for a parking lot but, in 1980, the property was thankfully relocated and preserved.
Originally located at 1010 Hillen Street, the house was east of the Jones Falls on land belonging to John Moale, Jr. (1731-1798), who in 1752 sketched the earliest view of the Town of Baltimore. The house was built between 1782 and 1784 for Stephen Bahon, a blacksmith around the same time the area east of the Jones Falls was annexed into Baltimore City. In 1784, it was purchased by Wolfgang Etschburger, a veteran of the American Revolution who later also served during the War of 1812. From about 1850 to 1880, the building was used to sell flour and meal; the Italianate storefront may date from this period. In the early twentieth century, the building was the headquarters of the Excelsior Printing Company. From 1929, it served as an antique shop run by the Null family until the 1970s.
The building almost met its demise in 1980 when Baltimore Gas and Electric Company wanted to raze the building for a parking lot. On September 28, 1980, the building was moved 300 feet diagonally across the street to its current location. The contractor who undertook the job was Teddy Rouse, son of famous developer James Rouse. The Null House was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on January 27, 1983.
O'Connor's, a package store and restaurant, has been located since the early 1920s in the heart of Greektown at the corner of Eastern Avenue and Oldham Street. In the 1940s, this unassuming, two-story, brick building played a significant role in the city labor movement of the New Deal era.
O'Connor's, a package store and restaurant, has been located since the early 1920s in the heart of Greektown at the corner of Eastern Avenue and Oldham Street. In the 1940s, this unassuming, two-story, brick building played a significant role in the city labor movement of the New Deal era. Baltimore steel workers fought to unionize between 1940 and 1942 and turned O鈥機onnor鈥檚 into the meeting spot where they could discuss the progress of organizing efforts. Similar meetings took place at the Finnish Hall in nearby Highlandtown at Ponca and Foster Streets. The Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC) moved their headquarters into the second floor of O鈥機onnor鈥檚 and, in 1943, the committee became the United Steelworkers of America, a CIO union. Ellen Pinter was part of the Finnish community of Highlandtown, and her father worked at the steel mill in Sparrow鈥檚 Point. She saw firsthand the effects of underemployment on the steelworkers and their families during the Great Depression. Some only received work for one to two days a week. Many families ran up debts at the grocery store or fell behind on rent. Some families took in boarders to try to make ends meet. Ellen took a job for $18 week working for the steel workers鈥 union SWOC around 1937 in the office on top of O鈥機onnor鈥檚. In a 1980 interview with the Baltimore Neighborhood Heritage Project, Ellen recollected:
"The quarters were small but the activity was small. I can vividly remember when the miners came to Baltimore and started the big organization drive of the CIO. The men were pouring into that hall with their pockets just bulging with dollar bills as they were signing up men into the union. There was such a tremendous upsurge of interest in the union. Of course, the mills were full of foreign-born people who knew the value of unions because they had come from European countries where they had been a little more politically astute. And Finns were aware of unionization and more progressive thought鈥 Oh I can remember the Italians, the Finns, the Czechs, the Americans, they were organizing left and right then, in Bethlehem Steel Company."Pinter also notes African American participation in the organizing activity鈥擣innish activists welcomed African Americans at the Finnish Hall during the early days of organizing activity, even though Highlandtown remained a segregated white neighborhood. Racial antagonisms, however, were not absent in the social activities of the union. For instance, Pinter remembers being at a union picnic; a black man asked her to dance and she accepted, only to have a white man cut in and demand to know how she could dare dance with a black man. O鈥機onnor鈥檚 still remains in operation today.
The Oak Street Garage, constructed in 1924 and enlarged in 1927, illustrates the dramatic impact of the automobile. Built and operated by first-generation Italian immigrants, the Oak Street Garage reflects the far-reaching impact of the automobile on Baltimore's urban fabric and economic life.
The evolution of the automobile-related services that it housed and the controversy its construction generated illustrate the striking shifts in the urban landscape and economic fortunes it created in the boom years of the 1920s. The Piraino family owned the one-story storage garage through 1969 and actively operated it most of those years. Neely and Ensor Auto. Co., formerly a high-end carriage manufacturer, was the building's first tenant, occupying a portion of the original garage and all of its addition.
with research support from
In October 1987, the members of University-Birkwood Association celebrated nearly fifteen years of work on a former parking lot turned green space on Barclay Street. Earlier that year, the small civic organization joined the friendly competition to win recognition as one of Baltimore's "Best Neighborhoods" in the city's fifth annual contest. Like many good stories, the history of this park lay hidden beneath the surface, as the group observed:
"Looking at it today, no one would guess that the little pocket park at Barclay and Birkwood Streets was once a vacant paved lot of little use to local residents. Beneath the cover of green grass and many spring flowering trees, it's hard to believe there still lies a hard asphalt surface."Over forty years earlier, on December 18, 1945, a small group of residents established the University-Birkwood Association, Inc. paid George A. Cook, a local builder and developer, and his wife Jeannette five dollars for the oddly shaped lot. The property came with a catch鈥攖he Association was prohibited from building any structure on the lot for twenty years. Instead, they turned the vacant land into a profitable investment by paving it over with asphalt and charging people who worked nearby to park their cars. The original agreement against building on the lot expired in 1965 but, by the early 1970s, members of the association had a different approach in mind. In April 1971, the Waverly Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library had moved from a small building at 1443 Gorsuch Avenue to a modern cast-concrete structure at the corner of E. 33rd and Barclay Streets. The library was located on the former site of the BellTel building and, unfortunately for the University-Birkwood Association, Bell System employees had made up a large share of the paying customers for their parking lot. In 1974, the Association's board of directors decided that the lot could better serve the neighborhood in a new way鈥攁nd voted to convert the parking lot into "green space." Limited funds for the new open space (and the uncertain prospect of paying property taxes on the lot without no revenue from parking fees) encouraged a creative approach. The Association sold shares to neighborhood residents interested in supporting the planned improvements. Proceeds went to purchase trees, bulbs, grass seed, and fertilizer. Between 1975 and 1978, members dug over thirty holes through the old asphalt to make room for new trees and flower beds. Association shareholders and volunteers spread mulch and seeded the ground creating a verdant lawn still enjoyed by local children. People walking or driving past likely enjoyed the springtime view when, according to the 1987 contest nomination, "daffodils bloom on the bank along Barclay Street and the flowering cherry and plum trees burst into color." Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, around twenty households participated in the University-Birkwood Association's efforts to maintain the lot by pruning, weeding, and mulching during "work days" each spring and fall鈥攁nd spending countless hours every summer helping with mowing the grass. 鈥淭he Oakenshawe Green Space is the neighbors,鈥 explained Laurie Feinberg. Feinberg, an Oakenshawe resident since 1987, gained a new appreciation for the green space after having children in 1991, recalling, "There is a whole generation of kids that essentially grew up playing the green space." In August 1993, the Association board converted the corporation into a new nonprofit organization鈥擮akenshaw Greenspace, Inc. Beyond the day-to-day tasks of cleaning up litter and dog waste, the group won a grant from the Parks & People Foundation to bulldoze parts of the original parking lot and replace the old asphalt with more grass. In early 2018, the group decided to donate the property to Baltimore Greenspace鈥攁n environmental land trust dedicated to preserving communities鈥 open spaces and forest patches as spaces for recreation, civic engagement, and community revitalization. At forty-four years old, the Oakenshaw Green Space is the oldest of any of the properties donated to the land trust in their ten-year history. Fortunately, the donation ensures that neighbors can expect many more years of trees, flowers, and community gatherings on Barclay Street.
After a brief stint in New York, Ogden Nash returned to Baltimore in 1934 and wrote: "I could have loved New York had I not loved Balti-more."
After a brief stint in New York, Ogden Nash returned to Baltimore in 1934 and wrote: "I could have loved New York had I not loved Balti-more." Nash grew up in Rye, New York and first came to Baltimore for love. On a trip to the Elkridge Hunt Ball in Maryland in 1928, Nash met Frances Rider Leonard, a granddaughter of Maryland Governor Elihu Jackson and the woman he would come to marry.
Nash married Frances at the chapel of the Church of the Redeemer in 1931. By this time, Nash was already a national celebrity, known for his witty light verse. He spent his time bouncing between New York and Baltimore before settling down at 4205 Underwood Road-鈥揳 handsome stone house in Guilford-鈥搃n 1934 where he started a family and began his love affair with Baltimore sports. He enjoyed gambling at Pimlico and became an avid fan of the Baltimore Colts and Orioles. He soon moved with his wife and two daughters to his in-law's home at 4300 Rugby Road where they lived until the 1960s.
Nash published numerous poems about Baltimore sports teams. The December 13, 1968, issue of Life magazine had a cover feature on Nash's love of the Colts complete with poems. In the collection, Nash wrote that "Colt Fever" is "the disease fate holds in store / For the population of Baltimore / A disease more virulent than rabies / Felling men and women and even babies." In 1958, Nash wrote "You Can't Kill an Oriole" when the St. Louis Browns moved to Baltimore for the 1954 season. Present day Orioles manager Buck Showalter has a copy of the poem hanging in his office.
Nash lived in Baltimore for 37 years and led a happy and successful life with his wife, two daughters, and, of course, his dog. Nash adored animals and is credited with coining the phrase: "The dog is man's best friend." He died on May 19, 1971 at Johns Hopkins Hospital of Crohn's Disease. A memorial service was held at the Church of the Redeemer, 40 years after the date he was married there. His old home at 4300 Rugby Road remains a private residence, nestled away in Guilford.
The Old Hamilton Branch Library at 3006 Hamilton Avenue is a historic branch library building constructed in 1920 to serve the community of Hamilton in the developing Harford Road corridor of northeast Baltimore. The library remained at this location through 1959 when a new Hamilton Branch Library building opened on Harford Road.
Designed by Baltimore architect Theodore W. Pietsch and built by Baltimore contractor R.B. Mason on a property donated through the organized efforts of the Woman's Club of Hamilton and the Hamilton Improvement Association, the Old Hamilton Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library is a handsome example of the work of an accomplished Beaux Arts architect and an enduring legacy of the enterprising efforts of civic and social organizations in promoting community development and civic life of northeast Baltimore during the early twentieth century. In addition, the Old Hamilton Library is distinguished as one of a collection of libraries in Baltimore and across the nation built from the late 1900s through the 1920s with support from Pittsburgh industrialist Andrew Carnegie.
In May 1917, the Woman鈥檚 Club of Hamilton and Ms. E.W.H. Scott, a library organizer with the Maryland Public Library Association established a 鈥渓ibrary organization鈥 with the goal of building a free public library in Hamilton. They combined their efforts with the Hamilton Improvement Association to raise funds and purchase a lot for the library at the northwest corner of Hamilton.
The building remained in use as a library for nearly three decades, providing books to patrons and serving as a social center for the broader community with exhibits from local painters and evening movie screenings. By the late 1940s, however, the growing number of library patrons living in northeast Baltimore made it difficult for the small building to keep up. After more years of efforts by local residents, construction began on a new library building designed by architects Cochran, Stephenson and Wing on April 2, 1957. In 1959, a new Hamilton Branch Library opened on Harford Road at Glenmore. The original building passed into use as commercial office building and remained occupied in this use by a variety of tenants through the early 2000s. 糖心影视 worked with the Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street program to list the building on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.
Baltimore Clayworks occupies the former Mount Washington Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library that opened at Smith and Greeley Avenues on January 5, 1921. Originally known as Branch 21, the building was designed by by local architect Edward H. Glidden on a lot located across from the Mount Washington public school. Funding for the new branch library came from a 1906 gift from Andrew Carnegie, industrialist and philanthropist, specifically designated to build branch libraries. The gift came with a condition, similar to the requirements for all new Carnegie Libraries, that "the city was to acquire the lots and equip and maintain the buildings yearly with a sum which was to be not less than 10 per cent of the amount expended in construction." By March 1919, the Mount Washington Improvement Association organized to support the library鈥檚 construction and, according to the Sun, received a lot 鈥済iven by the family of the late John M. Carter in his memory.鈥 In 1951, after three years of contentious debate (The Sun noted 鈥淗ell hath no fury like a Mount Washingtonian battling for his library.鈥), the library closed and the building was turned over to the city schools. After thirty years of access to their own neighborhood library, residents of Mount Washington were now offered the services of a book mobile. In 1980, Deborah Bedwell, along with four sculptors and four potters, opened Baltimore Clayworks in the former Pratt Library branch. Born in West Virginia, Bedwell moved to Maryland and took a job as an art teacher at Malcolm Middle School in Waldorf in the late 1960s. According to 2010 profile by Karen Nitkin in Baltimore Magazine, in 1969, she signed up for a ceramics class at University of Maryland, College Park but on her first attempt using the potter鈥檚 wheel the centrifugal force threw her to the floor. She left the room on a stretcher but didn鈥檛 give up on ceramics. In 1978, Bedwell was a graduate student at Towson University and, along with eight friends in the ceramics department, she had the idea of organizing a studio. The first few years were a struggle. The group had purchased the building for less than $60,000 but renovations cost nearly three times as much. In 2012, Bedell recalled, 鈥淭he first 10 years were focused on bringing in students and potential purchasers of pottery and sculpture. We pedaled very fast to keep it afloat.鈥 Their hard work paid off and, by 1999, Clayworks was able to expand into an additional structure, an 1898 stone building formerly used as convent for the Sisters of Mercy, St. Paul.
Unfortunately, financial trouble returned by the end of 2016 the nonprofit was over a million dollars in debt. In July 2017, the board of Baltimore Clayworks announced their decision close the organization and file for bankruptcy. Fortunately, a new board changed course, hired a new executive director, refinanced their mortgage, and, by October 2018, paid back their debt鈥攅nsuring a future for the historic library and a beloved community arts institution.
Old Otterbein Church, built in 1785, is one of the oldest churches still standing in Baltimore. With its classic brick and white trim tower (with bells brought over from Germany), the church shows off its landmark stature for countless Orioles fans and anybody traveling around downtown and Camden Yards.
Old Otterbein got its start in 1771, when a group of Baltimoreans erected a temporary chapel to house the German Evangelical Reformed Church. A few years later, the church hired Philip William Otterbein as pastor. Otterbein had come from Germany to Pennsylvania, and accepted the position in Baltimore as his fifth pastoral duty.
Otterbein apparently took to Baltimore, preaching at the church for 39 years and staying in the city for the rest of his life. Otterbein was a remarkable man. In 1784, he assisted Francis Asbury in founding the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in 1800, he and Martin Boehm helped found the United Brethren in Christ, with Otterbein's church in Baltimore as the cradle of the new denomination.
Members of Baltimore鈥檚 German immigrant community played a central role in the defense of Baltimore during the War of 1812 from Peter Gold and George Decker who volunteered as superintendents overseeing the construction of fortifications, Brigadier General John Stricker who commanded the Maryland Militia at the Battle of North Point (and later became Vice-President of the German Society of Maryland), and the Baltimore Jagers and die Union Jagers - two companies of German immigrants commanded in the German language. Many of these men, along with their families, worshipped with Philip William Otterbein at what is now Old Otterbein Church. Otterbein himself died less than a year before the Battle of Baltimore and remains buried in the churchyard with a monument placed over his grave in 1913.
The present church structure was erected in 1785, with the nearby parsonage in 1811 and the city's first German Sunday School in 1827. The interior of the church has been remodeled at various times, but the sanctuary remains the oldest in continuous use in Baltimore.
Since the doors opened at the former Southwestern District Police Station house on听July 17, 1884, the square brick building at Pratt and Calhoun Streets has served the city in many different ways. When construction on the new building began in the fall of 1883, the Baltimore Sun claimed the new Southwestern district police station would "surpass in size, elegance and completely of arrangement any police building now in the city, and, indeed, it will have few equals in the country." Builders Philip Walsh & Son and architect Frank E. Davis completed the three-story building with room for 47 officers. The men had been reassigned from the southern and eastern districts to听serve under听of veteran police officer Captain Daniel Lepson听who led the brand-new district. In the summer of 1944, Baltimore's first police boys' club moved into the upper floors, serving around 120 boys from 8 to 18 years old every day during the first few weeks after they opened. With donations from a local social club, the officers converted the station's third floor gymnasium into a听 "big clubroom," described by the Sun as,听"filled with tousle-haired boys noisily pushing at billiard balls, fashioning B-17's out of wood, nailing magazine racks together and eying each other craftily over checker games."听The city started four boys' clubs in the 1940s, with a segregated facility for black children at the Northwestern District Police Station on Gold Street. Both the officers and the Boys' Club departed in 1958 when the Southwestern District Police Station relocated to a modern, air-conditioned facility at Fonthill and Hurley Avenues. Following close on their tails, however, were the men and dogs of the department's K-9 Corps who moved their official headquarters from the Northern District station to Pratt Street. Unfortunately, by the late 1970s, the building fell vacant. The Maryland Department of Social Services renovated the former police station in the early 1980s. When they left, the building fell vacant again. Today, the structure is deteriorating and remains at risk until a new use for this often reinvented building can be found.
Old St. Paul's Cemetery opened in 1802鈥攋ust a few years after Baltimore incorporated as a city鈥攁nd is the final resting place of men and women that include a signatory to the Declaration of Independence, a Supreme Court Justice, and a Governor of Maryland.
Scores of storied veterans from the American Revolution, the War of 1812, and the Civil War are buried on the grounds. Among them are John Eager Howard (1752-1857), who donated the land for Lexington Market, and George Armistead (1780-1818), who commanded Fort McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore.
Today, a high stone wall surrounds the cemetery and provides some protection from the busy traffic of Martin Luther King Boulevard, whose construction cut the grounds in half in the 1980s.
One of the thirty original Anglican parishes in Maryland, St. Paul's parish has been a fixture of Baltimore since the city's incorporation. Many influential citizens attended this church, including George Armistead.
Old St. Paul鈥檚 Church is known as the mother church of all Episcopal congregations in Baltimore. As one of the thirty original Anglican parishes that the General Assembly created under the Establishment Act of 1692, St. Paul鈥檚 (also known as Patapsco) Parish covered the sparsely populated area between the Middle River and Anne Arundel County from the colony鈥檚 northern border to the Chesapeake Bay. In 1702, worshippers began meeting near Colgate Creek鈥攖he same Baltimore County peninsula that saw the Battle of North Point in 1814.
The parish relocated to the the newly incorporated Baltimore Town in 1731. Church leaders selected lot 19 on a hill overlooking the harbor where the church still remains today. St. Paul鈥檚 is distinguished as the only property that has remained under its original ownership since the founding of Baltimore. By the late eighteenth century, St. Paul鈥檚 counted among its members some of the most powerful men in Maryland. St. Paul鈥檚 worshippers included Declaration of Independence signer and Supreme Court justice Samuel Chase (whose father Thomas Chase served as the church鈥檚 rector in the mid-eighteenth century); Revolutionary War officer and governor, congressman, and slaveholder John Eager Howard; Thomas Johnson, a delegate to the Continental Congress and Maryland鈥檚 first governor; and George Armistead, commander of Fort McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore.
By 1814, the congregation had been meeting for over 120 years. Rev. Dr. James Kemp served as rector, a position he had held since November 1812. Nineteenth century local historian John T. Scharf described Kemp as 鈥渁 man of high literary and scientific culture, and an author of much repute.鈥 The parish began construction on a new neoclassical building, designed by Robert Cary Long, Sr., in May 1814 just a few months before the British attack on the city. Completed in 1817, the new St. Paul鈥檚 stood up until 1854 when a fire destroyed the building. Scharf noted that 鈥渢he steeple was considered the handsomest in the United States.鈥 The congregation rebuilt on the same lot, commissioning Richard Upjohn to design a new church built between 1854 and 1856. The striking structure on North Charles Street has remained a landmark for generations of Baltimoreans.
Beyond fulfilling a spiritual mission in the city, St. Paul鈥檚鈥攍ike many other churches of the day鈥攈as also provided social services. The church established the Benevolent Society for Educating and Supporting Female Children (also known as the Female Charity School) in 1799. The school sought to prepare orphans and underprivileged girls ages eight and above 鈥渢o be valuable and happy members of society.鈥 Charles Varle鈥檚 1833 book described the society as having thirty 鈥渋nmates鈥 who were fed, clothed, and educated in a building attached to the church.
The classically styled Old Town National Bank building at 221 N. Gay Street was constructed in 1924 as a bank headquarters. The first floor still retain an array of historic details, including a two-story lobby, cornice and parapet wall, grand marble stairway, and even vault spaces.
In 2010, 糖心影视 celebrated the renovation of the building and the conversion of the bank into a Holiday Inn Express Hotel. The work by owner Old Town Properties LLC and local architecture firm Kann Partners included refurbishing and repairing a host of historic features ensuring the building is preserved for future generations to appreciate.
Established in 1922, Olivet Baptist Church has occupied the historic Edgewood Theatre since the late 1960s. Built in 1930, the Edgewood Theatre was designed by one of the city鈥檚 most prominent theatre architects鈥擩ohn J. Zink. Born in Baltimore in 1886, Zink graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 1904 and started work with architect William H. Hodges and the local architecture firm Wyatt & Nolting. He began working on theatres when he joined architect Thomas W. Lamb in designing the famous Hippodrome Theatre on Eutaw Street and the Maryland Theatre in Hagerstown, Maryland. Over the next few decades, Zink and his partners designed over 200 movie theatres in cities up and down the east coast including over thirty in the Baltimore-DC area including the Senator Theatre on York Road and the Town Theatre (now known as the Everyman). In the Edgewood Theatre's heyday, the marquee featured a tall electric sign (a near twin of the Patterson designed by Zink on Eastern Avenue). Like many smaller neighborhood theatres, the business began to struggle in the 1950s and, after a brief second life as an art house theatre in 1962, ended its life as a movie house. That same year, Bishop Wilburn S. Watson joined the Olivet Baptist Church then located in a modest building on Riggs Avenue. In the late 1960s, Bishop Watson led the effort to purchase the former theatre on Edmondson Avenue and convert the building into a new sanctuary for the congregation.
Constructed in 1882, the Orchard Street United Methodist Church is one of the oldest standing structures built by a Black congregation in Baltimore. The church was established by Trueman Pratt, a free Black man who was born into slavery in Anne Arundel County, came to Baltimore, and began organizing prayer meetings at his home on Pierce Street in 1825. According to some sources, Pratt was originally held by General John Eager Howard and sold several times before he purchased his own freedom. The church formally organized in 1837 and, in 1839, Trueman, together with fellow free blacks Cyrus Moore and Basil Hall, leased the grounds at the corner of Orchard Street and what was then called Elder Alley and the church appeared as "Orchard Chapel," in a 1842 Baltimore business directory. The congregation paid $80.50 annually to Kirkpatrick Ewing, a Pennsylvanian who owned the property. The first building went up in 1838 followed by additions in 1853 and 1865 to accommodate a growing congregation. After the end of the Civil War, a great number of recently emancipated Black Marylanders from rural counties on the Eastern Shore and Southern Maryland moved to Baltimore and many lived in the area around the church. One such individual was the Reverend Samuel Green, a Dorchester County native, who had been imprisoned five years in the state penitentiary for possessing the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. Green moved to Baltimore in the early 1870s in order to work for the burgeoning Centenary Biblical Institute (now Morgan State University) and worshipped at Orchard Street until his death in 1877. By the time founder Trueman Pratt died in 1877鈥攁llegedly reaching over one hundred years of age鈥攖he congregation had clearly outgrown their building and began making plans to build a new church. In 1882, a Baltimore architect named Frank E. Davis was tasked with constructing the new facility on the same location. The church, renamed the Metropolitan Methodist Episcopal Church, was finished that December at an approximate cost of $27,000. Thousands of Baltimoreans came out for the laying of the corner-stone, including numerous prominent ministers from the region. A contemporary newspaper account refered to the finished building as the "foremost colored house of worship in the state." The church developed into an important civic institution for the African American community, often hosting conferences related to politics and education. The Colored Maryland Literary Union, the Washington Methodist Episcopal Conference, and reunions of United States Colored Troops met at Orchard Street over the years. Teddy Roosevelt even took to the pulpit in advance of the 1912 election in order to warn black voters against accepting bribes by "unscrupulous white men." The church remained in operation until the congregation relocated in 1972. Unfortunately, within a year, a fire and recurring vandalism nearly led to the structure being demolished by the city. Recognizing its historical significance, community groups mobilized to save the church. Several preservation organizations, including the Maryland Commission on Negro History and Culture, sought to document its story. Local historians succeed in listing the building on the National Register of Historic places in 1975. During the research process no evidence was recovered to support rumors of Underground Railroad activity, though church members may well have participated in that movement. Efforts to restore the church and establish a museum of black history in the state repeatedly stalled throughout the next 15 years. Orchard Street finally received the necessary backing when the Baltimore Urban League decided to move its offices there in 1992. The organization funded much of the restoration, which has returned the aged structure to its former grandeur.
Watch on this church!
The massive bronze sculpture of Orpheus at Fort McHenry represents an early 20th century celebration of the man who wrote the Star-Spangled Banner.
One of the most striking monuments related to the Battle of Baltimore is the nearly forty-foot tall statue of the Greek god Orpheus greeting visitors to Fort McHenry since 1922. Dedicated to Francis Scott Key as well as the Old Defenders, the sculpture takes a more allegorical approach than monuments to others involved in the Battle of Baltimore. The U.S. Congress appropriated $75,000 for a sculpture at this site in 1914 to mark the centennial of the Star-Spangled Banner-though the song did not become the national anthem until 1931. The Fine Arts Commission hosted a national contest to select the design, with Charles Niehaus' twenty-four-foot depiction of the Greek god of music and poetry selected as the most fitting memorial to Key. The bronze statue of a nude Orpheus playing the lyre stands atop a white marble base fifteen feet high. The low relief frieze on the base include a likeness of Key as well as other figures from mythology. World War I delayed the project for a eight years. President Warren G. Harding dedicated the monument on Flag Day in 1922 with a live broadcast from WEAR鈥攖he first time a president had been heard on the radio. Congress paid Niehaus $33,121 (above the original appropriation) for Orpheus with the Awkward Foot. Fort McHenry continued to serve as a military installation into the twentieth century. The Fort was briefly used as a city park from 1914 to 1917, when it returned to federal service as General Hospital No. 2 around World War I. When President Harding visited the Fort to dedicate the monument, the buildings had grown increasingly dilapidated. The Baltimore News American described the contrast between the empty fort and the new statue in August 1924:
"Deserted barracks and shacks gradually sink into ruin and weeds flourish where a great American victory of arms was won in the War of 1812. A movement is gaining headway to restore the ancient fort and transform it into a Federal park, worthy of its traditions and sightly to the tourists who come from distant places to visit the spot where a brilliant chapter of American history was written."The movement to restore the fort, with vocal support from locals in Baltimore, successfully reinvigorated the site. President Calvin Coolidge signed legislation in 1925 preserving Fort McHenry as a national park under the War Department--the first national park related to the War of 1812. Baltimoreans and visitors could stroll the grounds, walk along the water, and access this historic site freely once again. The National Park Service assumed stewardship in 1933. Six years later, the fort became the only NPS site with the dual designation of National Monument and Historic Shrine. Park service officials sought to distinguish historic sites of military importance with expansive natural landscapes in the west by using the categories of "National Monument" and "National Park." Outspoken locals pushed for the inclusion of "Historic Shrine" as it described the fort as a place of inspiration (for Key). James Hancock, President of the Society of the War of 1812, explained his position in a 1938 letter to Congressman Stephen Gambrill. The Fort, he argued, was "a distinctly historical place where people can go to review and renew those patriotic impulses that had much to do in making the national character." The defense of Baltimore took place both on land, at North Point, as well as by sea at Fort McHenry. However, interest in the Star-Spangled Banner story in the twentieth century鈥攅mbodied by Orpheus鈥攃ame at the expense of North Point. Decades of federal resources have focused public attention to the Battle of Baltimore on Fort McHenry.
Ottmar Mergenthaler was only 18 years old when he immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1872 to work with his cousin August Hahl at his machine shop in Washington, D.C. Four years later, after Hahl moved his shop to Baltimore, inventor Charles Moore approached Mergenthaler to redesign a faulty typewriter created to quickly publish legal briefs. Mergenthaler threw himself wholeheartedly at the project, and the result was the invention of the linotype鈥攁 machine that revolutionized the print industry and what Thomas Edison referred to as "the eighth wonder of the world."
It took Mergenthaler ten years of tweaking before the first linotype debuted at the New York Tribune. The machine accelerated the printing process by allowing typesetters to easily create molds of type, that is a "line o' type," using typewriter keys. Newspapers could run more efficiently and feature more pages. Linotypes continued in widespread use until the 1960s and 1970s when they were replaced by phototypesetting equipment and computers.
Mergenthaler operated out of Baltimore throughout most of his career. His first shop was a small operation at 12 Bank Lane (the site of the current Blaustein Building at One North Charles Street). He later established a larger factory in Locust Point. In 1894, Mergenthaler moved into a house at 159 West Lanvale Street with his wife and three children. The house was built between 1874 and 1875 by Joseph S. Hopkins, nephew of Johns Hopkins.
Mergenthaler's health was in serious decline when he moved into his Lanvale street home. He suffered a serious attack of pleurisy in 1888 and again in the summer of 1894. His symptoms were so severe he could no longer manage his factory. After brief stints in Arizona and New Mexico, where he hoped the climate might cure him, he returned to his Baltimore home in 1898 where he remained until his death on October 28, 1899.
The first African American owned company to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange, Parks Sausage Company, was headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland. Parks Sausage was successful because of its founder, Henry Parks. Parks started the company in 1951 with only two employees. Under his supervision, the company grew into a multimillion dollar business with almost 300 employees. Parks trained black and white workers. In his factory, he helped advance racial integration in the workplace.
As an African American businessman, Parks knew he would be under increased scrutiny. Inside his factory, Parks kept close watch over the sausage recipe that he had created. In an interview with the Baltimore Sun in 1971, it was reported that Parks would 鈥渢aste his sausage mixture everyday himself and [could] tell if the mixture is off by a tiny fraction.鈥 In wanting to create and maintain a quality product, Parks introduced sell-by dates to his meat products. In addition, he invited federal inspectors to tour his plant at a time when only state inspectors were required. He did this for two reasons. First, to show how good his products were. Second, to show the community-at-large that African American owned businesses could maintain the same strict standards as white businesses.
Baltimoreans didn鈥檛 just love Parks Sausage, they loved Henry Parks. In 1963, city residents showed their love for Parks by electing him to the Baltimore City Council for two consecutive terms. During his time on the council, Parks pushed for laws that opened public accommodations to African Americans. He also worked to help ease bail requirements. In 1969, Parks became the first African-American to serve on the Board of Trustees for Goucher College. By this time, Parks was already a lifetime member of the NAACP. 听
On a local and national level, Henry Parks was recognized for his role as a pioneering African American entrepreneur and civil rights advocate. In 1982, Parks was given the honor of being designated a Distinguished American by the United States Congress.
Today, employees at the Parks Sausage Plant, now re-named the Dietz & Watson Plant, no longer make Parks sausage.听 But that does not mean that Henry Park鈥檚 impact as a pioneer in the sausage industry has been forgotten. Everyday, as employees enter and exit work they drive along Henry Parks Jr. Drive and are reminded of Baltimore's original sausage king.
Occupying a busy corner at Charles and North, the magnificent Parkway Theater entertained audiences in Central Baltimore for decades with everything from vaudeville and silent movies to nightly live radio productions. Although abandoned for over a decade, the Parkway Theater is poised for renewal as developers vie for the chance to remake the handsome Italian Renaissance building for new crowds of Baltimore theater-goers.
Built in 1915, the Parkway was closely modeled on London's West End Theatre, later known as the Rialto, located near Leicester Square with shared features like the interior's rich ornamental plasterwork in a Louis XIV style. The architect, Oliver Birkhead Wight, was born in Baltimore County and designed a number of theaters around the city: the New Theater (now demolished) on Lexington Street, the Howard Theater around the corner on Howard Street, and the McHenry Theater on Light Street in Federal Hill.
Originally envisioned by owner Henry Webb's Northern Amusement Company as a 1100-seat vaudeville house, the theater added a movie projector even before they opened, screening "Zaza" starring leading Broadway actress Pauline Frederick for opening night on October 23, 1915. An early account of the theater remarked, "The lights radiating from the roof of the building as well as from the brilliantly lighted entrance, make an appreciable addition to the illuminations of North avenue which is fast becoming a nightly recreational center for the residents of the northern part of the city."
Loew's Theatres Incorporated bought the business in 1926, one of the scores of theaters across the Midwest and East Coast purchased by entrepreneur Marcus Loew as he grew his Cincinnati-based chain across the country. The new owners extensively remodeled the theater and replaced the original Moller Organ (Op. 1962, II/32) with a Wurlitzer theater organ. Loew's staged a grand re-opening along with the downtown Century Theater that they acquired and re-opened at the same time as the Parkway.
During the late 1940s and early 1950s, a group produced a nightly live radio program at the Parkway entitled "Nocturne" featuring poetry readings interspersed with musical selections on the organ. Morris Mechanic, a local theater operator who opened the Center Theater down the street in 1939, purchased the Parkway and closed the doors in 1952. Many thought that this might be the end of the Parkway, by then one of the oldest theaters in Baltimore City, and Morris Mechanic suggested that the building might be turned into offices.
Fortunately, the theater changed hands a few more times, spending a season or two as a live theater, before finally reopening with a new name 鈥 "5 West" 鈥 in 1956. With an eclectic mix of old movies, foreign films, and live performances, 5 West continued through the mid-1970s when it closed for good. Despite a handful of attempts to reuse the building in the 1980s and 1990s, the Parkway was closed from 1998 through 2017. In 2017, the Parkway reopened as The Stavros Niarchos Foundation Parkway鈥攁 complex of three theaters and the headquarters for the Maryland Film Festival.
In 1819, wealthy French merchant Louis Pascault, the Marquis de Poleon, constructed a row of eight houses on Lexington Street that now remain as the one of the earliest examples of the Baltimore rowhouse. Born in France, Pascault later moved to the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now known as Haiti). By the late 1780s, nearly 500,000 enslaved Africans labored at plantations on the island producing nearly half of the world's sugar and more than half of the world's coffee. In 1791, free blacks and enslaved people rose in revolt and Pascault joined thousands of white refugees fleeing the island for cities in the United States.
Pascault settled at Chatsworth, a large country mansion on Saratoga Street between Pine and Green, and profited from the quickly growing city's booming trade. After the city expanded in 1816, Pascault, together with carpenter and master builder Rezin Wight and merchant William Lorman, commissioned William F. Small to design this elegant row of Federal style houses adjacent to his estate. The dwellings soon attracted a host of wealthy residents, earning the row the distinction of being highlighted in an 1833 guidebook to Baltimore - the only row noted on the map.
The row soon became home to some of Baltimore's wealthiest families and remained a prestigious address for decades. Columbus O'Donnell, who was president of Baltimore's Gas and Light Company in the mid-nineteenth century and a director of the B & O Railroad (1839-1847) lived here with his wife, Eleanor, who was Louis Pascault's daughter. O'Donnell's mother, Sarah Chew Elliott O'Donnell, whose portrait hangs in Washington's National Gallery, lived in this row during the early 1820s. Her husband and Columbus' father, was John O'Donnell, a wealthy merchant and politician who had a momentous impact on Baltimore's international trade, particularly with China and Asia as a whole, and the man for whom Baltimore's O'Donnell Square is named.
By the 1970s, the iconic homes fell into disrepair. Using funds procured under the College Housing Loan Program, the University of Maryland, Baltimore, purchased the row in 1978 and renovated the historic buildings, transforming them into offices and student housing.
Artist Jim Sanborn鈥檚 first public sculpture, the Patapsco River Project was created as part of the Baltimore Sculpture Symposium sponsored by the city and administered by the Department of Housing and Community Development during the summer of 1977. Four artists were commissioned to each create gateway pieces for the city. The only other surviving gateway piece from the symposium is the Atlantic Blue Roller Column by Dominick Cea on Russell Street. This early work reveals Sanborn's long-standing interest in Mayan culture, the temples of Guatemala in particular. Abstract and horizontal, the work stands at the far edge of an open field directly fronting the Patapsco River, extending almost 80 feet along the water鈥檚 edge. Ten pyramidal shapes are aligned symmetrically, five on either side of an opening that contains a pool and allows a view of the river. In the pool, there is a grate made of aluminum. Light streams through the open space and is reflected on the grate and in the pool. Resting on top of the flattened pyramids made of concrete is one continuous lintel of weathering steel. The lintel carries four more pyramidal shapes, again symmetrically placed, two on each side of the central opening, and again flattened. The Department of Housing and Community Development assisted the artists at every turn, providing honoraria, materials, equipment, and assistants. For Patapsco River Project, Curtis Steel contributed between 12,000 and 15,000 pounds of Mayari-R steel, the city contributed and poured the concrete, and Edward Renneburg & Sons sheared the steel for free. Sanborn estimates that it might have cost him $100,000 to assemble the piece independently. Since 1977, Sanborn's sculpture has been displayed at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. His best known commission is an enigmatic cryptographic sculpture, entitled Kryptos, that was unveiled at the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia on November 3, 1990. In 1977, the concrete was bright white, the steel was a beautiful velvety brown, and the grass was green and lush. Unfortunately, very little maintenance has taken place since the work was first installed and few people are aware of the work or Sanborn's national reputation. Despite the neglect, the silhouette of the piece was and still is impressive today.
with research support from Friends of Maryland's Olmsted Parks and Landscapes
For almost two centuries, Baltimore鈥檚 Patterson Park has preserved its historic integrity while serving the recreational needs of an urban population with varied cultural, ethnic, and economic backgrounds. The dramatic geology, topography, and hydrology that define Patterson Park have critically influenced its development, but the park鈥檚 real identity is found in its fusion of its historic and natural features. In 1827, Patterson Park was established by William Patterson, an Irish immigrant and entrepreneur, when he donated six acres of land to Baltimore Town for use as a "public walk." The heart of the early development of the park is found in its western segment, a high, rolling, well-drained site with panoramic views of the harbor and downtown. The historic center of this section is Rogers鈥 Bastion, a significant War of 1812 landmark. Over the years, the park grew steadily, augmented by four major land acquisitions. The Olmsted Brothers鈥 influence occurred after the last land addition. Beginning in 1905, the firm was engaged to design improvements to the eastern side of the park, which was largely devoted to active recreation. In particular, the Olmsted plan designated plantings to adorn and demarcate the various recreational facilities. In 1997, two hundred trees, representing two hundred years of Baltimore鈥檚 history, were planted by volunteers in accordance with a new master plan. The park remains functionally and historically intact and continues to demonstrate both a coherent identity and strong sense of place. Today the park is 115 acres.
Watch our on this park!
In 1890 Charles H. Latrobe, then Superintendent of Parks, designed the Observatory. The structure was intended to reflect the bold Victorian style of the day. From the top of the tower one can view downtown, Baltimore's many neighborhoods, the Patapsco River, the Key Bridge and Fort McHenry. Over time and due to natural decay, vandalism, and lack of maintenance funds, the Observatory was closed to the public in 1951 when the first of a series of partial renovations was attempted. At one point demolition was proposed as an option but thankfully the 1998 Master Plan for Patterson Park called for the complete restoration of the structure. This project was guided by the Friends of Patterson Park, in partnership with Baltimore City's Department of Recreation and Parks and many neighborhood volunteers. Completed in the spring of 2002, the Observatory now stands as an iconic structure for Patterson Park and Baltimore City and signified the renaissance of the community around Patterson Park.
Check out our on this site!听
Built in 1970, the Pavilion Building is a companion to the adjacent Mercantile Bank & Trust building 鈥 both designed by architects Peterson and Brickbauer. Once home to the stylish Schrafft's restaurant, the Pavilion is now home to the City Plaza Medical Center.
One of the last buildings to be erected around Hopkins Plaza, Pavilion Building on Liberty Street was constructed in 1970. Built by the Manekin Corporation, the structure was planned as a bank for the Mercantile-Safe Deposit & Trust Company. The bank had just moved into a new 22-story tower just north of the Pavilion, designed by the same architects Peterson and Brickbauer who designed the 2-story Pavilion with a transparent glass-clad exterior from the base to the roof. The complex of both buildings received an AIA Honor Award in 1972.
Shortly before construction began, the plans shifted from retail bank to restaurant with Schrafft's chain restaurant occupying the first floor of the $1 million building. The Manekin Corporation planned to lease the second floor of the building as a small shopping center to serve visitors to Hopkins Plaza and office workers around Charles Center. Conveniently, a pedestrian "link" connected the Pavilion to the adjoining Mercantile building up until the walkways were dismantled in the 1990s and 2000s.
When Schrafft's restaurant opened at their new location in 1971, they advertised a rich meal at a bargain price, boasting: "It's mountains of salad at no extra cost, "say when" drinks, individual loaves of hot bread, and 15 tantalizing relishes. Complimentary cigars and candy mints for after dinner. Plus a sumptuous appetizer, a delightful glass of wine and a famous Schrafft's dessert, all included with dinner. And all located near theaters, movies, shopping and sports events. Everything from as little as $3.95."
Founded in Boston as a candy company in 1861, the Schrafft's began opening restaurants in and around New York in the 1950s. As they expanded into cities across the northeast, Schrafft's acquired a reputation as an upscale and tastefully decorated establishment, perhaps equivalent to Starbucks in the present. Unfortunately, as the 1970s continued the chain began to struggle and the Hopkins Plaza location closed within just a few years. Most recently, the Pavilion Building was occupied as the City Plaza Medical Center operated by Kaiser Permanente.
The site of Peabody Heights Brewery, also home to RavenBeer, Public Works Ale, and Full Tilt Brewing, was the site of Oriole Park from 1916 to 1944. Before this, the ballpark was home to the Baltimore Terrapins of the short-lived Federal League and was called Terrapin Park. During this time, the Orioles were playing in a ballpark literally across the street. When the Federal League went defunct in 1915, the Orioles took over Terrapin Park.
The ballpark was made out of wood, which led to its demise on July 3, 1944. The ballpark caught fire, destroying everything inside. The cause of the fire is unknown, but it was speculated at the time to have been a discarded cigarette.
Peabody Heights Brewery took over the site in 2012, making it the first brewery to be established in Baltimore City in over thirty years. In the late 1800s. there were about 40 breweries in the city, but by the 1970s, most had closed down. Owing to a national resurgence of interest in craft-brewing, breweries in Baltimore have begun to flourish again.
Established in 1857, the Peabody Institute is the second-oldest conservatory in the United States and a landmark at the southeast corner of the Washington Monument. Born in 1795 in Massachusetts, George Peabody lived briefly in Washington, DC, fought in the War of 1812, and, in 1816, settled in Baltimore where he lived for the next 20 years. Starting in the wholesale dry goods business and later through banking and finance, Peabody accumulated a tremendous fortune eventually moving to London to direct the banking firm of George Peabody & Co. Inspired by the many cultural and educational opportunities available to residents in London, Peabody set out to bring these same opportunities to the United States through philanthropy. The most significant of these efforts remains the Peabody Institute, founded in 1857 through a donation of $1,400,000. The construction of a home for the new Peabody Institute was delayed by the start of the Civil War, the Conservatory building opened in 1866. The Conservatory was joined in 1878 by the George Peabody Library, directly to the east, opened in 1878 and is one of the most spectacular enclosed spaces in our city. Designed by architect Edmund G. Lind, in collaboration with the first provost Dr. Nathaniel H. Morison, the library is distinguished by the unique interior architectural ironwork fabricated by the Bartlett-Robbins & Company. The Peabody Stack Room features five tiers of ornamental cast-iron balconies that rise to a skylight set 61 feet above the floor. The building is a rare example of Edmund Lind's architectural work as only a few other surviving buildings remain from his prolific 40-year career.
Watch our on George Peabody!
On August 15, 1814, almost exactly one month before the Battle of Baltimore and the bombing of Ft. McHenry in the War of 1812, Rembrandt Peale opened "Peale's Baltimore Museum and Gallery of Paintings" on Holliday Street in downtown Baltimore. Designed by noted Baltimore architect Robert Carey Long, the building is the first purpose-built museum in the western hemisphere. Taking after a natural history museum that his father, Charles Wilson Peale, started in Philadelphia in 1786, Rembrandt Peale displayed collections of fossils and other specimens, as well as portraits of many of the country's founding fathers that his family had painted. As the British made plans to attack and the War of 1812 was on the city's threshold, portraits of the Revolutionary War heroes were highly popular, and Peale was able to charge 25 cents for admission. In September of 1814, Baltimore turned back the British invasion on land and sea, providing a critical turning point in the war and likely sparing the city from destruction. The British, after all, had burned the nation's capital just a few miles south after Washington fell the month before. The Peale Museum capitalized on patriotic fervor, and put a number of bombs and shells that were collected from the failed British bombardment on display. In doing this, Peale became the first person to display samples of Britain's firepower, which of course Francis Scott Key immortalized as the bombs bursting in air in the Star Spangled Banner. Some years later, in 1830, Peale's museum was still capitalizing on the War of 1812 when they displayed the original flag that flew over Ft. McHenry, borrowed from a willing Mrs. Louisa Armistead, the widow of Lt. Colonel George Armistead. Lt. Colonel Armistead commanded Ft. McHenry during the war and reportedly ordered an extra large flag to fly at the Fort as a pointed challenge to the British. From its earliest days embracing Baltimore's war effort, the Peale Museum has been intertwined with the city's history. The building served as a museum from 1814 until 1830. It then became the Baltimore City Hall until 1875 when the current city hall building was erected. After 1875, the museum had various uses, including as the Colored School Number 1 for African American children, and then in 1931, it returned to its origins as a museum, becoming the "Municipal Museum of Baltimore." Fittingly, the Municipal Museum focused on Baltimore City history. In 1985, the museum underwent a physical renovation and was reborn as the center of the "City Life Museums." With exhibits on Baltimore's historic gems, such as the H.L. Mencken House and Phoenix Shot Tower, to the rowhouses and front steps that help define working class life in Baltimore, the City Life Museums lasted until 1997 when the enterprise closed. Today, the Peale Museum is empty and awaiting the next chapter in its long and storied service to Baltimore.
Watch our on the museum!
Founded in 1911, the Pemco International Corporation site on Eastern Avenue is a reminder of the enduring environmental legacy of Baltimore鈥檚 industrial businesses. First known as the Porcelain Enamel Manufacturing Corporation, the company produced porcelain and enamel coating for kitchen and bathroom appliances and tiles; perhaps most notably, Pemco supplied the orange roofing tiles for Howard Johnson hotels and restaurants. Karl Turk, Sr., a German immigrant who founded the company, became a leader in the porcelain industry after inventing a process for coating iron in porcelain. Turk was also the first to add color to porcelain coatings. In 1926, Pemco won acclaim at the Gas Association Conference for a new a line of kitchen stoves in various colors.
The company continued to grow in the years following WWII. According to a Baltimore Sun article from 1958, 鈥淭he plant has a battery of eight continuous smelters operating 24 hours a day, several days a week to provide porcelain enamels for appliance makers producing ranges, refrigerators, washing machines, bathroom and kitchen fixtures.鈥 The $750,000 Pemco research lab on Eastern Avenue opened in 1962 and was the first business in the city to have its own heliport.
By the next decade, however, the company ran into problems with environmental issues. In 1979, city officials demanded that the company clean the lead contamination on the complex on Eastern Avenue. The following year Pemco鈥檚 owner, Mobay Chemical Corp. had to pay a $10,000 fine for 鈥渆xcessive fluoride emissions.鈥 Currently, the site is in the process of undergoing redevelopment plans. Purchased by local investment group MCB Real Estate, the company has plans to develop the site as a mixed-use facility similar to Canton Crossing.
Penn Station is a unique combination of a classic Beaux-Arts architectural design from architect Kenneth Mackenzie Murchison and a functional, adaptable train station that serves as the eighth busiest station in the United States. Originally known as the Union Station, named for the Union of northern and southern railroads that came together at the station, this 1911 ornate granite, terracotta, and cast iron building is the third structure to exist on the site. In 1873, the Northern Central Railway built the first station on this site, a wooden structure, replaced in 1886 by a hulking Victorian brick structure. After critics declared the station overcrowded, uncomfortable, dangerous, and unsuitable for Baltimore's booming passenger traffic, the building was torn down in 1910 to be replaced by a new modern station. The architect, Kenneth Mackenzie Murchison, had extensive experience creating railroad stations around the nation and brought a stylish Beaux-Arts style to the job. Murchison's design incorporated an innovative waiting area illuminated by three large domed skylights directly connected to the boarding platforms. The Pennsylvania Railway Company took over the station in the 1920s and renamed it Pennsylvania Station to match the other Penn Stations along the line. The building deteriorated over the years and during World War II blackout paint was applied to the skylight and windows. This remained through the early 1980s, when a $5 million facelift restored the mosaic flooring, glazed wall tile, marble detailing, and the windows. In 2015, the station served more than 993,721 Amtrak passengers and even more MARC train commuters.
Watch on this building!
Built to house the Baltimore branch offices of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company following the Great Fire of 1904, this structure was an early commission of the architectural firm of Parker & Thomas (later Parker, Thomas & Rice), the preeminent architects of Baltimore鈥檚 Beaux Arts commercial & financial structures of the first quarter of the twentieth century.
Throughout the nineteenth century, the Pennsylvania Railroad vied with the locally owned Baltimore & Ohio Railroad for control of rights-of-way and development rights for lines in and out of the city. While the B&O was the older of the two competing railroads (founded in 1830), the Pennsylvania Railroad had surpassed the B&O in size, scope, and profitability by the 1870s.
Such was the nature of railroad competition in Baltimore that the two lines even maintained separate passenger terminals, with Mount Royal Station serving the B&O (and its dominance of lines running south) and the Pennsylvania maintaining a site between Charles and St. Paul Streets.
In 1900, under the leadership of Alexander Cassatt, brother of expatriate Impressionist painter Mary Cassatt, the Pennsylvania Railroad merged with the B&O, and the two companies shared a Board of Trustees. Partly in response to efforts in Washington to enact legislation prohibiting railroad monopolies, the Pennsylvania and B&O maintained separate corporate identities during this period, although the 鈥渦nion鈥 of the two companies was celebrated by Cassatt鈥檚 pet project, Washington, DC鈥檚 monumental Beaux-Arts style Union Station (1902).
When the 1904 Fire destroyed the Second-Empire style B&O headquarters on the northwest corner of Baltimore and Calvert Streets, the corporate officers elected to rebuild a grand, 13-story Beaux-arts tower on a new site, two blocks to the west. The Pennsylvania, by contrast, retained its site and elected the relatively small, restrained building seen today. The interrelationship of the two companies and the coordination of their post-Fire building schemes is attested to by the fact that both the Pennsylvania Railroad building and the B&O tower on Charles Street were designed by the same architectural firm, Parker & Thomas. The modesty of the Pennsylvania鈥檚 building (in spite of the company鈥檚 essential domination of the B&O) is part and parcel of the effort to maintain distinct identities for the two merged companies.
By 1906鈥攖he time of the Baltimore post-Fire rebuilding of both the Pennsylvania and B&O buildings鈥 Cassatt was dead, the Republicans had passed antitrust legislation and the two companies administratively pried themselves apart once again. Thus, what may have begun in 1905 as a somewhat disingenuous attempt to maintain the united railroad companies鈥 discrete corporate identities through the erection of two separate and stylistically and hierarchically distinct structures, became an accurate representation of corporate separation by the time the buildings were complete in 1906.
As early as the 1840s, a small oasis of green known as Perkins' Spring became a popular destination at the edge of the rapidly growing city. The park's unique value to local residents came from the fresh-water spring that poured out at a rate of 60 gallons a minute. One resident later recalled how their neighbors carried water away "by the barrel in the '80鈥瞫, especially when heavy rains flooded and polluted the normal supplies." In 1853, the city purchased a small triangle of land around the spring from the estate of Dr. Joseph Perkins bounded by Ogston Street, George Street, and Myrtle Avenue. The city hoped to protect the spring from development and preserve it as an amenity for a soaring population on the west side of Baltimore. City officials soon improved the new park with a brick enclosure and a cast iron Moorish-style canopy over the spring.
Mayor Joshua Van Sant appointed an official park keeper who lived in a frame house by the park's Myrtle Avenue entrance. The grounds were soon planted with hundreds of flowers of every shape, size and color, coleus and petunias the most common, all grown in the park's greenhouse built in 1887 and arranged in decorative patterns and designs.
Like many West Baltimore neighborhoods, the area around the park was primarily occupied by white households at its beginning but by the late nineteenth century, the city's black community had started to settle in the area. For example, in 1880, a church built by a German evangelical congregation facing the park at the corner of George and Ogston Streets became home to an African American congregation that soon established the Perkins Square Baptist Church. By the 1920s, Baltimore's black residents used the park for every day relaxation and special entertainment. On one warm June evening in 1922, over 3,000 black Baltimoreans crowded into the park to hear the Colored City Band, established by A. Jack Thomas, performing a selection of popular marches and operas.
In the decades after WWII, city leaders decried poor housing conditions in the neighborhoods around the park and resolved to address the situation through the construction of the new high-rise George B. Murphy Homes. Beginning with a ground-breaking ceremony at the corner of Myrtle and George Streets in December 1961, 758 housing units including four 14-story towers on a 13-acre site were built, surrounding Perkins Square on all sides. The complex opened to great acclaim on New Year's Eve 1963 but by the early 1970s, the housing project had already started to experience challenges. By the 1990s, Murphy Homes became known for crime and violence and plans moved forward for its demolition. Finally in 1999 on a bright July morning, 375 pounds of dynamite brought the towers to the ground. The park and the historic gazebo remain at the center of Heritage Crossing, a $53 million mixed-income development, still offering a restful bit of green for West Baltimore.