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Leon Day Park
Leon Day Park is named for Leon Day an outstanding player in the Negro Leagues who was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. A resident of southwest Baltimore, Day joined the Baltimore Black…
Carroll Park
Carroll Park is Baltimore's third oldest city park and was originally part of the enormous Mount Clare plantation owned by Charles Carroll, Barrister in the mid-eighteenth century. The park was the…
Carrollton Viaduct: 1829 Railroad Bridge Named for Charles Carroll of Carrollton
On July 4, 1828, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, the last living signer of the Declaration of Independence and a director of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, laid the cornerstone for the Carrollton…
Lutherville Colored School No. 24: A Two-Room Schoolhouse and Segregated Education
Constructed in 1908, Lutherville Colored School No. 24 is a simple two-room schoolhouse located on School Lane. Today, the building operates as a small museum of Maryland’s Black history and the…
Saint James A.U.M.P. Church: Towson's Second Oldest Church and the East Towson Black Community
The origins of this two-story frame church on Jefferson Avenue began in 1861 when a group of Black Baltimore County residents established the Saint James African Union First Colored Methodist…
Canton Branch, Enoch Pratt Free Library: The First Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library
The Canton Branch is one of four branch libraries, all designed by local architect Charles L. Carson, built by the Enoch Pratt Free Library in 1886. It stands alone, however, as the first to open and…
Patterson Park Observatory
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…
Gustav Brunn's Baltimore Spice Company
In almost every kitchen in Baltimore, and maybe Maryland, there is a tiny yellow, blue, and red tin of Old Bay seasoning. It is an essential part of local cuisine. Yet, most people are unaware of the…
The Office of John H. Murphy, Sr
From the humblest of beginnings, John H. Murphy Sr. rose to become the founder of the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper, which had an office here at 1336 N Carey St in the 1910’s. Murphy was born…
Home of Tupac Shakur
There are very few people who have made an impact on American popular culture like Tupac Shakur. His music served to inspire a generation of musicians--music that was inevitably shaped by his time in…
Club Hippo
Before the corner of N Charles and W Eager was a CVS, it was a Baltimore institution: Club Hippo. For more than 35 years, Club Hippo was a refuge for Baltimore’s queer community. The dance venue was…
George McMechen House
Although the famed African American lawyer and civil rights advocate George McMechen is remembered fondly for his service to the community, he is best remembered for living on McCulloh Street. In June…
Parks Sausage Factory
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…
Fort McHenry
Fort McHenry's history began in 1776 when the citizens of Baltimore Town feared an attack by British ships. An earthen star fort known as Fort Whetstone was quickly constructed. The fort, like…
Gunpowder Copper Works: Early Industry on the Gunpowder Falls
The Gunpowder Copper Works, a once-prominent factory located along the Great Gunpowder Falls near Glen Arm, Maryland is the second oldest copper works in the United States. The factory operated from…
Congress Hotel
Known originally as the Hotel Kernan, the Congress Hotel was built in 1903 by James L. Kernan. Kernan was a savvy businessman who sought to capitalize on the ways in which immigration had influenced…
James M. Deems Music School: A Local Composer at 426 W. Baltimore Street
Spinning wheel manufacturers, cigar makers, tailors, hat makers, multiple banks, and a music school all occupied this site—often at the same time—going back to the early nineteenth century. During the…
Edna St. Vincent Millay at Emmanuel Episcopal Church
Past the brick rowhomes that have come to define Baltimore, Emmanuel Episcopal Church, established in 1854, sits on the corner of Read and Cathedral Streets. At street level, only the abrupt…
North Avenue Market
Touted as "modern market in the country," and now considered an early prototype for suburban shopping centers, the North Avenue Market opened in 1928 with twelve retail stores and twenty-two lane…
Baltimore Design School
A survivor that has endured decades of abandonment, the 1914 Lebow Building is an impressive example of early twentieth century industrial architecture that is just starting a new future as the…
Harlem Theatre
The Harlem Park Theatre was originally built as a church for a congregation that had outgrown the size of their existing building. Construction on this Romanesque-style building on Gilmore Street…
Upton
High on a hill at 811 West Lanvale Street, behind a chain link fence and past the overgrown yard, is the grand Upton – an architectural treasure by one of Baltimore's earliest architects that has…
Martick's Restaurant
Martick’s Restaurant Francais on Mulberry Street is a place of fond memories where Baltimore enjoyed fine food, lively music, and art for nearly a century.
The once-famous restaurant started in 1917…
Interstate 395 and Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard: Cal Ripken Way and the Former Harbor City Boulevard
The little-known history of Baltimore's Interstate 395 (I-395) and Martin Luther King Boulevard, Jr. Boulevard offers a reminder of the years of contentious planning efforts that ended with the…
I Am an American Day Parade: Immigration and the Making of the East Baltimore Documentary Photography Project
East Baltimore's "I Am An American Day" parade is captured in a unique 1981 news program from WJZ-TV and a book of documentary photographs showing the people and places of East Baltimore in the late…
Masjid Ul-Haqq: Former Home to the Nation of Islam in Baltimore
Mosque No. 6, the predecessor of the Masjid Ul-Haqq, first moved into their present building on Wilson Street around 1958. The two-story brick building had most recently housed a automotive garage but…
Oakenshawe Green Space: A Former Parking Lot Turned Community Open Space
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…
John Stuban at 911 Tyson Street: Activist Founder of ACT UP Baltimore
John Stuban moved from New York City to Baltimore, Maryland in 1987 and settled in a small rowhouse on Tyson Street. That same year, a group of New York City activists founded ACT UP (AIDS Coalition…
Billie Holiday Statue: Monument by James Early Reid on Pennsylvania Avenue
The Billie Holiday Monument on Pennsylvania Avenue commemorates the life and legacy of the famed "Lady Day" who was born as Eleanora Fagan in Baltimore on April 7, 1915.
Billie Holiday's childhood was…
Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum: Original Emory Street Home of the "Sultan of Swat"
On February 6, 1968, the city paid $1,850 to buy four vacant, vandalized rowhouses on Emory Street—an unusual birthday celebration for famed Baltimore native Babe Ruth. Exactly seventy-three years…