Preserving and promoting Baltimore's historic buildings and neighborhoods.
Author: Johns
Johns Hopkins has been the executive director of Baltimore Heritage since 2003. Before that, Johns worked for the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development developing and implementing smart growth and neighborhood revitalization programs. Johns holds degrees from Yale University, George Washington University Law School, and the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment.
This Sunday, December 3, we are holding our second and final tour of the War Memorial in partnership with the Johns Hopkins University Symphony. After the guided tour, you can enjoy a concert featuring the symphony and the JHU Choral Arts Society for a performance by Maurice Durufle utilizing the acoustics of the War Memorial’s magnificent large hall.
Over the next few weeks, many local historic sites and neighborhoods are celebrating the holidays by opening their doors for tours and special events. We hope you can check out the open house at G. Krug and Son Ironworks, the annual Union Square Cookie Tour, the Charles Village Snowflake Tour, or another program at a historic site this December!
Last Thursday, November 2, the Republican leadership of the U.S. House of Representatives released a tax reform bill that, if approved, eliminates the federal historic rehabilitation tax credit program.
Please contact your members of Congress to show your support for the Historic Tax Credit program. The National Trust for Historic Preservation makes it easy to send your Senators and Congressional Representatives an email about this issue. All you need is your zip code.
Losing federal historic tax credits would be devastating for Baltimore City. Since 2002, over 350 projects have relied on funding from the federal historic tax credit program. The credit has helped developers find new uses for vacant buildings including the American Can Company, Clipper Mill, Tide Point, Montgomery Park, and the Stieff Silver Building. Historic tax credits can protect and preserve treasured historic places like Clifton Mansion, the Woman’s Industrial Exchange, Eastern High School, American Brewery, Center Theater, and many more. And, for each example, there are many more historic buildings that will need these credits to support rehabilitation in the future.
American Brewery Building. Photograph by Paul Burk.
This concerning proposal is moving forward quickly: the House leadership is seeking a full vote on their proposal before Thanksgiving. We need your help to protect one of the most important programs for historic buildings in Baltimore today.
For more on how the federal historic tax credit helps Baltimore and Maryland, check out this advocacy alert from our friends at Preservation Maryland or this resource from Preservation Action. Thank you for lending your support to keep this program that has helped so many in Baltimore and deserves to continue being a catalyst for our economic growth.
Over the past few days, preservationists from all over came together in Annapolis for the second Keeping History Above Water conference. Participants shared experiences using GIS to track eroding shorelines, protecting infrastructure in coastal cities, and designing resilient museum exhibits. Conference participants even played the Game of Floods—a board game created to teach players about flood risk from rising sea levels.
We can’t promise you’ll play a board game at next week’s lecture on climate change and cultural heritage but we can promise you’ll discover how communities are working to protect historic buildings and archaeological resources from rising water and serious storms. Our speaker, Lisa Craig, is the Chief of Historic Preservation for Annapolis and she brings over twenty years of experience in preservation to meet the challenges facing Annapolis and historic coastal communities all across the world. I hope to see you there.
Finally, if you are already a member of Baltimore Heritage, thank you. We can’t do it without you. If you haven’t donated this year, please consider renewing your support or becoming a member for the first time.
We’re continuing to add tours this fall with fun programs this weekend and over the next few weeks. We just lined up a new bike tour on October 28: All in the Family, a Bike Tour and Lunch with Baltimore’s Business Legacies. We’ll stop and talk with the owners at three, century-old Baltimore businesses: Budeke’s Paint and Decorating, Meyer Seed, and Tochterman’s Fishing Tackle, and then enjoy a picnic lunch from a fourth legacy business, DiPasquale’s Italian Market and Deli.
We still have room for you to join any or all of our three tours this weekend. On Saturday, come down to Lexington Market for a tour (and consider staying for lunch!). On Sunday morning, we are walking around Mount Vernon Place and climbing the steps at the Washington Monument. That afternoon, you can take a tour of the historic War Memorial Building followed by a concert by the Hopkins Symphony Orchestra.
Finally, we are excited to welcome Ms. Lisa Craig, Chief of Historic Preservation in Annapolis, to Baltimore on Thursday, November 9 for a free talk, Keeping History Above Water: Cultural Heritage in an Age of Climate Change. Ms. Craig will discuss her work planning for protecting historic places and cultural heritage in the face of rising waters and bigger storms. From hazard mitigation planning and flooding adaptation strategies to 3D modeling and hurricane case studies, Ms. Craig will share with us the leading edge of how Maryland can protect historic neighborhoods and communities from a future of rising tides.
There is a lot happening, and we hope you can join us!
Fall weather is perfect for going new places and exploring the city by bike and bus. We have three new tours lined up over the next few weeks including a beer history themed bike tour, a classical concert at a classical landmark, and a bus tour with local architect Tom Liebel for Doors Open Baltimore.
Baltimore Beer Week 2017 is coming up and Dr. Ralph Brown has volunteered to lead a morning ride on Saturday, October 14 covering breweries and beer-drinkers from the past. The bike tour ends with a sampler flight of beers at the Heavy Seas Alehouse (price included with registration), where we’ll hear from some of the folks making beer in Baltimore today.
The next day, October 15, we’ll be at the War Memorial Building for a tour where we can check out the recent window restoration of this historic landmark and then sit down to enjoy a performance by the Hopkins Symphony Orchestra. We’re excited to partner on this program with the orchestra and to offer a second performance on December 3 with new selections and soloists from the JHU Choral Society and Baltimore School for the Arts chorus.
Finally, you can close out the month with a Doors Open bus tour of local architecture and history from downtown to West Baltimore and back again led by Tom Liebel, architect and chair of Baltimore’s Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation. Our ride will include stops at six wonderful historic places: the 1814 Peale Museum, Union Baptist Church on Druid Hill Avenue, the Arabber Center off of Pennsylvania Avenue, the 1806 St. Mary’s Seminary Chapel in Seton Hill, the Le Mondo art and performance space on Howard Street, and the War Memorial Building near City Hall by architect Laurence Hall Fowler.
Doors Open Baltimore now includes a full weekend with free open houses and self-guided tours of over fifty sites on Saturday, October 28 and dozens of special events and guided tours on Sunday, October 29. We hope you can be part of this fun annual event!
