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.
We need your help to find the past year’s best preservation projects. Are you….
a homeowner who just finished a big restoration project? Or you know a neighbor who has?
a builder or architect who worked on a unique adaptive reuse project last year?
a volunteer with a community group preserving and celebrating historic places in Baltimore?
2015 Award Recipient, Police Station at Fells Point Station 1621 Bank Street
If you answered yes, then we want you to nominate your preservation project or heritage achievement for our 2016 Preservation Awards. Since 1961, we have given awards to hundreds of projects and people, from rowhouse renovations to brewery conversions, from authors of Baltimore history to civic groups saving our buildings and revitalizing our neighborhoods. We welcome nominations for projects large and small.
We keep our awards nomination process simple—all we need is a short description of the project or achievement, images, and names and contact information for the project partners. Learn more about our awards categories and review process then please send in your nomination today. Remember to make a nomination before our deadline on Wednesday, March 2, 2016. And don’t forget to stay tuned for the details on our annual awards celebration in June!
We are glad to start the new year, and our winter tour season, by taking you behind the scenes at the workshops of two wonderful local artisans. For our January 27 tour, we’ll visit Thomas Brown Woodwright, a Remington workshop that turns out the highest quality wood products while almost exclusively using machines built before the Great Depression. On February 10, we’re headed to Mount Vernon on a walk through the studio of McLain Wiesand. From their shop on Cathedral Street, McLain Wiseand create decorative arts pieces and furniture sold in glamorous showrooms from Los Angeles to New York following the tradition of Baltimore’s famed 19th century furniture makers.
Finally, we are back again with Baltimore historian Jamie Hunt for our annual Mt. Vernon Valentines Love Stories tour covering two hundred years of love, loss and betrayal in Baltimore’s high society. We’ll be doing two of these tours on February 13—the first at 11:00 am and the second at 1:00 pm.
We are looking forward to year packed with heritage tours and hope you can join us on our first two.
With just hours left in 2015, we still need your support. Our members, volunteers, and partners made 2015 a remarkable year for preservation in Baltimore. You can help us make 2016 even better. Please become a member for the very first time or renew your generous support today.
As the new year begins, we also invite you to join us for a few fun tours, walks, and community events organized by our friends and partners:
Druid Hill Park First Day Hike, January 1, 2016, 9:00 am to 11:00 am: Start a new tradition on New Year’s Day by starting the year off on the right foot, left foot or any foot. Join the Friends of Druid Hill Park for their 2nd Annual First Day Hike in Druid Hill Park! – $10 per person
Historic Lauraville Walking Tour, January 2, 2016, 2:00 pm: Join the Northeast Baltimore History Roundtable and Eric Holcomb for a historic walking tour in Lauraville starting at Zeke’s Cafe.
Herring Run Archaeology Hike, January 3, 2016, 2:00 pm: Meet at Hall Springs on Sunday afternoon to join local archaeologists, Lisa Kraus and Jason Shellenhamer for a hike in the Herring Run ending at Zeke’s Cafe.
Preservation Town Hall: Baltimore, January 4, 2016, 6:30 pm: Join Preservation Maryland at this open, town hall-style meeting to learn about local, state and federal advocacy efforts to help save places that matter and how you can be a force for reinvestment and redevelopment. RSVP on Facebook!
Thank you to everyone who supported Baltimore Heritage in 2015. We hope you have a happy beginning to the new year and that we see you soon in 2016.
Stone Hill Walking Tour. Photograph courtesy Alex Fox, 2015 April 12.
On behalf of Baltimore Heritage, I hope you are enjoying a cheerful holiday season. I am thankful for the volunteers, members, and supporters who helped us to sustain and expand Baltimore Heritage’s education and preservation programs over the past year.
Before we all start to sing Auld Lang Syne, I’d like to share a few highlights from our year in review:
We expanded our tours. With our new Monumental City Tours, we offered volunteer-led tours every Sunday morning from April to November from Patterson Park to the Shot Tower. And we are getting ready to do it again in 2016!
We celebrated heritage milestones. We welcomed the tenth family into our Centennial Homes program honoring families that have been in the same house for a century. We also organized a year-long series of Fell’s Point walking tours celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Robert Long House.
Be sure to learn more about what we do with your support in our 2015 year in review! Thank you again to everyone who volunteered with us, joined or renewed their membership, and came out on a tour to learn more about Baltimore. If you have not contributed yet in 2015, please donate online today or send a check to 11 1/2 W. Chase Street, Baltimore, MD 21201.
I wish you a happy holiday season and I look forward to seeing you in the new year.
On Wednesday, the Baltimore Department of Public Works released their “100%” final plan for the Druid Hill Reservoir project. DPW is planning to install two drinking water tanks (one holding 35 million gallons and another 19 million) buried under the western third of Druid Lake. After construction, the land above the tanks would become part of the park including a new band shell. DPW plans to convert the remaining eastern part of the reservoir into a publicly accessible lake but Druid Lake would no longer be part of the city’s drinking water supply.
Changes to Druid Lake are required by new federal policies to improve drinking water safety and follow nearly three years of study and public meetings. With the release of this final plan, the Department of Public Works is moving forward with implementation and anticipates completing work in four to five years – 2019 or 2020.
Throughout the planning process, Baltimore Heritage worked with neighbors and the Friends of Druid Hill Park, to draw attention to issues around the treatment of the historic lake and the new configuration of Druid Hill Park. We now have answers to a few of these big questions.
What happens to the historic stone wall and iron fence around the lake?
Around the eastern area of the lake, the project plan keeps the stone wall and fence in place and repairs any deteriorated elements. Around the western area (located above the tanks), the plan keeps segments of the stone wall in place but removes all the existing ironwork. The goal of the latter changes is to make the lake accessible to the public and support new opportunities for recreational boating, fishing, and other activities.
Now that the lake is no longer needed to supply drinking water, will it still be kept full of water?
The Department of Public Works has committed to keep Druid Lake filled with water by diverting groundwater into the reconstructed lake and, if necessary, supplementing that supply with drinking water.
How does this project pay for the necessary park improvements?
Funding for this project from the Department of Public Works should pay for widening the path on the southern part of the lake and constructing the base for the band shell. The Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks is expected to find funding for to complete the band shell and related park improvements. Funding for this additional work is not currently included in the capital budget for Recreation and Parks but we hope to see those resources identified before construction is complete.
Illustration of proposed improvements. Baltimore City Department of Public Works.
