Author: Molly Ricks

Baltimore Heritage Needs a Few Good Quilters!

If you are an experienced sewist who would like to use your skills and talents to join other volunteers in creating a group project that celebrates Baltimore, this post is for you.

Baltimore Heritage would like to submit a quilt to the 2026 Homage to Baltimore Quilting Competition, https://www.homagetobaltimorequiltingcompetition.com, and we could use extra hands to help create a quilt that reflects Baltimore Heritage’s commitment to Baltimore’s communities via places, people, and traditions.

Our idea is to create quilt blocks that are inspired by the subjects of our Five Minute Histories videos. We have a few subjects in mind but will also consider suggestions (please visit our YouTube channel for inspiration). Blocks will be a standard size (yet to be determined) and will include space to cite the topic being represented as well as the quilter’s name. Blocks can include a wide ranging of quilting techniques including (but not limited to) piecing, applique, and embroidery. Blocks will be due March 1 to give us time to assemble and quilt the piece by the April 1 deadline.

Our initial though is that volunteers would work on their blocks individually, though we will schedule a meeting kickoff via Zoom once we have our volunteers in place. If, however, there is a desire for a dedicated sew-in day, we could try to make that happen. We will ask for progress photos from individuals to be able to provide updates via social media, so our community can see us at work.

What we cannot do:
-teach quilting or piecing—experienced sewists only
-provide sewing machines
-provide materials—though if someone is in need, there’s a good chance we can crowd source small pieces of fabric

What we can do:
-coordinate and make assignments
-handle quilt assembly, quilting, and submission
-provide updates via social media
-answer questions
-enthusiastically cheer on this project!

If this sounds like something you would like to be involved in and have time for, please contact Mary Zajac at zajac@baltimoreheritage.org by Tuesday, January 20. Thanks!

January 28: Heritage Happy Hour at the Brewer’s Art

Join Baltimore Heritage for our very first Heritage Happy Hour! Come enjoy a casual get-together at The Brewer’s Art and connect with fellow history lovers, preservation enthusiasts, friends of Baltimore’s past, and Baltimore Heritage’s own Executive Director, Johns Hopkins. Drop in, share a drink, and meet others who care about celebrating and preserving our City’s stories. This is a free event, but we ask that you register ahead of time.

Click here to register! 

What Are We Planning for 2026? And why we need your support to make it happen.

With thanks to those who have already donated, we wanted to share what we’re planning for next year and ask again for help in making it happen by joining or renewing your membership! We are a small organization so a gift of any size – from $5 to $500 – will help immensely. Here are a few highlights for how your gift will help in the year ahead:

 

Heritage Tours

This past year we launched a new Inner Harbor by Boat tour and a new walking tour at Green Mount Cemetery focusing on John Willkes Booth and Abraham Lincoln. This spring we will be able to return with more robust tours and events, including more boat tours and a new series we’re calling Baltimore After Dark. Please stay tuned!

 

Five Minute Histories Videos 

We have produced 387 Five Minute Histories and counting! Don’t worry, these are here to stay, and we’re ramping up for a full year of them in 2026.

 

Hands On Preservation Work

This past year we launched a new “voluntours” series where we helped with community trash clean-ups and learned local history in the process. We held two voluntours at Laurel Cemetery and several trash clean-ups at Herring Run Park and Masonville Cove. We plan to continue this unique tour model in 2026.

 

 

We need your help today.

 

We at Baltimore Heritage are a little bit unusual. We rely heavily on kind volunteers to make our work possible, and nearly three quarters of our annual operating income comes from gifts from individuals. Most of these gifts are at our basic membership levels of $35 for an individual and $50 for a family. By donating at any level, be assured that your support goes a long way.

Please accept an enormous thank you to everyone who volunteers with us, comes out for tours and programs (in-person and virtually!), and supports our work by generously donating. Your help makes all of what we do possible.

— Johns Hopkins, Baltimore Heritage

Announcing our New WYPR Weekly Segment!

We are delighted to be partnering with WYPR 88.1 FM on a weekly radio segment called “Five Minutes of Baltimore History” hosted by our executive director, Johns Hopkins! Not all of Baltimore’s history is easy or straightforward, but all of it is important. Frederick Douglass escaped his enslavement from here; Holocaust survivor Gustav Brunn created Old Bay seasoning here; and William Walters gave the world Maryland rye whiskey (and gave us an art museum) from here. We hope you’ll join us each week to learn a little bit more about famous and not-so-famous people and events that continue to shape our city and our nation. To explore more of these stories, check out our Five Minute Histories videos.

The segment will begin airing on Tuesday, November 4, and can be heard on WYPR at 4:44 p.m. In addition to the radio broadcast, Five Minutes of Baltimore History will be available on demand at wypr.org and wherever you get your podcasts.