Category: Preservation

Bittersweet news for the Poe House

This fall has been bittersweet for Baltimore’s Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum. In November, the Poe House was honored by the Maryland Office of Tourism with a 2010 tourism award for its “Nevermore 2009” campaign. The year-long tribute to Poe’s 200th birthday generated $1.9 million in advertising equivalency, over 400 printed articles, and sold out events with people coming from as far away as Europe and Asia.

Unfortunately this fall the Poe House also received news that Baltimore City has decided to no longer provide funding for the city-owned museum. The museum’s sole staff member, director Jeff Jerome, had worked through Baltimore’s Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation (CHAP) for nearly three decades. The museum and CHAP are now working to find a solution to keep the building open. They have put out a request for proposals to hire a consultant to develop an operating and financial plan for the long-term sustainability of the museum. The deadline for submissions is in early December and CHAP expects to bring on the consultant in early January 2011.

Congratulations to Preservation Maryland Award Winners!

Baltimore Heritage 50th Anniversary Celebration

On November 16, 2010, Preservation Maryland, our statewide historic preservation organization, honored long-time Baltimore Heritage board member and executive director of the Baltimore Chapter of the American Institute of Architects Karen Lewand with a volunteer award for her work. Ms. Lewand has been an active Baltimore Heritage board member for 27 years.

Among other significant accomplishments, she began Baltimore’s first tour series to explore historic neighborhoods around the city, a popular program Baltimore Heritage continues to this day, and she led an effort to write and publish histories of Baltimore’s neighborhoods. Ms. Lewand is a former commissioner of the Baltimore Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation (CHAP) and was a founder of the state-wide smart growth organization 1000 Friends of Maryland. As the director of AIA Baltimore, Ms. Lewand has led the growth of that organization, including bringing a spotlight to the city’s architecture through an annual architecture week program that has now turned into a month-long series of lectures and events. The next time you see Ms. Lewand, please congratulate her on a much-deserved award.

The 2010 Preservation Maryland award winners also include John L. Graham, III, AIA of Salisbury who received the President’s Award for his architectural work and volunteer historic preservation efforts on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Eddie and Sylvia Brown of Brown Capital Management and the Brownstone Project received the Stewardship Award for projects including Baltimore’s iconic Bromo Seltzer Tower. Finally, Preservation Maryland’s inaugural Phoenix Award went to Humanim, Inc. for their radical transformation of the long abandoned American Brewery into an asset for East Baltimore as Humanim’s workforce development center. Congratulations to all of this year’s award winners and to Preservation Maryland for another successful year supporting historic preservation in Maryland!

Good news for friends of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum

On October 28, the National Park Service officially added the Asylum to the National Register of Historic Places and is featuring the building as the “Weekly Highlight” on the National Register homepage. We were pleased to work with Coppin State University, the building’s owner, to draft and submit the nomination and want to thank all of you who have supported our work.

To stay informed about the Hebrew Orphan Asylum and its future, please become a fan on our new Friends of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum page on Facebook. We would also like to ask you to help us continue our work on the Asylum and in revitalizing historic West Baltimore by supporting Baltimore Heritage. Please consider donating $20 towards our work. It’s tax deductible and we’ll be glad to add you to our email list to find out about our monthly Behind the Scenes tours, spring neighborhood walking tours, and other programs across the city.

Thank you so much for all of your interest and help in preserving this irreplaceable Baltimore landmark. We look forward to sharing more good news in the weeks and months ahead.

October CHAP Hearing Update: Edmondson Avenue Historic District

2400 block of West Lafayette Avenue within the proposed Edmondson Avenue Historic District.

This month’s edition in our new monthly series highlighting the hearing agenda for the Baltimore Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation is an opportunity for us to share a bit about our own work on the proposed Edmondson Avenue National Register Historic Historic District. In partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Baltimore Heritage has been working in West Baltimore to establish new historic districts and enable home-owners in West Baltimore to access the state Sustainable Communities Tax Credit Program. With support from the Evergreen Protective Association, the Bridgeview/Greenlawn Neighborhood Improvement Association, the Alliance of Rosemont Community Organizations and West Baltimore MARC TOD, Inc. we have nominated nearly 1700 properties in West Baltimore to the National Register of Historic Places.

The neighborhoods within the proposed historic district have a rich architectural legacy including handsome daylight rowhouses, graceful Gothic churches, and well-built schools. In addition, this proposed designation recognizes the important social history of Greater Rosemont as a middle-class African American community that successfully resisted displacement from the threat of the “Highway to Nowhere” in the 1960s and 1970s. You can download a draft copy of the National Register of Historic Places nomination form here (PDF) or take a look at our photos from the Edmondson Avenue Historic District up on Flickr.

Other items on the CHAP Agenda include a concept review for a proposed addition to 524 South Hanover Street within the Otterbein Historic District and a continuation of last month’s discussion on the Mount Vernon Place Restoration Master Plan.

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Thank you for your support for Baltimore’s Hebrew Orphan Asylum

This Place Matters: Baltimore's Hebrew Orphan Asylum

The results of the This Place Matters Community Challenge are in and the Hebrew Orphan Asylum landed in the top 10! With 1563 votes we came in 9th place out of 108 contenders nationwide. Congratulations to the winner–the Historic Paramount Theatre in Austin, TX–and thank you to everyone who voted in support of the building.

Special thanks to the Jewish Museum of Maryland, the Coppin Heights CDC, and Coppin State University for joining us in this effort. We also appreciated the great stories from Tim Tooten at WBAL (video), Jacques Kelly at the Baltimore Sun, the Baltimore Jewish Times, as well as posts on Baltimore Brew and the Baltidome Blog. Friends and neighbors–including the Alliance of Rosemont Community Organizations, the Baltimore National Heritage Area, the Baltimore Red Line, the Evergreen Protective Association, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, Temple Oheb Shalom, and Preservation Maryland–generously helped to spread the word across the city.

Although we did not win the $25,000 prize, your support for Baltimore’s Hebrew Orphan Asylum has affirmed our shared commitment to continue the hard work ahead, to preserve the Hebrew Orphan Asylum and restore the building to its historic role as an asset to the community. In the next few weeks, we will follow up with everyone who voted to offer a few suggestions on how you may be able to stay involved with the work to preserve this rare Baltimore landmark.