Category: Tours

Our Mount Vernon “Love Stories” tours are back!

Valentine’s Day would not be the same in Baltimore without our annual tour of jilted suitors, star-crossed lovers, and European royalty in historic Mount Vernon. Make a date and join tour guide and Baltimore historian Jamie Hunt on Sunday, February 12 for a wonderful walk through Mount Vernon. We’re running two identical tours, the first at 11:00 am and the second at 1:00 pm.

Plus, as we inch closer to those warmer days of spring, we are putting the final touches on our 2017 Monumental City and Baltimore by Foot tours. Watch out for details coming soon!

Exterior view of Hampton Mansion

Discover the story of America at Hampton Mansion

We hope you can join us on January 26 at Hampton Mansion. In 1948, the federal government designated this eighteenth century manor a National Historic Site and, in 2017, the building remains one of the highest regarded examples of Georgian architecture in the country. We are thrilled that Ms. Gregory Weidman, the mansion’s head curator, is leading our tour.

Are you interested in our Lexington Market and catacombs tours but frustrated that you have been stuck on a waitlist? Our tour coordinator Marsha Wise is working with the market management to schedule monthly Saturday morning tours into the spring. Look out for an announcement when registration opens!

If you’re curious about what’s going on with archaeology in Baltimore, please join the Archaeology Society of Maryland for a presentation on the Herring Run Archaeology project on January 20.

Finally, we could not be more pleased to share the news that one of our longest running preservation priorities, Baltimore’s Hebrew Orphan Asylum, took a big step towards a better future. The Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development recently awarded the Coppin Heights Community Development Corporation a grant to purchase the building from the University of Maryland University System. We plan to keep you updated as we continue to work to restore this fantastic building as an asset to the Greater Rosemont community.

Kick off 2017 with two Behind the Scenes Tours

Happy New Year! We are ready to ring in 2017 with some great new Baltimore Behind the Scenes tours.

On Tuesday, January 10, we’ll go backstage at the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall to learn about acoustical design, music legends, and the history of the Symphony Hall and the Meyerhoff family. On our tour, we will walk the stage and explore the basement, music library, and the area where the musicians hang out before the show.

On Saturday, February 4, we’re visiting the 150-year-old Manger Packing Corporation in southwest Baltimore to learn about the tradition of sausage making and Baltimore’s German heritage from Alvin Manger, great-grandson of the company’s founder and current patriarch of the Manger family’s business.

Finally, please join our statewide partner Preservation Maryland on Wednesday, January 4 for a town hall meeting to learn about how you can advocate for preservation during this year’s Maryland Legislative session. The meeting is at Union Mill (1500 Union Avenue) at 6:30 pm. Registration is not required!

I hope your new year is starting off well and I hope you can join us for these and other tours in the year ahead.

Holiday tour treat at the U.S. Custom House

As we enter into the 2016 holiday season in earnest, we hope you can squeeze in one last heritage tour with us into your December: a peek inside the U.S. Custom House on Lombard Street. On Dec. 28, we’ll tour this fantastic building with its Beaux Arts architecture, fabulous call room, and elaborate nautical murals by noted artist Francis David Millet.

If you are looking for more ways to celebrate the holidays with historic sites in Baltimore, don’t miss the 31st Annual Union Square Christmas Cookie Tour on December 11 and the Snowflake Tour of Charles Village Homes on December 18. Each of these tours gives you the chance to get to know a historic Baltimore neighborhood while enjoying sweet treats!

We’ll take up our 2017 heritage tour season in January. Stay tuned and have a happy holiday.

Lexington Market Entrance

Don’t miss our 2016 fall lecture on the history of the National Park Service tomorrow night

Come out tomorrow for our 2016 Fall Lecture celebrating 100 years of the National Park Service. The talk by Ms. Joy Beasley, the Park Service’s Deputy Director for Cultural Resources, at the First Unitarian Church of Baltimore begins at 7:00 pm with a wine and cheese reception following. We hope you can join us to hear how the National Park Service has changed how it manages some of our country’s most precious cultural resources over the last century and what it is planning for the next one.

We also hope you can join us for two upcoming tours that explore Baltimore landmarks in new ways. This Sunday, we will journey from artists in the present working in metal, paper and plastic to artists in the past who sculpted intricate marble funeral markers. Our two-part tour starts at Open Works in a historic Railway Express warehouse before crossing the street for a tour of Green Mount Cemetery with Baltimore historian Wayne Schaumburg.

On November 19, we will get an insider’s look at Lexington Market with market manager Stacey Pack to learn about recent changes and plans for the future of this iconic space. Along the tour, we will talk with the owners of Faidley’s, Berger’s, Konstant’s Candy, and other vendors that have been in their stalls for one hundred years or more. We will also go down and explore the catacombs under the marketplace, getting a first-hand look at these mysterious spaces that are normally closed to the public.