Join our esteemed guide Dr. Ralph Brown on a Memorial Weekend roll past a few of the highlights of the Monumental City as we remember to soldiers sailors, men and women who have served in wars throughout Baltimore history.
Category: Tours
Historic Clubs & Cocktails! Join us for a walking tour and happy hour at the Hamilton Street Club on May 31
Established in 1925, the Hamilton Street Club occupies a pre-1820 townhouse in a row designed by early Baltimore architect Robert Carey Long, Sr. – also the architect for the Peale Museum and Davidge Hall. Among Baltimore’s private social clubs, Hamilton Street has a reputation for both intellectual conversation and irreverence. It is a place where, as Francis F. Beirne recounted in The Amiable Baltimoreans, “anybody could say what he pleased and talk as long as he pleased but nobody was required to listen.”
The club’s popularity among by local writers, as well as journalists and editors from the Baltimore Sun, led long-time club president and owner of the Victor G. Bloede Chemical Co. William W. Woollcott to remark, “Here I am, the only businessman in the club, surrounded by parasites.” Join us at the club on May 31 for food, drinks and great conversation with fellow preservationists, including a chance to meet a few of the club’s long-time members.
Bonus! Walking Tour of Mt. Vernon’s Historic Clubs
Work up a thirst before the happy hour with a quick stroll through the history of private social clubs in Mt. Vernon. On a short walk from Mt. Vernon Place to the happy hour, we’ll share stories of Confederate sympathizers, tireless social reformers, and the most serious of university scholars from the neighborhood’s private social clubs from past and present. The tour begins at 6:00pm in the north park of Mt. Vernon Place by Charles and Madison Streets.
Eat your way through Baltimore’s Old Chinatown
Behind the Scenes Tour of Old Chinatown
Saturday June 1, 2013 from 4:15 pm to 6:30 pm
RSVP Today!
$45 members / $55 non-members
Includes sampling of international food from several restaurants
Limit of 10 people
Beginning in the 1870s, Chinese settlers started arriving in Baltimore from California and other West Coast states. Most had worked as laborers for the transcontinental railroad that was completed in 1869 and came east looking for jobs and to escape a rising level of persecution. In Baltimore near Lexington Market, the immigrants established places of worship (Joss houses), laundries, gambling houses, and restaurants. The original “Chinatown” was in the 200 block of Marion Street and even included a school for 40 children. Baltimore’s Chinatown was relocated to Park Avenue during an urban renewal effort in the 1950s and achieved its peak in the years preceding President Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972. Today the area has a number of shops and restaurants featuring international cuisine, including of course Chinese.
Please join us and our guide, Ms. Sharon Reuter, on a walking and eating tour that will follow Baltimore’s Chinese immigrants through historic Chinatown along Park Avenue to the present-day hodgepodge of ethnic eateries. The tour will include sampling dishes from Vietnamese/Thai, Ethiopian, and of course Chinese restaurants. It will also include learning about this once-bustling two-block area in the heart of downtown Baltimore and finding out what happened to the vigorous Chinese community and its many restaurants that once inhabited the area and which newer immigrants have since opened restaurants nearby.
The tour will provide an early dinner with a menu of vegetables, legumes, beef, shrimp, pork and duck dishes, along with water, tea and a bottle of Chinese beer. Vegetarian options, with or without shellfish, are available with advance notice. I hope you can join us! Johns
Tiffany, tile work and more: historic church tour with authors Sally Johnston and Lois Zanow
In their recent book “Monuments to Heaven,” historians and authors Sally Johnston and Lois Zanow describe the architecture, art and history of many historic houses of worship in Baltimore. Please join us on a tour with Ms. Johnston and Ms. Zanow to learn about the stained glass windows, lovely mosaic tile work, and great history of two of the city’s most impressive churches: Corpus Christi-Jenkins Memorial Church and Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church. The churches are a short walk apart in the Bolton Hill neighborhood.
Behind the Scenes Tour of Corpus Christi and Brown Memorial Churches
Wednesday, May 15, 2013 from 5:30 to 6:30 pm
Meet at Corpus Christi Church: 110 W. Lafayette Ave., Baltimore 21217
RSVP today. $10 members | $20 non-members
Corpus Christi Memorial Church was built in 1891 in memory of Thomas and Louisa Jenkins by their children. Their goal was to build the most exquisite church in Baltimore. Patrick Keeley, the foremost architect of Catholic churches in his day, designed the building. The interior, designed by John Hardman & Company of London, glitters and glows with colorful mosaics accented with gold tessera, stained glass windows and a high vaulted ceiling with clerestory windows. Famous for its large Florentine style mosaics adorning the chancel, Corpus Christi also has smaller mosaic Stations of the Cross as well as a charming mosaic depicting the founding of Maryland. There are four chapels and a baptistery which boast gold mosaic ceilings, marble walls, statues of saints and stained glass windows.
Just one block from Corpus Christi is Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church, built in memory of George Brown in 1870 by his wife Isabella Brown. The church was designed by Nathaniel Hutton and John Murdoch, and the stunning interior has 17 stained glass windows including 12 Tiffany windows, making it one of the world’s largest and finest collections of stained glass. The two largest windows measure 16″ by 32″ and are the largest windows the Tiffany Studios ever made. The chancel has a five part window in the medieval style by the Wilbur Burnham Studios. Without interior columns, there is an unobstructed view of these glorious windows.
I hope you can join us to learn about these wonderful churches and their artwork.
Spring is here and Looking Up Downtown is back at the Baltimore Farmer’s Market
Spring has arrived and our popular Looking Up Downtown Tours are back. This Sunday is your chance to discover a piece of the Berlin Wall in downtown Baltimore, stumble upon a War of 1812 cannon ball, and catch a glimpse of the noble lions, hellish fiends, and neo-Egyptian sphinxes that call the buildings downtown home! With our quick 75-minute guided walking tour you will learn about the architecture and the history of downtown Baltimore. Our route winds through a yard of the early 19th century Zion Lutheran Church, past Baltimore City Hall to pay a visit to the proud survivors of Baltimore’s Great 1904 Fire and return right back where we start at the Baltimore Farmer’s Market!
Looking Up Downtown – Gargoyles & More!
Sunday, April 7, 9:30am to 10:45am
Tours continue twice a month on the first and third Sunday from April through November.
Meet at the Baltimore Farmers’ Market – at the Hollywood Diner, N. Holliday and S. Saratoga Streets
RSVP online today! $5 for adults. Children under 16 are free!
