Baltimore Heritage

Mount Vernon Place: A Monumental City Tour
2024-07-28 09:30 - 10:30, 2024-08-25 09:30 - 10:30, 2024-09-22 09:30 - 10:30 (America/New_York) | Washington Monument (South Entrance), 699 N. Charles Street, Baltimore, MD, 21201, United States
Mount Vernon began as a country estate for Revolutionary War hero John Eager Howard and grew to be the place to live for Baltimore’s rich and famous in the mid-nineteenth century. The Garrett family, owners of the B&O Railroad, the Walters, founders of the Walters Art Museum, and the Thomases, owners of Mercantile Bank, are among the families that built handsome mansions along the four parks that surround the Washington Monument. Join us on a tour to hear the stories behind the landmarks of Baltimore’s grandest historic neighborhood.
Our Monumental City tours are guided walks exploring iconic Baltimore landmarks in Federal Hill, Downtown, Mount Vernon and Ridgely’s Delight on the first four Sundays of each month from April through November, except holiday weekends.

Historic Clifton Mansion
2024-08-03 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-08-21 17:30 - 18:30, 2024-09-25 17:30 - 18:30 | Clifton Mansion, 2701 Saint Lo Drive, Baltimore, MD, 21218, United States
Join us for a tour inside Clifton Mansion, the unique Italianate country house that has overlooked Baltimore City for over 200 years! At one time the summer home of War of 1812 captain Henry Thompson and then philanthropist Johns Hopkins, the story of Clifton Estate is one about two prominent businessmen, enslaved & free Black people, and more. You’ll see the latest restorations made possible by the Friends of Clifton Mansion and Civic Works. You will also be invited into unrestored spaces that are brimming with stories to tell! And the tour wouldn’t be complete without climbing the tower and taking in one-of-a-kind views of Clifton Park and our surrounding city. We hope to see you there.

Out of the Ashes: The Great Baltimore Fire of 1904
2024-08-04 09:30 - 10:30, 2024-10-06 09:30 - 10:30 | The Replica Gaslight, 300 E Baltimore St, Baltimore, MD, 21202, United States
In February 1904, Baltimore’s chief firefighter cabled Washington DC: “Desperate fire here. Must have help at once!” A tremendous fire was sweeping through downtown and showed little signs of stopping. Not until 5:00 p.m. the next day was the fire brought under control. Overall, it destroyed 1500 buildings, left 35,000 people unemployed, and damaged $150 million of property. Resilient Baltimore rebounded quickly, erecting new buildings, widening streets, and improving fire safety designs. Rising out of the ashes, Baltimore used the fire to rethink the city, and the downtown we know today is shaped largely by this incident. Join us on this walking tour as we see what 2500 degrees Fahrenheit heat can do to blocks of solid stone, learn how the fire shaped architecture locally and across the country, and hear the tale of one of the fire’s great heroes: Goliath the horse.
Our Monumental City tours are guided walks exploring iconic Baltimore landmarks in Downtown, Ridgely’s Delight, Mount Vernon and Federal Hill on the first four Sundays of each month from April through November, except holiday weekends.

Hampden History Bar Crawl
2024-08-10 15:00 - 16:30 | Atomic Books, 3620 Falls Rd, Baltimore, Maryland, 21211
On August 10, join us on a pleasant stroll through historic Hampden to learn about many of the local bars in the neighborhood! We’ll also delve into our city’s long and beloved relationship with local bars and the changes brought about during the tumultuous Prohibition era. We’ll stop at a beer garden where we will sample some locally-brewed beer and then we will end at a former speakeasy tucked away on a residential street to quench our thirst one last time. We hope you’ll join us on August 10 for a brew-tiful walk around Hampden (ticket includes 2 beer samples).

Historic Ridgely’s Delight
2024-08-11 09:30 - 10:30, 2024-09-08 09:30 - 10:30 | Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum, 216 Emory Street, Baltimore, MD, United States
For a tiny neighborhood squeezed between the University of Maryland and Camden Yards, Ridgely’s Delight contains an oversized history. George Washington rode here and Babe Ruth was born here! Join us to walk the preserved, picturesque streets of one of the earliest neighborhoods in Baltimore while we look back at the stories of both its famous visitors and the ordinary Baltimoreans who worked and raised their families here.
Our Monumental City tours are guided walks exploring iconic Baltimore landmarks in Federal Hill, Downtown, and Ridgely’s Delight on the first three Sundays of each month from May through November, except holiday weekends.

Federal Hill Beyond the Views: A Monumental City Tour
2024-08-18 09:30 - 10:30, 2024-09-15 09:30 - 10:30 | Federal Hill Park (Southwest Corner), 301 Warren Avenue, Baltimore, MD, 21230, United States
Baltimoreans celebrated atop Federal Hill when we ratified the U.S. Constitution. We used it to defend the city from the British in the War of 1812 and to make sure we stayed in the Union in the Civil War. We have even tunnelled under it to quarry minerals. Join us on a tour of Federal Hill and the neighborhood around it to learn about this waterfront community’s rich history, including stops at one of the last wooden houses in the city, the oldest house in Federal Hill, and the wonderful alley houses along Churchill Street.
Our Monumental City tours are guided walks exploring iconic Baltimore landmarks in Federal Hill, Downtown, Mount Vernon and Ridgely’s Delight on the first four Sundays of each month from April through November, except holiday weekends.

A Walking Tour of East Baltimore’s Historic American Indian “Reservation”
2024-09-04 17:30 - 18:30 | South Broadway Baptist Church, 211 South Broadway, Baltimore, 21231, United States
The place now known as Baltimore, like the rest of what is now known as the United States, has always been home to Native peoples. Baltimore is part of the ancestral homelands of the Piscataway and the Susquehannock, and a diverse host of American Indian folks from other nations have passed through or lived here at different times — and still do! In the mid-twentieth century, thousands of Lumbee Indians and members of other tribal nations migrated to Baltimore City, seeking jobs and a better quality of life. They settled in Upper Fells Point and Washington Hill and created a vibrant, intertribal American Indian community, which they affectionately referred to as “the reservation,” in its heyday. In the decades since the community has gradually moved away from the area. Recent generations never experienced “the reservation” as such. Today, most Baltimoreans are surprised to learn that it ever existed. On September 4, join historian and artist Ashley Minner Jones to learn about places and spaces important to American Indian history and heritage in the city, with a focus on East Baltimore’s Historic American Indian “Reservation” in the 20th century.

Heart of Local Government: City Hall
2024-09-05 15:00 - 16:00 | Baltimore City Hall, 100 N. Holiday Street, Baltimore, MD, 21202, United States
Housing the offices of the Mayor and other officials, Baltimore City Hall is the heart of local government. Designed in a French Second Empire style, local leaders dedicated the new City Hall in October 1875. Architect George Frederick was only 21 when he won the design competition organized for project. The Baltimore City Hall may be Frederick’s claim to fame but he also designed Maryland’s Pavilion for Philadelphia Exposition, Baltimore City College, Hutzler’s Palace Building, and many more landmarks across the city. In an appropriate move for a bustling industrial city, the structure employed a good deal of cast iron, including the 227-foot tall dome designed by Wendel Bollman and cast by Bartlett, Robbins, and Company.
Our tour will cover architectural history, as well as Baltimore and city government history. In addition to the rotunda, we’ll venture into the building’s ceremonial room, the original mayor’s office, and the council chambers (as long as they are not in use). We’ll also witness close-up the prize-winning renovations that happened in the 1970s and saved City Hall from demolition. Peer behind the curtain and get an up close look at the architecture and renovations where our city’s leaders make some of their biggest decisions.

Historic Green Mount Cemetery
2024-09-07 09:30 - 11:30, 2024-09-14 09:30 - 11:30, 2024-10-05 09:30 - 11:30 | Green Mount Cemetery, 1501 Greenmount Ave, Baltimore, MD, 21202, United States
Inherited from the great Baltimore historian Wayne Schaumburg, join Baltimore Heritage to tour Baltimore’s historic Green Mount Cemetery.
Opened in 1839, Green Mount is an early example of an urban-rural cemetery, that is, a cemetery with a park-like setting located close to the countryside. Green Mount is the final resting place of some of Maryland’s most famous, and infamous, figures including Johns Hopkins, Enoch Pratt, William and Henry Walters, Mary Elizabeth Garrett, Betsy Patterson, A.S. Abell, John H. B. Latrobe, John Wilkes Booth, and Elijah Bond, who patented the Ouija Board!
Accessibility: Although there are some paved pathways, we will be walking over mostly uneven grassy terrain and cobblestones.

“Life Goes On:” The Legacy of Henrietta Lacks and Turner Station
2024-09-07 10:00 - 11:30 | Sollers Point Multi-Purpose Center, 323 Sollers Point Road, Dundalk, MD, 21222, United States
Don’t know who Henrietta Lacks was? Most of the world didn’t until about ten years ago. Mrs. Lacks is best recognized for her immortal cells, which scientists and doctors still use today to study the effects of toxins, drugs, hormones and viruses on people without experimenting on humans. Her cells helped create the HPV and polio vaccines. Yet it took some twenty-five years before the Lacks family received any knowledge of the important contribution of their beloved wife and mother. Please join us and the Henrietta Lacks Legacy Group for a walking tour of Turner Station in Dundalk, the last home of Henrietta Lacks, to hear about Henrietta, her family, and her life in Turner Station.
In 1951, Mrs. Lacks went to Johns Hopkins Hospital for treatment of cervical cancer. Without informing Mrs. Lacks, Hopkins doctors noticed that the removed cancer cells continued to grow in the lab. This marked the first instance of continuous growth of human cells outside the body. Henrietta died on October 4, 1951 from her cancer. She was 31 years old.
Doctors named her cells HeLa (from the first letters of her first and last names) and, without Lacks family approval, began sending them to laboratories around the world for research. Mrs. Lacks’ story weaves together important ethical and racial issues of the medical industrial complex, segregation, and the polarized economy of Baltimore. We are honored to be partnering with the Henrietta Lacks Legacy Group for this tour. Join guides Servant Speed and Adele Newson-Horst as we walk through Henrietta’s Turner Station community and learn about her incredible story.
Want to learn more about Henrietta Lacks?
The Double-Edged Helix” in Rolling Stone Magazine
“The Miracle of HeLa” in Ebony Magazine
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Jonestown & the Shot Tower: A Walking Tour
2024-09-07 10:00 - 11:30 | Carroll Mansion, 800 Lombard Street, Baltimore, MD, 21202, United States
Jonestown is one of Baltimore’s oldest and most historic neighborhoods. Both groundbreaking industry and vibrant communities have thrived here. On this tour, we will see the vestiges of its Eastern European Jewish residents as we pass Corned Beef Row. We hope you’ll join Baltimore Heritage and tour guide Bev Rosen as we stroll past a series of firsts: the McKim Free School, the city’s oldest education building from 1833, the Lloyd Street Synagogue, the first synagogue in Maryland and the third oldest in the country, and the 1808 home of Charles Carroll, the longest living signer of the Declaration of Independence. And of course, what is a visit to Jonestown without a stop at the iconic Phoenix Shot Tower, which until 1846 was the tallest building in the country!

Creating the Foundations of The Movement: Baltimore’s Civil Rights Bus Tour
2024-09-14 10:00 - 12:00 | 211 N. Paca St, Baltimore, MD 21201, 211 N Paca St, Baltimore, MD, 21201, United States
Baltimore has an incredible history of Civil Rights activism. Join us on this bus tour to explore neighborhoods like Marble Hill, which gave rise to some of the fundamental pillars of the Civil Rights Movement. We will discover how luminaries like Juanita Jackson Mitchell, Thurgood Marshall, and our late congressman, Elijah Cummings, were at the forefront of the fight for equality for Black citizens. We’ll see sites of demonstrations against Jim Crow laws in Druid Hill Park and department stores near Lexington Market, as well as the homes of activists who waged legal battles against racist housing laws in West Baltimore. We’ll discuss the efforts to end segregation in schools and the work of Black suffragists to gain the right to vote. We hope you’ll join us to see how the incredible organizing of people like Lillie Carroll Jackson and Rev. Harvey Johnson promoted Civil Rights not just for Baltimoreans, but for Americans across the nation.

Students are free

This tour will start and end near Lexington Market. This tour will be two-hours long with one stop where we disembark the bus and walk two blocks. There will be an option to stay on the bus and receive the same information as the walking portion. There are bathrooms for use before the tour at Lexington Market.

This project has been financed in part with funds from the Charles A. and Lois H. Miller Foundation and State funds from the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority, an instrumentality of the State of Maryland. However, project contents or opinions do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority.

The Catacombs Under Westminster: Two Hundred Years of Tombs and Edgar Allan Poe’s Gravesite
2024-09-14 11:00 - 12:00, 2024-09-29 11:00 - 12:00 | Westminster Hall and Burying Ground, 519 W Fayette Street, Baltimore, MD, 21201, United States
Join us to explore the eerie catacombs underneath Baltimore’s First Presbyterian Church, now called Westminster Hall, and the graves that surround it, including the final resting place of Edgar Allan Poe. The burial ground predates the church, which was built on arches above the gravesites, so that the graveyard and its tombstones lie both underneath and around the building. We bet you will also recognize more than a few Baltimore street names as we walk among the patriots and civic leaders buried at Westminster including Calhoun, Hollins, Gilmore, and Bentalou. All told, the compact cemetery next to the University of Maryland School of Law is the final resting place for over 1,000 individuals. We can’t wait to see you “Where Baltimore’s History Rests in Peace!”

A Mouthful of History: The Museum of Dentistry
2024-09-18 17:00 - 18:00 | 31 S Greene St, Baltimore, MD 21201
On September 18, join us at the Dr. Samuel D. Harris National Museum of Dentistry to discover the past, present, and future of dentistry!
Located on the site of the University of Maryland’s first “Dental Infirmary and Laboratory Building,” and housed in the University’s second Dental School building erected in 1903, the National Museum of Dentistry is located at the heart of the University System of Maryland’s founding campus in Baltimore and at the epicenter of the beginnings of professional dentistry.
The museum has an extensive 40,000 object collection of dental instruments and equipment, including George Washington’s dentures, Queen Victoria’s dental instruments, and the world’s only tooth jukebox! It is one of the largest and oldest collections in the world related to dentistry. If you are curious about the often-overlooked history hidden behind your smile and the scientists, tradesmen, and professionals that have shaped the field throughout history, join us on this exclusive after-hours tour!

A Road Wars Tour of Fell's Point
2024-09-21 11:00 - 12:00 | 802 South Ann, Baltimore, MD 21231, 802 South Ann, Baltimore, 21231, United States
Imagine an interstate highway barreling through Fell’s Point–loud trucks, smog, and restricted access to the water. Luckily we only have to imagine, but it was almost a reality. Join us on September 21 for the ultimate insider’s guide to who-what-where-and-how historic Fell’s Point was protected from destruction. Get to know the no-name outsiders and activists that defeated the insiders and the powerful to save this vibrant and historic waterfront community. The walking tour will be conducted by Evans Paull, author of Stop the Road, Stories from the Trenches of Baltimore’s Road Wars and Joe McNeely, the first director of Southeast Community Organization (SECO). Joe was active in Southeast Council Against the Road (SCAR), and one of the brave squatters that occupied Fell’s Point houses and prevented their decline while the Road Fight dragged on. We hope to see you on September 21 to hear about this scrappy underdog saga!

Mount Vernon Place Plein Air Art Show 2024
2024-09-22 13:00 - 16:00 | Engineers Club / Garrett Jacobs Mansion, 11 West Mount Vernon Place, Baltimore, MD, 21201, United States
The best of Baltimore’s history and art come together on September 22 at one of Baltimore’s most spectacular historic places: the Garrett-Jacobs Mansion. This spring and summer, artists from the Mid-Atlantic Plein Air Painters Association brought their easels to Mount Vernon Place to capture its magnificent history, landscapes and architecture. On Sunday, September 22, we’ll have nearly 100 original paintings of Mount Vernon Place on display and for sale.
We hope you will join us for a chance to see…and take home!…great art by local artists capturing our city in its finest light. Doors open at 1:00 pm and the event will end at 4:00 pm.
Online registration encouraged! Tickets will increase to $20 for purchase at the door.
The event is a partnership between Baltimore Heritage, the Garrett-Jacobs Mansion Endowment Fund, and the Mount Vernon Place Conservancy.

For Sponsors: We’re looking for sponsors in the following categories

$200 (Pissaro Sponsor) – will fund an artist prize in a category of your choice.
$500 (Matisse Sponsor) – will provide lunch for the 30 participating artists.
$1000 (Monet Sponsor) – will fund reception costs for 50 of a goal of 100 guests.

Become a Sponsor Today!

Bmore Historic 2024
2024-09-27 08:00 - 17:00 | Baltimore Museum of Industry, 1415 Key Hwy, Baltimore, MD, 21230, United States
Bmore Historic is a participant-led unconference at the Baltimore Museum of Industry for scholars, students, professionals and volunteers who care about public history, historic preservation and cultural heritage in the Baltimore region. Free light breakfast and lunch provided. Students are free!
As always, Bmore Historic is a unique opportunity to spend a day with friends, neighbors, and colleagues interested in exploring the connections between people, places and the past in Baltimore and Maryland. Bmore Historic is a place where many kinds of participation are welcoming: enthusiastic speaking out and careful listening; practicing hands-on skills and struggling with big issues. Expect thoughtful conversations but no academic papers or boring slideshows.
Please come out and explore how we can build on our community’s cultural heritage to create a better future for all people in our region. If you have never participated in an unconference, please read our Bmore Historic 101 guide to learn more.
Bmore Historic is organized by Baltimore Heritage and a team of volunteers. Special thanks to Hopkins Retrospective, The Maryland Center for History & Culture, UMBC Orser Center, UMBC Dresher Center for the Humanities, UMBC Public Humanities, UMBC Shriver Center, and the UMBC Department of History for supporting Bmore Historic in 2024.

Doors Open Baltimore 2024 Kick Off Event
2024-10-02 18:00 - 19:00
Baltimore Architecture Foundation and Baltimore Heritage are shaking up the Doors Open kick-off event. Join us for a casual evening of storytelling showcasing a variety of voices, perspectives, and special places in Baltimore as we take our letter writing campaign to the stage in the inaugural Love Letters Live!
Hosted by the Hotel Ulysses in their new event space, Swann House, the event will include light fare and wine.
RSVPs appreciated but not required! RSVP here.
Speakers will be listed soon!

Scottish Rite Temple Tour
2024-10-03 17:00 - 18:00 | 3800 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21218, 3800 North Charles Street, Baltimore, 21218, United States
When the Scottish Rite Masons set out to build a new building in the 1920s, they dreamt big. They hired the nationally prominent architect John Russell Pope as a consultant (Pope designed the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Baltimore Museum of Art around the corner) and the ground breaking ceremony on May 1, 1930 included officiating with the gavel used by President George Washington at the Masonic groundbreaking of the U.S. Capitol building. The Italian Renaissance temple at the corner of Charles and 39th Streets includes an exterior of Indiana limestone with 10 columns 34 feet high, solid bronze doors that measure 14 by 18 feet, and an interior with gray marble wainscot and a black marble base. The Great Depression that had begun six months before unfortunately put a crimp on some of the grandest plans, but the 1100-seat auditorium that sits under a 60-ft. domed ceiling still could boast to be the largest auditorium south of New York when it was built. Please join us on a tour of the building and its Masonic elements.

Victorian-Era Seton Hill: A Walking Tour
2024-10-05 11:00 - 12:30 | Howard Street Dog Park, 310 W Centre Street, Baltimore, 21201, United States
Baltimore’s Seton Hill neighborhood, once known as the city’s French Quarter, has a rich nineteenth-century history. On this walking tour through the beautiful old streets of Seton Hill, we will explore the surviving traces and look for the ghosts of the Victorian city. Come join historian Emma Katherine Bilski to step off the beaten path and hear stories of this neighborhood, including Baltimore’s Black Catholic history, student “pranks and misdemeanors,” the real history of Baltimore’s asylums, and the human history of America’s oldest Gothic Revival masterpiece.
Accessibility: We will be walking over some uneven grassy terrain and paving stones in addition to city sidewalks, and the tour will cover approximately 1.5 miles.
