Maryland - Day 16 - Baltimore

Cherry Hill Park
Saturday, 16 February 2019

David and Anna sent me a care package from Texas to this campground that included my mail and 2 Valentines and - best of all - a loaf of Pecan Bread from the Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana!  Most wonderful stuff in the world.  For those who don't know, that bakery is known worldwide for its fruitcakes and has received mail addressed to "Fruit Cake, Texas."  Now, Texas has its share of fruit cakes (of various types), but this little bakery is IT.  And its Pecan Bread is my favorite.  Hard to beat my luck in having such a thoughtful family.

today's route

I was still a little tired from yesterday's drive, but tomorrow's forecast includes possible snow so I figured I'd better take advantage of today's non-snow to go see things.  Baltimore has quite a few places I'd like to visit so the challenge was to come up with an itinerary that was possible but not punitive.

My main goal was the Baltimore Museum of Industry, and I'd charted a route that would at least take me past several other places, even if I was too tired to check them out.  But it turns out that Baltimore is only a half hour or so away from the campground so I got to the Museum an hour before it opened.  I decided to run by the other places while I waited.

National Visionary Art Museum
I'd never heard of this place but the outside is so lighthearted, it made me wish I had the time and energy to visit.  That Christmas tree on the right is still there - it's not just a seasonal thing.  This building is in an area that's part industrial and part condo/apartment, with glimpses through the buildings of Baltimore's Inner Harbor.  And then, suddenly, this amazing building.  This is an internet photo.

USS Constitution

Old Ironsides

It really wasn't possible for me to just stop to take a photo - even at 9:00 there was a lot of traffic.  Baltimore is full of one-way streets (traps for the unwary) and sudden commands to turn left only when I didn't want to turn left.

But I was lucky and got a red light right in a place where I could get almost this exact view of the ship (this is another internet photo).  This ship was launched in 1797 and is still able to sail under its own power.   wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Constitution   This web page explains all about the ship and its history.  That's not a reproduction, as I'd expected given its age, but instead the original ship.  The wiki page says it's usually berthed in Boston, but the ship's museum says this is the original here in Baltimore.

I next tried to find the Babe Ruth Museum and Camden Yards and had fairly detailed directions.  Unfortunately, I turned on the wrong street and ended up on my way back to College Park on a high speed highway for miles before I could find a way to get off.  That really shook me up (I'm still feeling the effects of that stupid bridge from yesterday) so when I got back to the industry museum, I counted myself lucky and parked.  The dogs were happy, anyway, because I took them for a walk.

Baltimore Museum of Industry

explains the crane

crane from Bethlehem Steel's repair dock

In my crane photo, the museum is on the right, and the parking lot exit is through the crane's uprights.  A little intimidating.

The museum extols the extraordinary energy and creativity that has come from the city of Baltimore over the years, and it's even more interesting than I'd expected.


Just inside the entrance is an introduction to the factors that brought about this vibrant history.

Past these signs are others that talk about the history of canning to preserve food, a history that seems to center on Baltimore.  All the following information is from the museum.

At the beginning of the 1800's food was preserved by sealing glass jars with cork and tar.  By the 1820s the jars were being replaced with tin-plated canisters ("cans") that were made by hand.  A skilled laborer could make 60 cans/day.  In the 1840s and '50s, can makers were gradually being replaced by machines that made up to 1,500/day.  By the 1880s, the industry was fully automated, despite protests and strikes from preempted can makers.

In the 1850s Baltimorean Isaac Solomon appropriated Sir Humphrey Davy's idea of adding calcium chloride (salt) to water, which raised the boiling point to 240°.  This allowed the cooking time of oysters (the prime food product of the region at the time) to go from 5-6 hours down to 30-40 minutes.  Although this innovation increased production, the process was still something of an art, requiring skilled laborers.

an original retort with cans

That situation changed in 1874 when Baltimorean Andrew Shriver invented a steam retort that allowed cooking time to be standardized.  From there, the food processing industry exploded.  Baltimore, on the edge of farming country, received truckloads of fresh vegetables that were processed, in addition to the boatloads of oysters and other seafood from the Bay.

Usually the cannery workers were immigrant women and children or black men who weren't hired for more prestigious jobs.  The museum had many photographs of the canneries and workers, showing they were the ones peeling the tomatoes, snapping the beans, shucking the oysters and packing them in cans - no machines.  The workers said the smell in the packing plants could get pretty bad.  (No kidding.)

Baltimore Firsts:
▫  The first umbrella factory in the US was founded in 1828 in Baltimore; by the 1900s Baltimore was the umbrella capital of the world

Baltimore umbrella factory

▫ Baltimore was home to the first gas company in the US (1816).

▫ The Stieff Sterling Co., founded in 1892 in Baltimore, was the oldest continually operating silver co. in the US until its closing in 1999.  In 1939 it was chosen to recreate 18th century silver for Colonial Williamsburg.

▫ The B&O Railroad (1827) was the first railroad to be built in the US and the first to carry paying passengers.  It ran from Baltimore to the Ohio River at Wheeling, WV, and was the first to connect the Atlantic Ocean and the Ohio River.  It was 380 miles of double track, and cost 25 years and $30 million to build.

Crown Cork bottle cap

▫ The modern bottle cap was invented and first made by William Painter, a Baltimore machinist, maker of the Crown Cork; he said inventing the capping machine was harder than inventing the cap.

▫ The Bendix Radio Co. had a number of firsts all by themselves.

▫ Maryland Paper Products, in its Sweetheart brand division, created individually wrapped "sanitary" paper straws and became the world's largest producer.

▫ In 1897 the first practical modern submarine was launched in Baltimore; its design was based on the Nautilus in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

▫ The Black & Decker Co. was founded in 1910 in Baltimore; in 1916 it produced the first portable ½" electric drill.  This drill was used extensively in WWII, helping make Rosie the Riveter famous and Black+Decker™ a post-war household name.

 

▫ In 1910, mercurochrome was invented in Baltimore.  It got me through my childhood but has apparently recently fallen into disrepute.   https://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-mercurochrome.htm  Sad.

▫ In 1939 Westinghouse (after it moved to Baltimore from Pittsburgh) developed radar which was used in WWII to warn of enemy planes; it detected the oncoming Japanese planes at Pearl Harbor, but the higher-ups thought they knew better and ignored it.  In 1953 they developed doppler radar which is the basis for all today's airborne radar.

▫ In 1950, a Baltimorean created the world's first aluminum ski. 

▫ These photos illustrate some of the other firsts for Baltimore.

I was in the museum for more than an hour and a half and passed up several exhibits because I didn't want to leave the critters much longer, and anyway it was lunchtime.  I couldn't have imagined one city would be able to produce so much inventiveness.

The sign explains that this cupola was for years on a grand piano factory here, and from 1869 to 1930s the pianos were sent all over the world for such musicians as Tchaikovsky, Puccini and Rubinstein.

From the museum parking lot where we ate lunch I had a good view of this Domino Sugars sign, though this isn't my photo.  Apparently this factory is still functioning here.

The parking lot is also used by people with sailboats docked here.  I was surprised to see the first, and then the second arrive and don protective clothing, but they kept coming.  I'll bet I saw a dozen people altogether head for the boats while I was there - and this was a very cold, windy day with no sun to speak of.  Those Baltimoreans are hardy folks.

On the way out of town I drove by Camden Yards, mostly because it wasn't very far from the museum.  I guess it's lucky it isn't baseball season because the streets here are fairly narrow.  (It's the Camden neighborhood.)

Camden Yards

On the way back to the campground I took a slight detour past Laurel Racecourse.  They had horseracing today, and I'd have liked to stop off for a bit but parking was a tricky and anyway I was tired.  Opened in 1911, it's owned by the Maryland Jockey Club, founded 1743, the oldest sporting organization in America.  These folks also own Pimlico Racecourse, opened in 1870 and host of the Preakness.

It felt like a long day but I was glad to be able to dodge winter weather and see as much of Baltimore as I did.