Baltimore is the largest city in the US state of Maryland, but
not its capital (that's Annapolis). The city is notorious as a
socio-economic hotspot with high rates of violent crime, but
also offers visitors a number of very attractive attractions
such as B. one of the most beautiful inner-city ports in the
USA.
British settlement in what is now the Baltimore
metropolitan area began in the 17th century. At that time there
were very few Native Americans here. The Susquehannock who lived
in the Northeast only came here to hunt. In 1661, David Jones
settled where Jonestown is today. After tobacco cultivation
became more important in Maryland, the port of Baltimore was
founded in 1706 in what is now Locust Point. The Town of
Baltimore was founded in 1729. It was named after the
administrator of the Maryland colony, Cecil Calvert, second
Baron Baltimore (1605–1675). In the 18th century, Baltimore
gained further prominence as a storage place for the sugar grown
in the Caribbean.
In 1796/97 the Town of Baltimore became
the City of Baltimore, and in 1851 the city finally emancipated
itself from the surrounding county. There has been gas lighting
here since 1816. With the expansion of the Baltimore & Ohio
Railroad, the movement of goods was accelerated. Tobacco and
sugar cane declined in importance; in the early 19th century,
the city owed its wealth mainly to the timber industry,
shipbuilding and textile production. In 1844 the world's first
telegraph line opened between Baltimore and Washington. Workers'
uprisings broke out in Baltimore during the Great Depression of
1873-1879. In 1904, large parts of downtown fell victim to a
major fire.
In the 20th century - particularly in the
1950s and 1960s - hundreds of thousands of African Americans
moved to Baltimore. A push factor for this migration was the
miserable living conditions in the Deep South, and the pull
factor the low rents in the centers, because the white
population of cities like Baltimore discovered their preference
for living in leafy suburbs after the Second World War. Today,
nearly two-thirds of Baltimore's population is African American.
The Baltimore Riot broke out in April 1968 in response to the
assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Since then, the city
has recorded very high murder rates (1993: 344 murders, with a
population of around 100,000), with predominantly
African-American victims.
Efforts to redevelop the city
have been taking hold since the 1980s. The inner harbor and the
sports stadiums were the main attractions. The Port of Baltimore
is the second busiest in the Mid-Atlantic States after New
York/New Jersey. The city's largest employer is Johns Hopkins
University with its affiliated hospitals. However, the
socio-economic problems remain massive. So are e.g. B. 84% of
children attending public schools in Baltimore are poor enough
to qualify for concession or free dining. Almost a quarter of
the population lives below the poverty line.
Founded in 1916, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is one of the
major symphony orchestras in the United States of America. It gained an
international reputation under the direction of music director David
Zinman (1985 to 1998). It was during this period that a recording of
works for cello and orchestra by Samuel Barber and Benjamin Britten with
Yo-Yo Ma won the Grammy Awards in 1990 for "Best Solo Instrument
Performance with Orchestra". In 2007/2008, Marin Alsop took over the
baton of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, becoming the first woman in
history to direct a major US orchestra.
The city's problems
inspired Randy Newman to write his famous song Baltimore, which was also
interpreted in a German version by Nina Simone, Nils Lofgren and Udo
Lindenberg.
In the poem Incident by Countee Cullen, Baltimore is
mentioned as the place of a young boy's first encounter with
discrimination against black people.
The action of the musical
Hairspray, of which there are also two film versions (original from
1988; remake from 2007), takes place in Baltimore in 1962.
Baltimore was the home of the Baltimore Gun Club, which sent the first
humans to the moon in Jules Verne's novel From Earth to the Moon.
The critically acclaimed television series The Wire (2002–2008) is
set in Baltimore and describes Baltimore's high crime rate and social
problems.
Baltimore has been the location for films such as
Public Enemy #1 and Sleepless in Seattle (the Fell's Point
neighborhood). In the film The Bombing (2002), a nuclear bomb detonates
here, wiping out much of downtown Baltimore.
National Shrine Basilica of the Assumption, built 1806-1821 according
to plans by Benjamin Latrobe as the cathedral of the Roman Catholic
Archdiocese of Baltimore, today the concathedral
New Catholic
Cathedral of Our Lady Queen, built 1954–1959
Zion Church of the City
of Baltimore: Church built in 1807; there was a previous building from
1762. The congregation of the "Zion Church of the City of Baltimore" was
founded by German immigrants; even before the United States declared
independence, they held Lutheran services in German in Baltimore. This
tradition continues uninterruptedly to the present day.
Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum: Poe lived in Baltimore from 1831 to
1835 with his aunt Maria Clemm and cousin Virginia Clemm Poe
Walter's
Art Museum
Baltimore Museum of Art: with the Cone Collection by the
Cone sisters, one of the largest collections of works by Henri Matisse
Contemporary Museum
B&O Railroad Museum
National Aquarium: right
on the harbor
Fort McHenry
Museum ship U.S.C.G.S. Taney, formerly
the last active warship to survive the attack on Pearl Harbour. It was
last used as a Coast Guard ship.
Museum ship USS Constellation. One
of the oldest surviving US Navy sailing ships.
Tomb of Edgar Allan Poe
Washington Monument: oldest monument
honoring George Washington
Historical objects
The National
Park Service designates Baltimore as 25 National Historic Landmarks (as
of December 2016), including the B&O Railroad Museum, the USS
Constellation, the Basilica of the Assumption National Shrine, and the
Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum. The city has 298 structures and sites
listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) as of November
17, 2018.
Baltimore has been home to the NFL team Baltimore Ravens since 1996. The Ravens have won the Super Bowl twice so far. Previously, the Baltimore Colts were Baltimore's NFL team from 1953 and were victorious in Super Bowl V. In 1984, the franchise moved to Indianapolis, where it continues to this day. The MLB team Baltimore Orioles also plays at the baseball stadium Camden Yards. The Baltimore Bullets represented Baltimore in the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1949 to 1954. In 1963 the Chicago Zephyrs moved to Baltimore and from then on also carried the name Baltimore Bullets. In 1973, the franchise moved to Washington, D.C. on, where it now plays under the Washington Wizards name.
By plane
Baltimore practically borders on Washington and even
shares an airport with it. If you are flying into one of the other two
airports in Washington, then the most convenient way to go to Baltimore
is by car. From Europe, most likely, you will fly to Washington Dulles,
from where it is an hour and a half to Baltimore, if there are no
traffic jams.
1 Baltimore-Washington airport (IATA:BWI). The
airport is located 20 km south of the center of Baltimore, it is one of
the hubs of Southwest Airlines. Other American airlines also fly here,
but much less frequently, and there are practically no flights outside
the United States. As in other major American airports, car rental
offices are located a couple of kilometers from the terminal, and
customers are taken there on a special bus. A light metro line leads to
the airport, which will take you to the center in half an hour and
$1.70. Trains run every 20-30 minutes. In the opposite direction, on the
way to the airport, please note that the metro line forks, and only
trains from the BWI Airport terminus are suitable for you. 3 km west of
the terminal is the BWI Marshall Station, where MARC
(Washington-Baltimore) and Amtrak trains, including the
Washington-Boston Express, stop. There is a free bus to the station.
By train
Baltimore stands on the railroad linking Washington and
New York - this is the section with the most active passenger traffic in
the United States. Baltimore is served by the fast Boston-New
York-Washington Acela Express trains and the slower Northeast Regional
series trains on the same route. All of these trains belong to the
country's main rail operator Amtrak. Travel time is 40 minutes from
Washington DC and approximately 2.5 hours from New York. In addition,
Washington and Baltimore are connected by hourly MARC regional trains,
following on two independent lines - Penn Line and Camden Line to Penn
Station and Camden Yards, respectively.
2 Baltimore Penn Station.
Baltimore's main train station, where all Amtrak trains arrive, as well
as MARC trains following the Penn Line. The station is located north of
the city center. The building was built in 1911 in neoclassical style.
In 2004, the square in front of him was “decorated” with a 15.5-meter
aluminum sculpture Male / Female (Male / Female), which caused a lot of
controversy, but has now become one of the recognizable symbols of
Baltimore.
3 Camden Yards (Camden Station). South of the city center,
10 min walk to the Inner Harbor. Terminus for MARC trains on the Camden
Line. Cross-platform transfer to light rail trains. The station
building, built in 1857, stands to the north of the platforms and is now
given over to the museum of sports legends. This is one of the oldest
surviving train stations in America and perhaps the most remarkable
building in the city.
By car
Baltimore is on I-95, which runs
north-south from Florida to Maine along the oceanfront. Accordingly,
from New York, Philadelphia and Washington, you will arrive by it. Exit
53 leads into the city center. From western Maryland (Frederick and
Cumberland), as well as from western Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh), you will
need I-70, which adjoins 95 actually within the city. Finally, from
Annapolis and the cities of the southern Chesapeake Bay, I-97, also
adjacent to 95, will lead you to Baltimore. In downtown Baltimore,
parking on the streets (if you are lucky to find a free place) is free
on weekends, on weekdays all places are paid. For parking in one of the
many garages, expect to pay 10-15 dollars a day, look for a place in
advance (no need to book). In the center, many streets are one-way.
In Baltimore, passengers have one light rail line (Baltimore Light
Rail), one regular metro line (Baltimore Metro Subway) and several dozen
bus routes. The city transport operator is MTA (Maryland Transit
Administration), on the website of which there are schemes and
timetables for all routes, but there is no normal scheduler.
Tickets can be bought from vending machines at all metro stations or
from the bus driver. A single ride ticket costs $1.80 (2017) and can be
traveled for 90 minutes from the date of purchase, but cannot be
transferred except from one LRT train to another. To transfer from light
metro to regular metro or buses, you need to buy a separate ticket. If
you are planning more than one such trip per day, it makes sense to buy
a day ticket for $4, which allows unlimited use of all modes of
transport during the day.
The light metro looks more like a tram,
in the center it goes straight along the streets, and in the suburbs it
follows dedicated tracks. On the diagrams, three routes are marked with
different colors, which in reality follow the same line, differing only
in final and short branches. On weekdays, trains run from 5 am to
midnight, on Saturdays from 6 am, on Sundays only from 11 am to 7 pm.
Traffic interval: 5-10 minutes, in the evening and on weekends it
increases to 15 minutes. Most outlying LRT stations have free
ride-and-go parking, which some motorists take advantage of, although in
general the LRT passenger contingent is carless and unpleasant.
Neighbor counties
Baltimore County surrounds most of the city.
Anne Arundel County shares a brief southern border with the city.
The city was founded in 1729 and named after the first and second
Barons Baltimore, the British founders of the Maryland colony.
The name Baltimore is of Irish origin and named after another Baltimore
in County Longford, Ireland. It is based on the Irish "Baile an Tí
Mhóir", which means "place of the great house".
Initially
designed as a port for the tobacco trade, the city quickly developed
into the center of trade with Europe and the Caribbean. When the British
occupied Philadelphia in 1777, the Continental Congress was in
Baltimore. During the British-American War of 1812, the British
attempted to eliminate the privateers operating from Baltimore. The
resulting Battle of Fort McHenry in 1814 inspired Francis Scott Key to
compose what would later become the American national anthem, The
Star-Spangled Banner.
On December 28, 1827 in Baltimore, the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad laid the foundation stone for the first
railroad in the USA, which opened on May 24, 1830. It was initially
planned as a horse tram; after a race between the locomotive Tom Thumb
and a horse, all horses were withdrawn on July 31, 1831 and steam
operation was used, although the horse had won. In 1835, Baltimore
experienced one of the worst riots of the 19th century after the Bank of
Maryland collapsed and investors lost their savings. Twenty people were
killed and around a hundred injured when the militia intervened.
From 1831 to 1835 the young Edgar Allan Poe lived in Baltimore with his
aunt Maria Clemm. He began his career as an inventor and master of the
short story here in great poverty, then lived in Richmond (Virginia),
Philadelphia and New York City. In 1849 he died in the Washington
College Hospital in Baltimore. He is buried in the cemetery of the
former Presbyterian Church of Westminster (now Westminster Hall and
Burying Ground).
Thanks to good rail connections to the Midwest
and the establishment of a regular North German Lloyd steamer service
from Bremerhaven to Baltimore, the port developed into the second
largest immigration port in the USA after New York.
Baltimore
City Hall has been the seat of the Mayor and City Council since its
completion in 1875.
In 1886, the German immigrant Ottmar
Mergenthaler developed the Linotype typesetting machine here.
On
February 7, 1904, large parts of the city fell victim to the flames in a
major fire. Four people lost their lives. Estimated property damage was
around $150 million (over $4.5 billion in today's purchasing power).
Following the assassination of Martin Luther King on May 6, 1968,
violent riots broke out in Baltimore, as in over 100 other cities. In
Baltimore, these were particularly extensive, since the social change
towards actual racial segregation was particularly pronounced in the
city. Whites moved to the suburbs while blacks stayed behind in the old
town. The governor of Maryland Spiro Agnew reacted with particular
harshness from April 11, his policy is seen as the beginning of the
military build-up of the police force in the United States. More than
10,000 National Guard and US Army troops were called into the city, and
more than 5,000 arrests followed, most for curfew violations.
24
sites in the city have National Historic Landmark status for their
historical significance. 294 Baltimore structures and sites are listed
on the National Register of Historic Places as of November 11, 2017.
Cheap
1 Lexington Market. 9:00–17:00. Opened already in 1782, the
historical market gradually became a place for inexpensive food, and the
food trade itself faded into the background here. In a huge indoor area,
there are dozens of stalls with a wide variety of food - from Chinese
and BBQ to quite decent pasta. The informal center of the market is
Faidley's, which specializes in fish and seafood: this is the only place
in the market where there are at least tables (though high tables
without chairs), and people go here to feast on crab cakes, which the
residents themselves Baltimore is considered the best in the world.
Also, don't miss the bakery stands selling Bergers Cookies, the city's
most popular chocolate chip cookie.
2 Panera Bread, 600 E Pratt St.
(Inner Harbor). Mon–Sat 6:00–21:00, Sun 7:00–21:00. A chain cafe, a
cheap version of Starbucks that offers, in addition to coffee, simple
food on plates, including hot breakfasts.
3 Starbucks, 222 St
Paul Pl (halfway from harbor to Mount Vernon). Mon–Sun 7:00–21:00.
Standard Starbucks, but tastefully decorated (with old photos of
Baltimore) and well located - not just for travelers though, try not to
go there on weekday lunch breaks.
Average cost
4 Cazbar, 316 N
Charles St (halfway from harbor to Mount Vernon). Full lunch or dinner
around $30. Good Turkish restaurant, the only one in Baltimore. In
particular, wonderful Turkish coffee.
Heavy industry arrived in 1897 with the Sparrows Point Steelworks. In
the city's heyday just after World War II, it was home to a Bethlehem
Steel plant, Glenn-Martin aircraft manufacturer, Bethlehem Sparrows
Point Shipyard, a General Motors car factory, and several food
processing plants. 45,000 workers were employed in the shipyards, 50,000
in the aircraft industry and 30,000 in the steel works.
In the
following decades there was a strong deindustrialization. Today, Johns
Hopkins Hospital is the largest employer.
Located at the mouth of
the Patapsco River in the Chesapeake Bay, the port of Baltimore is one
of the largest seaports in the USA; it was the starting point of the
settlement history of the city. The city is a transportation hub between
Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia and maintains Baltimore-Washington
International Airport (BWI).
The Chesapeake Bay is also
considered the cradle of the American canning industry. In the 1860s,
several large corporations emerged specializing in the canning of
oysters.
At the end of the 18th century, Baltimore became known
worldwide for the Baltimore clippers, mostly two-masted topsail
schooners that were designed entirely for speed and had their heyday
between about 1795 and 1825. They marked the beginning of the era of
fast sailing ships.
Baltimore is home to many health, beauty,
medical and pharmaceutical companies. Also, many research institutions,
both from business and government laboratories, have their headquarters
in and around Baltimore. In addition to private laboratories, the city
is home to 61 state-level research laboratories.
Currently,
Baltimore is the largest American city not home to a Fortune 500
company.
The Baltimore metro area generated economic output of
$187.4 billion in 2016, ranking 19th among the metropolitan areas of the
United States. The unemployment rate was four percent, slightly above
the national average of 3.8 percent (as of May 2018).
In 2014, Baltimore's population was about 63.3 percent African American, 28.3 percent White, 2.6 percent Asian, 0.4 percent Native American, and 0.1 percent Hawaiian. The remaining 5.3 percent are Hispanic or have multiple ethnicities.
While the population of the city of Baltimore is declining, the population of the metro area is growing.
The world-famous Johns Hopkins University, which is particularly outstanding in medicine, is located in Baltimore. The University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Towson University and the University of Baltimore have their headquarters in the surrounding district. The Maryland Institute College of Art, founded in 1826, is one of the oldest art schools in Maryland.