Light Industrial

Accession Number P75-54-0244g, Hughes Company Glass Negatives Collection,

Courtesy of the Photography Collections, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Another view of a portable classroom at Warren and Williams Streets, 1923.  This space clearly focuses on vocational training, which helped prepare children from the working classes for future factory work.

State of the Art in 1915

After several months of delays, the Baltimore Sun reported on August 6, 1915 that the Lake Montebello plant in Northeast Baltimore had begun filtering water for public consumption.  The Hughes Company photos, taken July 12, 1915, show the brand new facilities just a few weeks before full-scale operations began.  These images show the beauty of the plant's interior and exterior architectural features. 

Accession Number P75-54-0830g, Hughes Company Glass Negatives Collection,

Courtesy of the Photography Collections, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Accession Number P75-54-0834g, Hughes Company Glass Negatives Collection,

Courtesy of the Photography Collections, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Modern Neighborhoods

Image Number Neg Z9. 269. PP8, Hughes Studio Photograph Collection,

Courtesy of the Prints and Photographs Division, Maryland Historical Society

The annexation provided more opportunity for builders to change what was considered a “neighborhood” in Baltimore. Their creations led to “White flight” in Baltimore well before the widely known period after WWII. This period in Baltimore shows not only the shift toward contemporary housing but also a focus on housing reform. Organizations such as the Baltimore Housing Authority formed during this time, showed both a city and federal focus on state of housing. It is important to acknowledge that the slum clearance program was meant to fix housing but more important contain the poor, specifically Black residents. After WWII, the Housing Authority planned for the creation of high rise apartments to control the poor population. The expansion of Baltimore neighborhoods between the wars initiated issues still battled today, as many cities see middle class families move away to upscale secluded suburbs, leaving exposed poor conditioned neighborhoods within the city.

Selected Bibliography

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