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abandoned house, Baltimore, bricks, Eagles, engineering, FILTRATION, fishing, glass plate negatives, Gunpowder Falls, Hiking, HISTORY, Montebello, nature, photography, Public Works, water history
The day before taking off work for my daughter’s operation, I was contacted by CHAP – Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation. They wanted to know if I knew anything about a fireplace mantle from Glenn Ellen Castle that was stored in a maintenance building downstream from the second dam? No. They were getting ready to tear down the buildings and were told by the contractors about the mantle.
This was Glenn Ellen prior to raising the dam from elevation 188′ to 240′. The reservoir did not reach this height but it was still on watershed property and taken by the City. I think only the foundation exists now.
Earlier this week a friend of mine, Thom, contacted me and told me about some signs he saw on the property as he was hiking behind the construction site. At first glance I thought they were bronze plaques so I met him and Wayne to go exploring.
The hiking trail is on the hill behind the silt fence. This is where the signs were. Turned out to be steel and not bronze, but still worth keeping a couple for history’s sake!
Saw some interesting items so took a closer look. I thought it was odd that the contractor cut the beams instead of just knocking this building down. Come to find out a company called Bricks And Boards came up a removed the wood to re-purpose. The boxes contain core bore samples. Not sure why the City didn’t want to keep these? They do me no good without the engineer’s records saying where the samples came from.
After rooting around in the barn we decided to head into the house. This is being knocked down also. A few years ago I was told there were lantern slides stored in here along with some old drawings. Back then, I wasn’t allowed in to look.
The house as it looked about the 1920-30s. I tried to find who was the original owner but had no luck. From a map of 1882 it has it listed as City Property. Adjacent to the Wisner, Shanklin properties. Further investigation is needed.
Wayne asked the date the house was built. Not sure but it shows up in a 1881 photo. Far right side just up from the Gunpowder River. This photo shows the dam near completion, ready to lay the last stone.
Back into the house. Entrance hall.
There are 3 fireplaces. One plastered over and two, like this one, with the mantles missing.
Kitchen.
Looking up the stairwell. Three floors.
Second floor to third floor
This was a nice design – up the stairs to a landing that will take you in both directions. This is a huge house.
Lots of rooms – curves and angles.
Chairs on a desk – watching…
One of the many views. Someone nailed a metal sign to the window? I would have loved to live here with this view. Two eagles were playing most of the morning over the lower reservoir. Nice!
Another room. Candles, a bed, money box and stuffed ducks that look like the turkey buzzards tore open – must of thought they were real!
Prologue: I asked the contractor to hold two of the signs for me until I can come back up. He said ok…but, between my visit and when I sent off the email, Brick and Boards came up and took them. Talked to Max from there and he said they are in his warehouse and I can come pick them up!
Their site: https://baltimorebrickbybrick.com/2016/08/04/brick-board-is-here/
Water and Me 
Why was the house demolished? Could it not have been rented? Or sold?
It is being demolished to make way for a new maintenance complex for the watershed workers. It fell into this sad state a few years ago. Being on watershed property, it could not be sold. I only know of one other watershed house that is rented and that is to a city employee. It would have cost too much to fix this house up.
You stumbled on a real piece of history here. I’m not sure I would have gone in there though haha
The history of the property is interesting indeed. I wonder it was built as a supervisor’s home? The 1879 Baltimore atlas shows that land as owned by the City already. There is no structure illustrated on the atlas on that date.
https://jscholarship.library.jhu.edu/handle/1774.2/32720
By the way, these 1879 maps show the right of way for the conduit clearly, and all the shafts. The Shaft 1 land (plate U) is still held in fee by Baltimore city.
I love these old maps – always a little confusing! On one page it says the property was the Heirs of Gilmore and then on another it says Ridgely. (Title map, maps T and U)
Ron, I found an old article about a “Booth” mansion that the city rebuilt at Loch Raven in 1916. I wonder if this was the house pictured in the post. Baltimore Sun, Jul 10, 1916: https://www.dropbox.com/s/q91tfmv2x5u0xek/NEW%20LOCH%20RAVEN%20NOW.pdf?dl=0
Thanks, that is interesting! Thom from CVP just wrote me about Gilmore.
I lived in the house as a kid. My grandfather was the Loch Raven superintendent from the early fifties until the early eighties. Sad to see as I have not been back in a bit over a decade. Many, many memories.
I’d like to hear about those memories. You could submit a document or oral history that I could place in the archives. Did you see my other post about the 18″x24″ stone tunnel? We still haven’t figured out what that was. And any idea why the Keizer stone was left at this property? I have seen the name Greenwood in a bunch of reports and it is nice to know that someone is still around from then. I met two people from 2 separate properties that they lived in at Montebello. Whittemore and Armstrong.
It was my maternal grandfather, so you might find William Farrell in the roles of Baltimore County. Talking about the signs you mentioned, my elder and younger brothers scavenged a sign or two from what was the service garage at the top of the hill, including a stop sign from back when they were yellow with a black stripe under the “STOP”, although I am uncertain whether either still has it. Looking at the photos is a little sad, but I see my room’s door at the top floor. The room with the mattress lying in it was mostly storage and many dead flies, the latter we found fascinating of course! We used to hike all around, but it has been forty years or so, so I have to think a bit about the tunnel. There were various lime kilns and such in and around.
I wish you had a closeup of the ducks. My late Uncle Bill was an avid hunter and 9800 Loch Raven Dr. was his home nearly from birth, so those were likely his.
Please send me a link for the article about the tunnel. Given the simpler times back then, after either our mother or grandparents (or uncle) kicked us out of the house to get us out of their hair, we ranged pretty far once we finished sulking.
Sorry it has taken a couple days to get back to you. House work, hiking and kayaking pretty much occupy my weekends. Here is a link for the tunnel that was found. I have another one and will send that soon. I think it was a conduit for spring water from Shanghai Run up over the hill. There seems to be an abandoned spring house up there. There is also a foundation to the property up north of the spring house. Can’t figure out what it was.
https://wordpress.com/post/rep5355.com/1631 Also, here is what I found on the name Farrell from my archives: May 30, 1951 Police report, “Report of a boy drowning at lower dam at Loch Raven…walking along rocks, slipped and fell in…brought to shore and giving artificial respiration. Towson ambulance arrived. Dr. Green arrived and pronounced him dead. The boy was Joseph Farrell, age 14. Parents notified and his bicycle taken to his house.”
Yes, there were a few drownings I recall as a kid, although they tried to keep us out of it. There was a fire road down to the water near Providence Road, so folks would go down there to swim or boat and get in trouble.
It may take me a bit, but I will find some photos. Our Aunt Ginnie’s wedding reception was at the house in 1971, so I have a few pictures somewhere with the house in the background. I can still picture the various mantels that were there and the kitchen cabinets in your photos are the same ones as I can see the wire and turnbuckles our grandfather anchored to the ceiling to help hold them up.
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The fire road is still there. Just hiked it a couple weeks ago. You should see the lime kilns in Cromwell Park. Beautiful restoration. I have 2-3 folders on drownings up at Loch Raven. I can imagine that it was a beautiful house back then. Once city employees took it over, it really started to fall apart. I loved the stairwell and the views. Thanks for sharing with me. You can send any photos you find to rep5355@msn.com. Are you able to see my other post on here. I have a few of Loch Raven and Cromwell – my two favorite places to hike. (Except when the ticks are out in full force!) Thanks again.
I was not able to log in as of yet, but shall a little later. Next you home that fire road, as you are looking at it from Providence Road, there is a steep drop into the woods (or was). At the bottom there was a spring, essentially someone put an iron pipe out of the side of the hill at the bottom.
It has been forty years, so I cannot say that it is still there, but it was never marked, you just had to know it was there.
I will dig out some albums and see if Aunt Ginnie can scan and send me a few. I will make sure it is more in line with documenting the house with some backgrounds and parallel the photos with current.
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Thanks!
According to family history, the home was built in stages sometime before the Civil War. The kitchen section was built first, then the center section, then finally the large section up front, including the porch. It was later bought by the city.
The house was always occupied by the Superintendent up until 1980 when my grandfather retired. Legend has it that General Harry Gilmor spent time in the house during his adventures in the area.
Many, many stories. I remember evacuating the house during Agnes, and ice skating below the lower dam in the winter, and hearing about Chuck Thompson at the fishing center (a celebrity!) In the 60s we’d get trapped in the house as the road became gridlocked with folks cruising in their cars and flat lands below the dam became a big parking lot/beach party every weekend. In the mid-seventies they planted trees below the lower damn and closed the road on the weekends and the hippies were replaced by bicyclists.
Despite the beautiful photos, the area between the dams was usually a mud pit with a stream of water trickling down the middle.
My grandfather kept a close eye on the place, and we always enjoyed him shouting from the front porch at people getting into things they shouldn’t get into.
This is great and you just opened a can of worms of sorts! If Gilmor spent time in this house, it shouldn’t have been knocked down (my point of view). And, being a confederate, should his marker on Mountain Road be taken down? Is it ok if I copy your post from here and add it to the history of the water department. Also I’d like permission to use it in another post I want to create? Thanks for all the info – keep it coming! PS: I remember as a teen being able to pull right on the grass below the lower dam. Good times.
I think Chuck Thompson came to one of the crab feasts. Several barrels of steamed crabs from Hale’s for the then crazy sum of $100 each.
Winter was always fun for us with the salt trucks going in and out and never understood why our grandfather hated snow. Greatest sled hill in the world up behind the pumps and the old foundation up on the hill.
Wait! I just realized I’m talking to two different people here! Brothers? I pose the same question to both of you – can I use your info in another post? Thanks
feel free to use my posts, I’ll add some more thoughts as they surface.
I do remember the fireplace mantles. If memory serves, the two in the front section of the house were made of marble, and the one in the center of the house was carved wood, probably the nicest of the three.
and yes, brothers
Ok thanks. I found another photo of the house and of 2 other houses just a few hundred feet on both sides. I will post tomorrow. Also got some crazy info on the signs I found up there. Thanks again.
We somewhat had the run of the place since all the workers knew us and we would despoil Uncle Bill’s penny jar and walk to Sanders’ at the juncture of Cromwell Valley. If nothing else, we could check on the dead cat along the way and occasionally didn’t catch fish off the little dam while the hippies jumped off it. It was always fascinating to talk to Clarence, who tended to come on duty in the evening to patrol and was missing a finger and was always happy to show us his pistol.
We did get in a little trouble like accidentally throwing kerosene on the workers’ wood stove.
I loved Sanders. When I was a little kid we would go there for ice cream. It burned down in the late 1930s. I met the one Sander’s kid a few years ago while doing research for my book. He didn’t seem to have much interest in the place and it closed for a while. It is now the Iron Horse Tavern – reference to the rail road spur across the street. Was Clarence a watershed police?
My apologies for inundating you regarding the info on the house. A little background is that my daughter works for Disney and has a colleague from Bel Air, so she asked about Baltimore and Loch Raven was our life as kids, so I happened upon your site and wanted to spread it around once I saw your site indicating the lack of info about it.
Just looking at the kitchen photo, I recall our little brother (Dave) refusing to wash his dish because he wiped it off with bread when he was eating.
I spent just shy of seven years in Afghanistan and perspective takes over and reflection kicks in. There were summers when you went to sleep listening to the falls and were all stuck in one room, and Jim had a foldout cot while our Uncle Bill made room, played Lynyrd Skynyrd from his eight-track out the windows. Plenty of agida, but a lot of freedom for a bunch of kids who only managed to break one window throwing the baseball. Raspberry bushes up by the garage and the pear tree, it was the Netflix of the seventies.
It sounds great and no apologies needed. All this info that you and your brother give to me I am going to put in the archives. As I find families who lived and worked for the water department from years gone by, I place the info and any accompanying photos in a folder, then cross reference with other pertinent information. Your info will go in the folder under Loch Raven Properties.
The perspective is not just mine, so I didn’t mean to weigh in strictly based on where I have been or done. Our grandparents and how that house was the central point in our world means a lot to probably one-hundred or so people and was the family hub.
No problem. It is like the 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon – we are all connected somehow. I use to be one of those hippies partying up there in the late 60s early 70s. Now I have been working for the water department for almost 36 years. It is all good shared memories. It is our shared history.