10
The resulting geography, and the Port’s position relative to the Patap-
sco River Valley, the Bay and America’s Midwest, laid the foundation
for Baltimore’s port to emerge as a commercial transportation hub
.
There’s a divide in Maryland’s broad, brackish seam: the fabled
“Land of Pleasant Living,” sometimes called the world’s best fishing
hole, commands the Chesapeake to the south, while to the north
the Port, in concert with Baltimore’s adjoining downtown business
district, occupies the business end.
The Port, with its ready access to sea lanes, was also adjacent to
rich wheat and corn fields of northern Maryland and southern Penn-
sylvania, as well as the “fall line,” where rivers like the Patapsco, Gwynns
Falls and Jones Falls provide a natural means to power mill machinery
in their descent from an interior plateau toward the tidewater.
Baltimore’s two great rivals as the state’s dominant maritime
power mid-18th century were Fell’s Point —whose status exceeded
Baltimore’s, owing to its superior harbor and growing notoriety
in Colonial circles as the place to go to have a ship built — and
Annapolis, where leading Maryland families like the Carrolls and
Dulaneys entertained in their elegant Georgian town houses; like
other members of Maryland’s privileged class, their wealth and
prominence principally emanated from the Port.
Overreliance on a single, seasonal agricultural crop like
tobacco
is the enemy of sustained economic growth:
After
Captain John Smith sailed up into the Bay, he named it River
Bolus because the riverbanks emitted a hue which reminded
him of a red resin called bole armoniack used in cosmetics, a
coloring that actually emanated from plentiful iron ore deposits
speckling the region. Principio Company, on the Gunpowder
River in Cecil County, began producing iron in 1715. Nottingham
Ironworks and Baltimore Ironworks soon followed, forming a
robust manufacturing industry which used the Port as a gateway
to ship tons of iron across the Atlantic, sometimes in the form of
ballast for departing British ships traveling “light” or without
cargoes. Ballast stone, later used to build the celebrated white
steps of Baltimore’s row houses, came across from England.
Baltimore always built
ships with the very best
of them— built and
launched them, mended
and refurbished them,
and broke ships apart
for scrap metal when
their useful economic
lives ended.
No one innovated
better, or launched more
new types of vessels,
from wooden sailing
ships that cut through
waves like clouds to
mammoth troop carriers
rushed into production
to protect the free
world.
America doesn’t
make great ships
anymore. That industry
has moved offshore. So
it’s unlikely Baltimore
will ever be surpassed as
a shipbuilding giant.
Shipyards are labor-
intensive. At their peak
duringWorldWar II, the
three shipyard industries
— building, repair,
demolition — employed
Key to Baltimore's reputation as America’s shipbuilding hub,
the workers at Bethlehem Steel’s Fairfield yard were a proud lot,
especially when witnessing the launch of ships such as the
Charles
Carroll
, below right, in 1943.
Shipyard Snapshots
