AKfLAND •AZIN Published Quarterly by the Maryland Historical Society FALL 1976 Vol. 71, No. 3 BOARD OF EDITORS JOSEPH L. ARNOLD, University of Maryland, Baltimore County JEAN BAKER, Goucher College GARY BROWNE, Wayne State University JOSEPH W. COX, Towson State College CURTIS CARROLL DAVIS, Baltimore RICHARD R. DUNCAN, Georgetown University RONALD HOFFMAN, University of Maryland, College Park H. H. WALKER LEWIS, Baltimore EDWARD C. PAPENFUSE, Hall of Records BENJAMIN QUARLES, Morgan State College JOHN B. BOLES, Editor, Towson State College NANCY G. BOLES, Assistant Editor RICHARD J. COX, Manuscripts MARY K. MEYER, Genealogy MARY KATHLEEN THOMSEN, Graphics FORMER EDITORS WILLIAM HAND BROWNE, 1906-1909 LOUIS H. DIELMAN, 1910-1937 JAMES W. FOSTER, 1938-1949, 1950-1951 HARRY AMMON, 1950 FRED SHELLEY, 1951-1955 FRANCIS C. HABER 1955-1958 RICHARD WALSH, 1958-1967 RICHARD R. DUNCAN, 1967-1974 P. WILLIAM FILBY, Director ROMAINE S. SOMERVILLE, Assistant Director The Maryland Historical Magazine is published quarterly by the Maryland Historical Society, 201 W. Monument Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21201. Contributions and correspondence relating to articles, book reviews, and any other editorial matters should be addressed to the Editor in care of the Society. All contributions should be submitted in duplicate, double-spaced, and consistent with the form out- lined in A Manual of Style (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969). The Maryland Historical Society disclaims responsibility for statements made by contributors. Composed and printed at Waverly Press, Inc., Baltimore, Maryland 21202,. Second-class postage paid at Baltimore, Maryland. © 1976, Maryland Historical Society. 6 0F ^ ^^^f^i"^^lARYLA/ i ^ RECORDS LIBRARY \9T6 00^ 26 HIST NAPOLIS, M^tl^ND Fall 1976 #. L OF ^ CONTENTS Kathryn Allamong Jacob The Woman's Lot in Baltimore Town, 1729-97 283 Paul Kent Walker Business and Commerce in Baltimore on the Eve of In- dependence 296 Lee W. Formwalt A Conversation Between Two Rivers: A Debate on the Location of the U.S. Capital in Maryland 310 G. Terry Sharrer Flour Milling in the Growth of Baltimore, 1750-1830 .. 322 Whitman H. Ridgway Community Leadership: Baltimore During the First and Second Party Systems 334 Beverly Berghaus Chico Two American Firsts: Sarah Peale, Portrait Painter, and John Neal, Critic 349 Bettye Gardner Ante-bellum Black Education in Baltimore 360 Michael S. Franch The Congregational Community in the Changing City, 1840-70 367 Bettye C. Thomas Public Education and Black Protest in Baltimore, 1865- 1900 381 Joseph Garonzik The Racial and Ethnic Make-up of Baltimore Neigh- borhoods, 1850-70 392 Edward K. Muller and The Changing Location of the Clothing Industry: A Paul A. Groves Link to the Social Geography of Baltimore in the Nine- teenth Century 403 James B. Crooks Politics and Reform: The Dimensions of Baltimore Pro- gressivism 421 David Lamoreaux, with Gerson G. Eisenberg Baltimore Views the Great Depression 428 Joseph Arnold The Last of the Good Old Days: Politics in Baltimore, 1920-1950 443 Manuscript Notes Richard J. Cox A Bibliography of Articles and Books on Maryland His- tory, 1975 449 Notes and Queries 465 Erratum 466 THE EDITOR'S PA( Last fall, for the first time in its 246-year history, Baltimore City was the sole topic of a historical conference. Over 200 persons interested in practically every aspect of the city's history attended and participated in the two-day affair planned and directed by an ad hoc committee of interested academics and com- munity representatives. The conference was co-sponsored by the Maryland His- torical Society and funded by the Maryland Committee for the Humanities and Pubic Policy. The variety and quality of the papers and panel discussions showed the growing excitement over Baltimore's past. The "Perfect Lady," as H. L. Mencken once labeled Baltimore, is certainly the least studied of the large north- eastern cities, and has a richer history than most. Its heritage is one of paradox, being part northern, part southern, with an unusual blend of European ethnic groups and a substantial number of free blacks and slaves. It was the prototype of the boom city, though after its ante-bellum heyday Baltimore entered what in comparison seems almost a century-long hibernation. In the last decade or so the old city appears to have gathered momentum again; now its proud heritage of diverse neighborhoods of distinct ethnic and racial character, tied together to form a heterogeneous city, stands as an obvious urban advantage. Its treasures of usable old buildings, the splendor of its downtown harbor, its great cultural institutions—the Hopkins, the Walters, the Maryland Historical Society, the Enoch Pratt Free Library, the Peabody Conservatory, the Maryland Institute of Art, the Baltimore Symphony, the Peale Museum—all with strong ties to the city's past, are visible symbols of why urban life is essential to civilized society. As the city begins to take on a new vitality and rediscover faith in itself, we must remember that Charles Centers and Inner Harbor Projects in themselves, for all their importance, do not a great city make. Every citizen, every businessman, every government official truly committed to this city must recognize that the mind and spirit are what animate urban civilization. Emphasis on skycrapers and subways alone may gain us fortunes, but risks losing our community's soul. Boosterism is alive and well in Baltimore, but let us not forget the whole spec- trum of cultural institutions that have done so much—and promise to do more— to maintain the amenities of life. We must support the activities of, and even enlarge the scope and variety of our cultural agencies, if Baltimore is really to aspire to become "Charm City." Knowledge of our history, brought into the active present by lively writing, museum exhibits, and preservation projects, can go a long way toward assuring that we do not destroy the old city in our haste to modernize. In its past Baltimore can find pride, examples of public-spirited ac- tion, and architectural distinction. Knowing that the readers of the Maryland Historical Magazine would want to participate vicariously in the Baltimore History Conference, both the Baltimore City Bicentennial Committee and the Maryland Bicentennial Commission gave generous grants making possible this expanded issue. Their support of the past for the sake of the future is a good omen for Baltimore, and all Marylanders. JOHN B. BOLES BahinKxeQty Bicentennial ^ The Woman's Lot in Baltimore Town: 1729-97 KATHRYN ALLAMONG JACOB WHEN SPEAKING OF WOMEN IN HISTORY, ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, SR., ONCE NOTED, "From reading history textbooks, one would think half of our population made only a negligible contribution to history. "l He precisely described the standard histories of Baltimore. One finds lamentably few references to women in the town's traditional chronicles. Those few women who do appear are the lovely belles who captured the hearts of young men at home and abroad and the women who gained recognition by virtue of being the wife, mother, or daughter of a famous gentleman. The widowed mothers of a dozen or more children who built up prosperous businesses and the anonymous women who donated long-labored- over quilts to the war effort are consistently overlooked. Yet these, and even the women accused of horsethievery or bearing bastards, represent the very essence of Baltimore Town's social history. Created by legislative fiat in 1729, Baltimore was officially called Baltimore Town until it received its city charter in 1797. Rising from almost empty acres along the Patapsco, it lacked the sophistication of its older and more glamorous neighbor, Annapolis. The majority of Baltimore's women were more expert at wielding a needle than a pen. Theirs were the skills of cookery, not composition, and consequently they left few written accounts of themselves. Fortunately, records about these early women were kept by others. Tax, court, land, and church records, wills and inventories, censuses, newspapers, and private papers provide a wealth of information about Baltimore's first women citizens.2 The wide variety of information gleaned from this data permits a partial reconstruction of various facets of the Baltimore woman's life, her birth, her marriage, and her legal status. Several specific threads run through the data, creating unity on several levels. One such thread, and one of the most striking, is the very real way in which economics was related to every aspect of the woman's life, from whom and how she would marry to the kinds of problems that resulted in her appearance before the courts. Dependent in childhood upon her father, in middle age upon her husband, and, often, in old age upon her sons, with few ex- ceptions the Baltimore woman's whole life style and social status was largely de- termined by the wealth of the men in her life. Ms. Kathryn Allamong Jacob is Archivist of the Johns Hopkins University. 1. Julia Cherry Spruill, Women's Life and Work in the Southern Colonies (2nd edition; New York, 1938), p. v. 2. Kathryn Allamong Jacob, "The Women of Baltimore Town: A Social History, 1729-1797" (Master's thesis, Georgetown University, 1975). 283 MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE VOL. 71, No. 3, FALL 1976 284 MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE The wealth of her father or husband determined whether she would wear silks and damasks or coarse linen and osnaburg; whether her food would be sweetened with expensive sugar or plain honey. Her house might be an elegant, multistory brick dwelling or a two room, readily combustible wooden structure. For amusement, she might attend the gay assemblies and banquets or gossip with a neighbor while they made soap together—it all depended on her economic status. Aside from such tangible and obvious evidence of economic differences as dress, diet, and housing, economic considerations clearly affected the woman's prospects in the marriage market.