For proof that Chesapeake history does not always create an air of nostalgia, one needs to look no further than the devastating Great Fire of 1904- an event that destroyed much of Baltimore’s harbor neighborhoods- and paved the way for the modern Baltimore harbor we know today.

mdhsphotographs:

Looking southeast from Continental Trust building
Baltimore, Maryland
February 1904
Unidentified photographer
The Great Baltimore Fire Photograph Collection
PP179.174 

Full image with detail. 

Maryland National Guard, Great Baltimore Fire of 1904
Baltimore, Maryland
February 1904
Unidentified photographer
Subject Vertical File
SVF (Baltimore - Fires & Explosions)

Full image and detail. 

Burnt District map, The Sun Magazine (detail)
1904
The Great Baltimore Fire Photograph Collection
PP179.727

It’s the 110th Anniversary of The Great Baltimore Fire of 1904.

The Great Baltimore Fire of 1904 started on Sunday, February 7, at 10:48 a.m. with a fire alarm sounding the Hurst Building, Liberty Street and Hopkins Place on the south side of German Street (now Redwood Street). The fire would continue until approximately 5 p.m. Monday. The Great Fire was the largest municipal disaster in American history up until that time. The cause of the fire has been speculated as beginning with a discarded cigarette or cigar butt falling through a two-inch hole in a glass deadlight in the sidewalk above the basement of the Hurst Building.

Brisk winter winds spread the fire easily, and suddenly Baltimore’s fire department realized that they would not be able to contain the disaster solely and help from the surrounding area, including Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia, was requested. The fire destroyed 86 blocks and resulted in one direct fatality from the fire and four fatalities from illness attributed to the fire. More than $70 million in property loses were reported.