Original research, historical narratives, and insightful articles exploring the people, places, and events that have shaped our community, written by Society members and guest contributors.
On May 24th, 1830, tickets went on sale for the first passenger train service between Mount Claire in Baltimore and Ellicott Mills, a distance some 13 miles. Three Years earlier 25 Baltimore bankers and merchants had met in the home of George Brown, a director at Alex Brown & Sons, to charter the Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road Company with a 25-million-dollar stock issuance.
Thomas Worthington embraced Methodism very early, around 1770, through his association with Richard Owings, who was the first American-born Methodist preacher. In 1786 Richard’s sister, Marcella, became Thomas Worthington’s second wife. In 1827, Six years after Thomas’ death, Marcella persuaded her son Rezin to donate an acre of land and an initial fund for the establishment of a Chapel of the faith.
The Land Grants show Worthington Purchases, dated 1736, extending along the current Davis Avenue area to the current Old Court Road, adjoining the chief quarrying area. Thomas Worthington, father of Noah and Rezin, would have arrived sometime before his marriage to Elizabeth Hammond in 1761, which took place in Baltimore County. Rezin is said by Scharf to have been born on his farm, so Thomas and family by 1794 had moved from the original settlement house (remains located just North of Old Court Road) to the main family land described in this report.
Granite, Maryland, like hundreds of other communities across the United States, was the site of an active Nike Missile Base during the Cold War years. The Hernwood Road base comprised two separate sites, and was operational for 25 years beginning in the 1950s. A brief history and some images of this site can be found…
At the extreme western end of Baltimore county, near where the Old Court road terminates at the Patapsco river, lies the tranquil village of Granite. The surrounding countryside of about one square mile contains the visible but almost forgotten remains of a robust industry that flourished there for nearly a century – quarrying the finest, hardest granite rock on the North American continent.
The Granite National Register Historic District comprises the focus of a rural quarrying community located in the Patapsco Valley of western Baltimore County, Maryland. The district includes properties along Old Court Road and several side streets, between Granite Road on the east and Hernwood Road on the west. Contributing resources include two churches, a school,…
Daniels, Maryland, was a mill town with its roots as far back as the 1820s. The little town was located on the banks of the Patapsco River just downstream of Granite. In 1831 the townspeople first saw passengers passing through traveling on tracks laid by the newly formed B&O Railroad, the first in the country….
The old horse, pulling his load of the plow, guided assuredly by the powerful hand of a future resident, couldn’t have known he was opening up a road for diligent, hard-working Granitonians, which in years to come would be called RFD #1, Featherbed Lane, and finally, Acme Avenue.
Perhaps you have found yourself giving directions to our beloved, little village of Granite by saying, “You turn at the snowball stand on Route 99.” There seems to be immediate recognition from the visitor, “Oh, yeah, I know where the snowball stand is!” And, perhaps, rightly named The Snowball Stand, for it is the special…
