underbelly
Maryland Historical Society
Morris A. Soper Papers – Coming Soon! (or 25 years late…)
Several months ago while pulling a collection from our sub-basement, or coal cellar, under the south end of the Keyser building here at MdHS, I became intrigued by a box labeled Soper Papers. Most curious were the words “Don’t catalog until 3/88” scrawled on it. Being quite familiar with the fact that most archives—including MdHS—have [...]
Big Stories in Small Pieces of History: President Andrew Johnson’s Impeachment Trial (March 13-May 26, 1868)
On Monday, May 13, the FBI and NARA returned twenty-one of the documents stolen from the Maryland Historical Society Library on June 15, 2011.* Among the invitations and announcements were several pieces of political ephemera, including tickets to President Andrew Johnson’s congressional impeachment trial in the spring of 1868. Johnson (1808–1875), seventeenth president of the [...]
Everyday People: Paul Henderson Collection Goes to City Hall
It’s been a crazy couple of weeks here in the Imaging Services Department at MdHS. Through some wild confluence of ambition and scheduling, I agreed to curate and deliver a 48-piece photography exhibition the very week of the debut of my new documentary, HIT & STAY, at the Maryland Film Festival. I can’t really [...]
Baltimore’s Clothes Horse: David Abercrombie
Abercrombie & Fitch – the name brings up images of young, scantily clad men and women staring out from advertisements with smoldering eyes and pouty lips. But the store known today for its teen apparel as well as its controversial ideas about how to dress children was originally a much different enterprise, offering clothing and [...]
The Quasi-War (1798-1801): Diplomatic Treasures from a Long Forgotten Dispute
MdHS cataloger Kristi Thomas recently pulled together all of the institution’s holdings on the French Spoliation Claims, a little-known group of pamphlets and documents on a long-forgotten episode during which thousands of citizens sought compensation from the federal government for ships and cargoes captured and destroyed during the Quasi-War with France, 1797–1801. This international drama offers [...]
Lost City: The Regent Theater
The theaters, night clubs, and restaurants that once made Pennsylvania Avenue Baltimore’s center for African-American entertainment are today a receding memory. In the segregated Baltimore of the early to mid twentieth century, the Avenue was where African-Americans went to see the latest films, have a drink at one of the many nightclubs and bars, and hear [...]
The Gypsy Queen of Baltimore*
In 1904, Baltimore was buzzing with scandal – Jessie Key Habersham had disappeared again. This was not the first time that Habersham, the daughter of a Baltimore canned goods broker, had gone missing. The young debutante had once escaped to Europe for several months with family friends, before her father convinced her to return [...]
National Pet Day
Today, April 11, is National Pet Day. We here at the state’s most pet-loving, pro-adoption historical repository thought you might like to view some Maryland pets from days gone by. Please enjoy and remember to hug your best friend(s) when you get home—and give up an extra treat.
Your Baltimore Canaries: a very brief history of Baltimore’s second professional base ball team
Look up, Baltimore baseball fans! You’ve come a long way. The origin of baseball in Baltimore is a ridiculously complicated affair. Scant photographic evidence remains and accounts in newspapers, which used nicknames for teams and players as often as they did proper names, leave behind a murky, hard-to-follow record. By the 1870s there were already a [...]
A Whale of a Tale: the Mysterious Case of the Tolchester Whale*
It’s hard to work at the Maryland Historical Society and not be familiar with the R.H. Eichner & Company color lithograph entitled “Go See the Whale at Tolchester, 1889.” An original of this iconic print lives in our library, and posters depicting it grace the halls of the Education Department and the offices on the [...]
© 2013 underbelly. All Rights Reserved.
Powered by Wordpress. Designed by 