Curtis Bay is a residential / commercial / industrial

neighborhood A neighbourhood (British English, Irish English, Australian English and Canadian English) or neighborhood (American English; see spelling differences) is a geographically localised community within a larger city, town, suburb or rural area, ...

in the southern portion of the

City of Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The neighborhood is on steep sloping heights, about four city blocks wide (west to east) and fifteen blocks long (north to south) and above and surrounded on three sides (northeast - east - southeast) in a highly

industrialized Industrialisation ( alternatively spelled industrialization) is the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an industrial society. This involves an extensive re-organisation of an econo ...

waterfront area in the southern part of the city, and receives its name from the body (

cove A cove is a small type of bay or coastal inlet. Coves usually have narrow, restricted entrances, are often circular or oval, and are often situated within a larger bay. Small, narrow, sheltered bays, inlets, creeks, or recesses in a coast are o ...

) of water to the east in which it sits. The cove of "Curtis Bay" with two small branches - Stone House Cove and Cabin Branch is fed from the southwest by

Curtis Creek Curtis Creek is a tidal creek located in Baltimore City and Anne Arundel County, Maryland. It is a tributary of the cove Curtis Bay and is adjacent to the west of the South Baltimore community of Curtis Bay. The creek begins at the confluence ...

which in turn is formed further south by Marley Creek and Furnace Branch/Creek in

Anne Arundel County Anne Arundel County (; ), also notated as AA or A.A. County, is located in the U.S. state of Maryland. As of the 2020 United States census, its population was 588,261, an increase of just under 10% since 2010. Its county seat is Annapolis, whi ...

. Adjoining nearby to the east is Thoms Cove near Hawkins Point at the north end of the Marley Neck peninsula. Curtis Bay cove itself also has a dredged deep water channel with considerable port facilities and waterfront industries and is a branch of the main stem of the

Patapsco River The Patapsco River mainstem is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed April 1, 2011 river in central Maryland that flows into the Chesapeake Bay. The river's tidal port ...

, which forms the extensive frontage of Baltimore Harbor and Port, northwest off of the

Chesapeake Bay The Chesapeake Bay ( ) is the largest estuary in the United States. The Bay is located in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region and is primarily separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Delmarva Peninsula (including the parts: the ...

. The residential community of Curtis Bay is along three major north–south thoroughfares of Curtis Avenue, Pennington Avenue (

Maryland Route 173 Maryland Route 173 (MD 173) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Maryland. Known for most of its length as Fort Smallwood Road, the state highway runs from Fort Smallwood Park near Jacobsville north to MD 2 in the Brooklyn neighborhood of ...

on which most commercial businesses are located) and residential Fairhaven Avenue and a partial street of Prudence Street. Running west to east are fifteen smaller residential streets named alphabetically for various types of trees. "The Bay", as it is often called colloquially, also offers a variety of housing,

townhouse A townhouse, townhome, town house, or town home, is a type of terraced housing. A modern townhouse is often one with a small footprint on multiple floors. In a different British usage, the term originally referred to any type of city residence ...

rowhouse In architecture and city planning, a terrace or terraced house ( UK) or townhouse ( US) is a form of medium-density housing that originated in Europe in the 16th century, whereby a row of attached dwellings share side walls. In the United State ...

s, individual homes, (both constructed of wood-frame, brick, stone and concrete block/stuccoed) and corner stores, taverns/bars. Curtis Bay is also home since 1897 to the

United States Coast Guard Yard The United States Coast Guard Yard or just Coast Guard Yard is a United States Coast Guard operated shipyard located on Curtis Bay in northern Anne Arundel County, Maryland, just south of the Baltimore city limits. It is the largest industrial fac ...

(formerly the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service until 1915) on Hawkins Point Road / extending south from Pennington Avenue (

) on Arundel Cove off

on the border line with neighboring suburban

to the south. During the middle and late 19th and early 20th centuries, a

Quarantine Station A quarantine is a restriction on the movement of people, animals and goods which is intended to prevent the spread of disease or pests. It is often used in connection to disease and illness, preventing the movement of those who may have been ...

and

lazaretto A lazaretto or lazaret (from it, lazzaretto a diminutive form of the Italian word for beggar cf. lazzaro) is a quarantine station for maritime travellers. Lazarets can be ships permanently at anchor, isolated islands, or mainland buildings ...

run by the United States Government agency (future

U.S. Public Health Service The United States Public Health Service (USPHS or PHS) is a collection of agencies of the Department of Health and Human Services concerned with public health, containing nine out of the department's twelve operating divisions. The Assistant ...

) along Thoms Cove between Sledds Point and Hawkins Point. There is a large

Polish American Polish Americans ( pl, Polonia amerykańska) are Americans who either have total or partial Polish ancestry, or are citizens of the Republic of Poland. There are an estimated 9.15 million self-identified Polish Americans, representing about 2.83 ...

community in Curtis Bay. The former town hall, real estate office, volunteer fire station, and meeting/assembly hall on the second floor for Curtis Bay was constructed on the heights overlooking the new town and rapidly developing industrial waterfront along Fairview Avenue (now Fairhaven Avenue) facing Filbert Street by a successor developing firm, the South Baltimore Harbor and Improvement Company in 1905. In 1925, the United Polish Societies purchased the building and named it

Polish Home Hall Polish Home Hall is a historic building located in the waterfront industrial/commercial/residential and heavily ethnic community of Curtis Bay in southern Baltimore, Maryland, (United States). Built on the southwest corner of Fairhaven Avenue (fo ...

and it became central to the

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...

ethnic experience in Curtis Bay, functioning as a social, educational, and political center for Curtis Bay's Polish community into the 1970s.

References

External links

Community of Curtis Bay Association
{{authority control Neighborhoods in Baltimore Polish-American culture in Baltimore Polish communities in the United States Maryland populated places on the Chesapeake Bay Poverty in Maryland Working-class culture in Baltimore