Roland Park, Baltimore
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Roland Park is a community in
Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the List of United States ...
. It was developed between 1890 and 1920 as an upper-class
streetcar suburb A streetcar suburb is a residential community whose growth and development was strongly shaped by the use of streetcar lines as a primary means of transportation. Such suburbs developed in the United States in the years before the automobile, when ...
. The early phases of the neighborhood were designed by Edward Bouton and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr.


History

Jarvis and Conklin, a Chicago investment firm, purchased of land near Lake Roland in 1891 and founded the Roland Park Company with $1 million in capital. Not long after, the
Panic of 1893 The Panic of 1893 was an economic depression in the United States. It began in February 1893 and officially ended eight months later. The Panic of 1896 followed. It was the most serious economic depression in history until the Great Depression of ...
forced Jarvis and Conklin to sell the Roland Park Company to the firm of Stewart and Young. Despite the dire economics after 1893, Stewart and Young continued investment in the development. The Roland Park Company hired Kansas City developer Edward H. Bouton as the general manager and George Edward Kessler to lay out the lots for the first tract. They hired the
Olmsted Brothers The Olmsted Brothers company was a Landscape architecture, landscape architectural firm in the United States, established in 1898 by brothers John Charles Olmsted (1852–1920) and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. (1870–1957), sons of the landscape ar ...
to lay out the second tract, and installed expensive infrastructure, including graded-streets, gutters, sidewalks, and constructed the Lake Roland Elevated Railroad. The company consulted George E Waring Jr. to advise them on the installation of a sewer system. Bouton placed restrictive covenants on all lots in Roland Park. These included setback requirements and proscriptions against any business operations. It was a modern development, electricity for lighting throughout the neighborhood as well as gas for cooking and lighting. Water came from artesian wells dug up to , nearly of water mains were constructed, in addition to of roadways, and of sidewalks. Bouton and some Baltimore investors purchased the interests of Roland Park and reorganized the company in 1903. Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. cited Roland Park as a model residential subdivision to his Harvard School of Design students. Duncan McDuffie, developer of St. Francis Wood in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
, called Roland Park "an ideal residential district."
Jesse Clyde Nichols Jesse Clyde "J. C." Nichols (August 23, 1880 - February 16, 1950) was an American urban planner and developer of commercial and residential real estate in Kansas City, Missouri. Born in Olathe, Kansas, and a student at the University of Kans ...
had found inspiration in Roland Park when he was planning the Country Club District of Kansas City. Nichols continued to refer to Roland Park as an ideal residential development when he counselled other residential developers. The park-like setting designed by the Olmsted brothers was a mark of affluence echoed by other neighborhoods in Baltimore such as Mayfield and Guilford.


Deed restrictions and further implications

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Baltimore saw an influx of immigrants, nearing 600,000. Bouton took 100 acres of land a few miles north of Downtown Baltimore and sold it as an exclusive, lush “garden suburb”, free of city grime and racial diversity. Letters from the time show that Bouton asked a law firm, Schmuker & Whitelock, if he could legally restrict who bought property in Roland Park. Though the firm advised against it, by 1912, the ‘Nuisances’ section of the deed read, “At no time shall the land included in said tract or any part thereof, or any building erected thereon, be occupied by any negro or person of negro extraction. This prohibition, however, is not intended to include occupancy by a negro domestic servant.” Additionally, Bouton claimed that he did not sell to Jews, as they were “undesirable”, at the 1914 Annual Conference of the Development of High-Class Residential Property, further demonstrating the levels of exclusion in the emerging city suburbs. In 1911, George Ford, a professor at Columbia University and later the president of the National Conference on City Planning, was starting to teach a course on urban planning and reached out to Bouton as he was impressed with his racial restrictions. Employees of the Roland Park Company would later go on to serve on national boards, such as the Federal Housing Administration, which helped normalize and standardize the practice of redlining throughout the country. Though the Supreme Court ruled against the enforceability of racially restrictive deeds in 1948, segregation and redlining remained prevalent in Roland Park and throughout other areas of Baltimore City through the 1950s and up until today. In the early 1940s and ‘50s, Baltimore City and the federal government undertook housing development projects displacing African-American populations into inner-city, high-rise buildings that were, essentially, created to reinforce the patterns of neighborhood segregation that emerged in the late 1800s. On this matter, the government stated the project was “not or
slum A slum is a highly populated Urban area, urban residential area consisting of densely packed housing units of weak build quality and often associated with poverty. The infrastructure in slums is often deteriorated or incomplete, and they are p ...
clearance but rather using the projects to block the Negro from encroaching upon white territory”. The real estate developer James W. Rouse used
antisemitic Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...
quotas when building in Roland Park. In 1951, Rouse enforced a quota of no more than 12%
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
residents for the Maryland Apartment in north Baltimore until 75% of the apartments were rented.


Roland Park Shopping Center

Roland Park Shopping Center (originally Roland Park Business Block) was built at the corner of Upland Road and Roland Avenue in 1896 in the English Tudor style. Developed by Roland Park Company President Edward Bouton and designed by Wyatt and Nolting, it was originally planned as an apartment and office building with a “community room” for civic functions on the upper level. It opened in 1907 as shops. It has been credited by
Guinness World Records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a British reference book published annually, list ...
as the world's first shopping center (though some editions of Guinness incorrectly date it to 1896, when it was not yet a shopping center). Since it had only six stores, qualifying today as a
strip mall A strip mall, strip center, strip plaza or simply plaza is a type of shopping mall, shopping center common in North America and Australia where the stores are arranged in a row, with a footpath in front. Strip malls are typically developed as a ...
, other, larger centers have received more recognition as “firsts”, such as
Market Square A market square (also known as a market place) is an urban square meant for trading, in which a market is held. It is an important feature of many towns and cities around the world. A market square is an open area where market stalls are tradit ...
in
Lake Forest, Illinois Lake Forest is a city located in Lake County, Illinois, United States. Per the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 19,367. The city is along the shore of Lake Michigan, and is a part of the Chicago metropolitan area and t ...
(1916, the first uniformly planned
neighborhood shopping center A neighborhood shopping center (Commonwealth English: neighbourhood shopping centre) is an industry term in the United States for a shopping center with of gross leasable area, typically anchored by a supermarket and/or large drugstore. Versus ...
) and the
Country Club Plaza The Country Club Plaza (often called The Plaza) is a privately owned regional shopping center in the Country Club District of Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas City, Missouri. Opened in 1923, it is considered to be the first planned large outdoor su ...
(1923) in
Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City, Missouri, abbreviated KC or KCMO, is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri by List of cities in Missouri, population and area. The city lies within Jackson County, Missouri, Jackson, Clay County, Missouri, Clay, and Pl ...
, the first uniformly-planned regional shopping center.


Education

The neighborhood is within the bounds of Baltimore City Public Schools and is assigned to Roland Park Elementary/Middle School, a K-8 schoolRoland Park Public School http://rolandparkpublic.org/?page_id=2 that earned the Blue Ribbon for Academic Excellence from the state department of education in 1997 and 1998. There are several private schools in the neighborhood: Friends School of Baltimore,
Gilman School Gilman School is an all-boys independent school, independent, day school, day, college preparatory school located in the Roland Park neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland, United States. There are three school divisions: Lower School, grades pre ...
, Roland Park Country School, the
Bryn Mawr School Bryn Mawr School, founded in 1885 as the first college-preparatory school for girls in the United States, is an independent, nonsectarian all-girls school for grades PK-12, with a coed preschool. Bryn Mawr School is located in the Roland Pa ...
,
Cathedral School Cathedral schools began in the Early Middle Ages as centers of advanced education, some of them ultimately evolving into medieval universities. Throughout the Middle Ages and beyond, they were complemented by the monastic schools. Some of these ...
, and Boys' Latin School of Maryland. In addition,
St. Mary's Seminary and University St. Mary's Seminary and University is a Catholic Church, Catholic seminary located within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore, Archdiocese of Baltimore in Baltimore, Maryland; it was the first seminary founded in the United States after ...
is located in Roland Park. There is also a branch of the
Enoch Pratt Free Library The Enoch Pratt Free Library is the free public library system of Baltimore, Maryland. Its Central Library is located on 400 Cathedral Street (southbound) and occupies the northeastern three quarters of a city block bounded by West Franklin S ...
in Roland Park.


Transportation

The
Baltimore Light Rail The Baltimore Light RailLink (formerly Baltimore Light Rail, also known simply as the "Light Rail") is a light rail system serving Baltimore, Maryland, United States, and its northern and southern suburbs. It is operated by the Maryland Transi ...
's Cold Spring Lane Station is to the west, within walking distance of much of the neighborhood, just across Falls Road and running alongside the
Jones Falls Expressway Interstate 83 (I-83) is an Interstate Highway located in the states of Maryland and Pennsylvania in the Eastern United States. Its southern terminus is at a signalized intersection with Fayette Street in Baltimore, Maryland; its northern ...
.


References


External links

*, including undated photo, at Maryland Historical Trust, an
accompanying mapCommunity of Roland ParkHistory of Roland Park
* ttp://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=2524 Historical Marker Database, Roland Park includes photos
Roland Park: Most Fashionable and Pretentious Suburb
- Ghosts of Baltimore blog {{National Register of Historic Places in Maryland Neighborhoods in Baltimore Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Baltimore Baltimore City Landmarks