Baltimore Day 2: Part 2 Churches

Old St. Paul's Episcopal Church, founded in 1692 it was one of the original 30 parishes of Baltimore and it's the only property that has stayed under the same ownership since the original survey of Baltimore Town in 1730. Pretty cool! This building was built in 1856, the fourth built on the property. All Episcopal churches in Baltimore trace their lineage to this parish. A six-story bell tower was part of the original plans for this building, but was never completed.


A few blocks away is the Rectory of Old St Paul's Parish, built 1788–1791.


Saint Alphonsus Church, built in 1845. At the time it was supposed to be open to visitors when I got there but it wasn't. The first set of doors opened for this shot, but the doors to the chapel were locked.


This is the view through the glass of the locked doors to the chapel area.


Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Or the Baltimore Basilica for short. This was America's very first cathedral built from 1806-1821.


It's so light and airy inside but apparently that wasn't always the case. After I had already looked all around a priest? approached me and asked about me with the assumption that I'd been there before. Turns out he thought I looked so comfortable and familiar with the place and moved like I knew exactly what I was doing. Well, that's good, I like looking like that generally but was certainly going for that look as I walked around a big city as a lone woman carrying a bunch of expensive camera gear! Anyway, we had a great chat and he told me lots about the Basilica including about what a difference the restoration from 2004-06 made. It was a lot darker in there!
Wikipedia covers a lot of what he told me:
"...restoring the interior to Latrobe's original design. Many "misguided accretions" were corrected. Twenty four skylights in the main dome were re-opened, and the stained glass windows (installed in the 1940s) were replaced with clear glass windows. The original wall colors (pale yellow, blue, and rose) were restored, as was the light-colored marble flooring which for decades had been a dark green color."


The first dome's mural


Moving into the big center dome


I'll admit I layed on the floor to take this picture of the dome.


A closer view. It's quite beautiful.


Another change from the restoration was the surprise uncovering of the blue rectangular panels on the dome walls. No one knew those were under there. There's four of them, each bearing the name of one of the four gospel writers (Matthew, Mark, Luke & John) but written like S. Marcus and S. Joannes.


The third dome


Entry to the Basilica's crypt



From Wikipedia: "The undercroft, until [the 2004-06 restoration], was filled with sand from the original building of the cathedral, which prevented Carroll and Latrobe's vision of a Chapel in the undercroft. During the restoration, the tons of sand were removed, and the Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Chapel was finally realized."
Here's the front of that chapel.


And here's the back seats of the chapel.


Some of the beautiful arch work in the undercroft. There's a little plaque down there with this comment about them, "Inverted Arches: Built of massive brick and stone masonry construction they are located at four corners below the nave chancel, these arches support the entire main dome, distributing hundreds of tons of compressive load across the earth below in a very efficient manner."


Some pictures of the restoration process.


An alcove houses changing exhibits. This on is Sacred Stitches: An Historic Vestment Exhibit at the Baltimore Basilica.


I love this photograph of this path through the undercroft. It reminds me of a video game, which I don't know anything about at this point but it looks a lot like Myst which I played as a kid. The path goes downhill so that the brick walls go from below or about the knee level to about chest height.


At the end of the path, Jesus overlooks


The Basilica Museum, including items dating back to the 17th century.


And back upstairs in a back area off the main domed area I found this anomaly...


Moving along, I later came to Mount Vernon Place United Methodist Church, a Victorian Gothic structure completed in 1872. The doors were locked, so no luck seeing the interior.


I love the red doors and the green in some of the brick work.






And a pause for all those tulips.








I like how the light falls on these.


This was just a house on the corner, but we definitely don't have houses like this in Oregon. Actually, I think there's a business in there now.


Emmanuel Episcopal Church. It wasn't until later that I realized this was all the closer I got! Why didn't I go up to it and try to see the interior? Distracted I guess since at this point I was feeling pretty done and only had one more church to get to before I turned back to catch the shuttle.


First & Franklin Presbyterian Church. They were founded in 1761, moved to his location in 1859 and in 1875 the 273 foot steeple was add and it's still the tallest steeple in Baltimore.


Look, there's a tree growing on the steeple!


After backtracking the way I came, the left side of this shot shows a bit of that corner house so this gives a better idea of how that steeple just soars into the sky.


These last two churches I saw in my trek on the third day, Saturday.

St. Vincent de Paul Church, opened in 1841.


Church of St. Leo the Great, opened in 1881.


And they're open. The priest there was very welcoming, helpful and appreciative of my interest in photographing the building.


There were a smattering of kids there practicing for some presentation.


Lastly, as I continued on that day I spotted this painting on this building. It's the Church of St. Leo the Great!


Last up, pictures of the Inner Harbor, several war related stops and a couple other tidbits to finish the trip.

This post covered the aqua markers mostly from the blue route but a few from the green route.

View Baltimore Trip 2011 in a larger map
Map Key
red - pt 1 - Day 1 National Museum Of Dentistry
yellow - pt 2 - Day 1 National Aquarium
blue - pt 3 - Day 2 Architecture, Walter's Art Museum
aqua - pt 4 - Day 2(3) Churches
green - pt 5 - Day 3 The Inner Harbor and War Related Sites
Lines: The daytime tours, Red for Day 1 with Travis, Blue for Day 2 and Green for Day 3. There are no lines for our evening/night outings or my day 3 afternoon shopping.