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,

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 t ...

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 Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. 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 econ ...

waterfront area in the southern part of the city, and receives its name from the body ( cove) 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. 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 region and is primarily separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Delmarva Peninsula (including the parts: the Eastern Shore of Maryland / ...

. The residential community of Curtis Bay is along three major north–south thoroughfares of Curtis Avenue, Pennington Avenue ( Maryland Route 173 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 ...

s, rowhouses, 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 (formerly the

U.S. Revenue Cutter Service ) , colors= , colors_label= , march= , mascot= , equipment= , equipment_label= , battles= , anniversaries=4 August , decorations= , battle_honours= , battle_honours_label= , disbanded=28 January 1915 , flying_hours= , website= , commander1= , co ...

until 1915) on Hawkins Point Road / extending south from Pennington Avenue ( Maryland Route 173) on Arundel Cove off

on the border line with neighboring suburban Anne Arundel County to the south. During the middle and late 19th and early 20th centuries, a Quarantine Station and lazaretto run by the United States Government agency (future U.S. Public Health Service) along Thoms Cove between Sledds Point and Hawkins Point. There is a large Polish American 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 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