Lorraine Ave

Lorraine Ave. . , In the 1940s and '50s the neighborhood bubbled with activity. In the 1940s and 50s the neighborhood bubbled with activity. Stores on almost every corner supplied meats and produce, fresh bread and sweets, shoes and hardware. Churches like Guardian Angel and Oak Street AME were hubs of community, hosting regular services and events. Many residents shopped and worked within walking distance, and multiple trolley lines connected Remington to all corners of the city, making the expense of car ownership optional. High’s Dairy, Sanitary Laundry, Potts and Callahan, and other neighborhood businesses provided numerous jobs., Access to work, education, transportation, credit, and housing , these are waters that give a community life. Severing these wellsprings disrupts the social landscape., From the 1960s through the ‘90s the fortunes of Remington mirrored countless other places across America. Reliable blue-collar jobs dried up; savings evaporated. Unemployment, drugs, and crime percolated through the neighborhood. Some residents fled to the suburbs. For others, race, money, class, and education were barriers to mobility. Despite community efforts in the ‘70s and ‘80s that built grass-roots social service programs and a new rec center, the neighborhood fortunes and population declined. These were difficult decades for Remingtonians and for Baltimore at large., Since the early 2000s improved safety and renewed interest in city living have reshaped the neighborhood, bringing in younger, more diverse residents and an inflow of new businesses and capital. Like successful stream restoration efforts at nearby Stony Run, investments in the neighborhood ecosystem are helping Remington thrive again.,

“Remington was segregated. African Americans lived on Remington [Avenue] or the bottom parts of Fox Street, and the surrounding areas were all white. It was especially dangerous for outsiders if you were African American. My father actually couldn’t come onto Lorraine [Avenue] without being questioned or stopped. The neighborhood only started to change 20 years ago.” , , Joan Hazelwood, Remington resident (interviewed in 2021)