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Thames Street history: Recreation Pier and the waterfront
Start with a documented landmark, locate your block, and compare dated sources. This guide helps you research Thames Street; it does not claim a complete history of every building.
Thames Street
Fells Point, Baltimore, Maryland
· locator 39.2818, -76.5925
The marker locates the street for orientation. It is not a parcel boundary and not a survey position.
PlaceLayers editorial guide · Sources checked 30 September 2026
Why the date of a map matters
The Recreation Pier at 1715 Thames Street opened in 1914 for both waterfront work and community recreation. Baltimore Heritage documents dances, outings and language lessons there. That opening date is later than the 1890 and 1901 Sanborn editions currently listed here: neither edition can show the pier as it opened in 1914.
Source: Mary Zajac, Fell’s Point Recreation Pier, Explore Baltimore Heritage.
Try this research route
- Use 1715 Thames Street as a landmark and note the shoreline orientation. A modern street number is a starting clue, not proof of a historical parcel match.
- Compare the waterfront in the 1894 regional map with a later layer. Look for changes in the outline of piers rather than trying to identify a business from a small-scale map.
- Write a separate timeline for the pier using the dated historical account. Keep documented events apart from your own observations of the maps.
A hypothesis to investigate
If a detailed map shows a small structure behind a street-front building, one possible explanation is storage or a workshop serving the main premises. It could also have had another use. This is a research hypothesis, not a finding about a particular house on this street. Look for a printed label, a directory entry or a permit before choosing an explanation.
Keep a record you can check
For every finding, save the source link, edition date, printed sheet number, exact wording and what remains uncertain. A missing building may reflect coverage or scale, not an empty site. Never use a topographic map to infer a property’s condition.
Sanborn atlas editions to investigate
The available Baltimore atlas list includes 1890 and 1901. Coverage of your particular block must be checked in the edition index. Open the index sheet of an edition, find the sheet number for this block, then step to it in the sheet browser.
- 1890 — Vol. 1, 86 sheets. index sheet · catalogue record
- 1890 — Vol. 2, 90 sheets. index sheet · catalogue record
- 1901 — Vol. 1, 109 sheets. index sheet · catalogue record
Topographic maps covering this area
- 1894 — Baltimore, MD, 1:62,500. source record
- 1908 — Patapsco, MD, 1:125,000. source record
- 1953 — Baltimore East, MD, 1:24,000. source record
- 1984 — Baltimore, MD, 1:100,000. source record
What to look for on the sheet
Sanborn surveyors lettered the use of a building onto the building. On a street like this the lettering to read carefully is anything to do with fuel, solvents, metal or wood processing — not because it says anything about the ground, but because those are the uses an environmental professional will ask about.
Open the former-use decoder Glossary of map terms Every digitised sheet Make a share card
Do you know something about Thames Street, Fells Point, Baltimore?
Old photographs, what your family remembers being on the corner, a shop that is not on any map we have. Contributions are read by a person before anything is published, and we never publish the names of living people.
Talking to an environmental professional
If the historical record shows a use you want explained, the next step is a conversation with an environmental consultant licensed in your state. A Phase I Environmental Site Assessment is the standard product; typical quotes fall between $2,200 and $4,000.