For today's journal, I will be reflecting on the progress I have made on my project throughout February. As I stated in my first blog post, I am in the process of creating a virtual walking tour of Harbor East. So far, I have been able to find information on seven sites and I only need to chose three more sites.
The seven companies that I have chosen so far are: the Wilson Steamboat Line, the Rennert Hotel, the H & S Bakery, Gibbs Preserving Company, the Blue Top Diner, the E. J. Codd Company, and William G. Scarlett & Co. I have been struggling to find an overall theme to link each of these smaller narratives together. Currently, my idea is to have each narrative focus on diversity in the workplace, but this is proving to be difficult due to the limited collections of the museum. I cannot find information on some of the companies in the BMI's collections and the result is that I have a tour that appears to be impractical. So far, my tour stretches from the Inner Harbor all the way to Boston Street in Canton. I plan to walk the tour to see how feasible the route is, but I also am trying to meet the minimum requirement of ten tour sites.
I was inspired by a discussion on inclusive narratives in my Introduction to Public History class and my goal is to create a multifaceted view of the workforce of Baltimore. I first ran into trouble when researching the Rennert Hotel. I became distracted by the overarching narrative of a grand architectural wonder and the elite patrons who visited the Rennert Hotel. By chance, I happened to come across an article discussing an interracial fight at the hotel. It was then that I realized that I had excluded the narrative of African Americans. After this realization, I began to be more cognizant of the groups I was subconsciously excluding in my research. In order to make my research more inclusive, I started utilizing the Baltimore Afro-American archives to find the narratives of African Americans. I ended up finding an article about an African American named Henry Cummings who was head chef of the Rennert Hotel. After reading Mr. Cummings' story, I decided to focus on what was hidden behind the glamour of the hotel's decorations. I wanted to take away the curtain and show the narrative of this hardworking man who was praised for his traditional Maryland cuisine.
The story of Henry Cummings inspired me to continue to look for these overlooked narratives. Once I began to be more conscious of the narratives of minority groups, I had more success in my research. I discovered that the Wilson Line practiced segregation and further down the rabbit hole I learned about the issue of segregation at beaches in the Chesapeake. I am currently using this information to talk about two African American sisters who founded all black beaches.
In my research, I have covered a diverse group of people (blue collar workers, African Americans, women, Polish immigrants, Greek immigrants, for example) and I am hoping to continue to make the narrative of Baltimore East's industrial history even more inclusive.
