Baltimore's President Street Station, south of Little Italy, looks like a decrepit warehouse that time has forgotten. Come next summer, though, this Greek Revival structure -- the oldest surviving big-city depot in the nation -- will begin a transformation into a mini-museum.
"It's basically going to be a Civil War museum" with exhibits highlighting that bloody conflict and the Underground Railroad guiding slaves to the North, explained John Ott, director of the B&O; Railroad Museum, which will supervise the reconstruction. One of the first skirmishes of the war, after all, took place around the station.
On the morning of April 19, 1861 -- one week after Confederate troops fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina -- the 700-man Sixth Massachusetts Regiment arrived at President Street. After their 31 train cars were uncoupled, the troops were proceeding to Pratt Street, where the soldiers were confronted by a stone-throwing mob of angry Southern sympathizers. At least nine civilians and three soldiers died in the fighting along a one-mile section of Pratt Street, becoming the first casualties of the Civil War.
B&0 Railroad Museum officials, who are acting as consultants, hope the building will be restored so that the new exhibit can open by April 19, 1996, the 135th anniversary of the riot. "This thing has been a difficult project for a long time," allows Shawn Cunningham, a museum official planning the new exhibit.
But because of a combination of federal, state and city funding, the project is finally becoming a reality. A ceremonial kickoff will be held at 10 a.m., Jan. 10 in the presence of Gov. William Donald Schaefer, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke and state Transportation Secretary O. James Lighthizer.
The restored President Street Station will occupy a gateway position to what promises to be Baltimore's next big redevelopment project, Inner Harbor East. That 20-acre waterfront parcel south of the future museum is slated to contain apartments, offices and a hotel.
The restored President Street Station will fit nicely with nearby attractions like the Public Works Museum, the expanded City Life Museums and, eventually, with the major children's museum now in the planning stages.
Looking at President Street Station today, anyone would find it difficult to imagine how the rotting, fire-damaged structure could be a tourist magnet. But, then, few thought the old Orchard Street Church would be the gem of architectural restoration it is today.