Baltimore MD Maryland
Hey HON! The Bawlamerese Lexicon
A curious handbill circulated in Baltimore during September 1835. This "EARNEST AND DIRECT APPEAL" chastised city residents "who vainly claim to be considered Orderly." Indeed, an afternoon stroll through town revealed shocking scenes of lawbreaking and moral apathy: merchants and storekeepers blocked sidewalks with crates and boxes, housekeepers dumped kitchen waste in the streets, and dog owners allowed their canines to bark all night at the expense of neighbors' sleep. When upright citizens perpetrated o
A month earlier, the ruins of Baltimore's finest homes were smoldering, an armed militia patrolled city streets, and a dozen men had been shot in three nights of rioting. Obstructed sidewalks and barking dogs were the least of Baltimore's problems! As out-of-place as September's handbill might seem, its author saw an obvious connection between littering and rioting: why would the "ignorant" respect the law if their social superiors flaunted it with impunity? Prohibiting men from riding their horses too rapi
Although the tension between order and disorder was not unique to the first decades of the nineteenth century, scholars have interpreted much of this era's history around these poles. The democratization of electoral politics, the proliferation of competing religious sects, and a new boom-and-bust economy unmoored individuals, families, and communities from previous forms of hierarchy, gender structures, and class relations. Rapid economic development spurred social mobility and the growth of cities, where
Baltimore MD Maryland
Hey HON! The Bawlamerese Lexicon