HoCo 250 - local activities, online talks, open houses

Howard County (and the USA) is celebrating 250 years since 1776 in 2026. HoCo 250. Open houses, talks and other activities. Below are some links to calendars of events. In 2022 Ellicott City celebrated EC250 - 250 years of its founding in 1772, blog post HERE

15 buildings! - Museums, businesses, homes and even the Odd Fellows - are participating in an Open House Day on Sat. Oct 17.

Art on Main Street - OEC - Old Ellicott City

A variety of art including two large murals on the buildings next to the visitors center (part of the Yates mural, left), inside the old Post Office are two New Deal Murals, sculptures of an eggplant and peach on upper Main, mill wheel and water sculpture on side of a building, tile entryways to some of the stores, faux painting of bricks and rocks for the Times building, faux painting on plywood window covers after flooding, Christmas art on store windows...

Click to enlarge each photo, HABS is Historic American Buildings writeup.

Ellicott store or warehouse before 1790

Martha Ellicott Tyson (1795-1873), daughter of George Ellicott (1760-1832) and Elizabeth (Brooke) Ellicott (1762-1853) was raised in his stone home across from the mill and store/warehouse. She wrote about the history of many buildings and people in her Maryland Historical Society article 1865. Image from 1854.

Mark Russo Creations creating art on Main Street 2023

For a few months this fall, artist Mark Russo painted some bright vibrant paintings on the boards of Great Panes and Phoenix Emporium on lower Main Street, Ellicott City. He cleverly made the two art pieces look like stained glass, on the building (Great Panes) which used to make and sell stained glass. Likewise the painting for the Phoenix Emporium includes an imaginative version of the brick wall breaking apart, and the phoenix (bird) rising. Unfortunately those buildings and two others will be demolished this January. So go down and see these creative paintings quickly!

ALERT the wall mural was torn down early.

Easton Sons Funeral Home & Haunted Ellicott City

Bernard Fort and brother William 'cabinetmaker and undertaker' came to Ellicott City from England. They had a small place in 1836 but in 1878 Bernard Fort built a new funeral parlor crossing the stream (Tiber River). Clinton Easton bought it in 1891, continued by son Milton, who built a new building in 1931 and then to his son, Clinton. Building on left, carriage house with hearse on second floor, at right rear. EC haunted taped talks.

Patapsco Manor Sanitarium in Ellicott City 1914 ad

Started in 1907, the Patapsco Manor Sanitarium was bought in 1939 by Issac H. Taylor of Taylor furniture and became Taylor Manor until Sheppard Pratt used the buildings 2002-2020.  The Taylor family is now building even more homes on this land above old Ellicott City, despite the risk of more flooding of Main Street.

7 mile walk from Relay to Ellicott City 1919

Illchester had a "medieval air" and "nothing very modern" while Ellicott City felt like being "in Europe again. These old houses with their balconies, their stone walls either orange and tawny as the quarries yielded them, or washed with pale pinks and yellows and blues, Italian fashion."  The flour from the Patapsco mill "so familiar to your grocer's shelves."

Andrew McLaughlin's 1834 lottery description of Ellicott's Mills -- it was noisey

Andrew McLaughlin (1802-1863) managed or owned three hotels, more HERE He sold The Patapsco Hotel in 1834 by lottery, and advertised it in the newspapers and a poster. Below, is his description of the looks... and sounds... around the hotel.  Not to mention the rumbling of the trains next to the hotel. Click to enlarge.

James Lea grafitti at the B&O railroad station 1838

James Lea (1816-1857) was the son of Elizabeth (Ellicott) Lea (daughter of George Ellicott), and Thomas Lea, of the Lea Brandywine mills.  James was born in Delaware but raised south west of Ellicott's mills at the family farm "Walnut Hill" near Sandy Spring, Md.  He and his brothers took produce and livestock into Ellicott's mills, then visited his grandmother Elizabeth (Brooke) Ellicott who lived by their mill, across the river from the station.

James fought during the Mexican War (1846-48), went overland to California for the 1849 gold rush then ran a hotel until he became ill and returned home. A further reason, when his grandmother Elizabeth (Brooke) Ellicott died in 1853 she left him a portion of her Brooke lands near Sandy Spring, MD if he returned to live in Maryland. He died, unmarried, in 1857.

1851 Businesses and professionals in Howard County

The following list from Thomson's Mercantile and Professional Directory 1851-52. (Baltimore: 1851) gives names and businesses in mid century Howard district of Anne Arundel county. 

The first Patapsco Bank building is on the hill by St. Paul's (and now part of it) south of the B&O train station.  Two later buildings are next to each other on the north side of Main St. - 2d 1887 (8090 Main) and 3rd 1905 (8098 Main)

1871 Businesses and farmers in Howard County

The State Gazette and Merchants and Farmers' Directory for Maryland listed about 150 businessmen and 70 farmers in Howard County.  The book described the county and some of the towns.  Ellicott City was one of "the most romantic cities" in the US with "some of the largest cotton factories in the country."

Trying to tame the floods - Stormwater Staircase; Tiber branch, Hudson branch, New Cut

The Hudson and Tiber 'branches' (more like streams in dry weather) join in parking lot D behind the visitor's center (old post office).  The Tiber branch enters from the pipe on the left, and the Hudson branch flows under Main St. then under the building in the upper right. They become the Tiber branch as it proceeds east, joined by New Cut stream, then flows into the Patapsco River.

Wealthy Kraft family's butcher shop on Main Street OEC

8081 Main St., a fine stone building, was built c1833 as a home then became a store.  In 1881 Dorothy Kraft bought the building for Kraft's Meat Market. The Kraft meat sign is seen on the first building.



Andrew Kraft (1836-1881) and Dorothy (1839-1916) were both from Germany - he arrived at age 15, she at age 6 and started working at the mills.  He worked for a butcher, then started out on his own. They married in 1858 and had a large family which continued the business after she died in 1916 as "one of the richest women" in the county leaving "$300,000 worth of property" to her family.

Walking from Ellicott Mills to Elkridge, then by train in 1843

On Friday, Oct. 13, 1843 a reporter (“Old Honesty”) walked the six miles from Ellicott’s Mills to Elkridge Landing and wrote a long article about the scenery, mills and trains along the Patapsco River.  He passed Illchester, Thistle Factory (image left), Avalon Furnace, Elkridge Landing and Relay station.

The river was called 'Patapsco Falls' until it reached Elkridge, where it was called 'Patapsco River' to the Chesapeake Bay.

1831 B & O survey of route for the first rail road line

The first passenger and freight railroad ran from Baltimore to Ellicott's mills (Ellicott City).  The tracks headed south out of Baltimore to run along the Patapsco River mills (Avalon mill at Elkridge, Md) to Ellicott's mills.  From the 1831 Ellicott mills rail road station (the oldest rr station in America, now a museum HERE) the route ran west along the river then to Frederick.

Ellicott City flood.... again

Less than two years after the last devastating flood of 2016, Main Street was flooded again on Sunday May 27, 2018.  Within a few mile swath 9.5 inches of rain pummeled us over a short time in the afternoon, however less than 15 miles south there was no rain.

An old stone building - the first county courthouse - turned into orientation center behind the log cabin museum, is now gone; as is the road on left side of the photo.

Chief Little Turtle visited George Ellicott's home in 1807

The then famous Native American chief Little Turtle (c1752-1812) and other chiefs visited Ellicott mills during Christmas week 1807 after meetings in Washington City and Baltimore.  Two were chiefs of the Miami nation: The Little Turtle and Busheville; two from the Delaware nation; two chiefs of the Shawnee nation; and two chiefs of the Potowatomi nation (Marpau and his wife did not go to Ellicott's home). 

George Ellicott's (1760-1832) wife Elizabeth (Brooke) Ellicott (1762-1853) prepared hominy and other dishes she felt would interest their guests.  Their daughter Martha (Ellicott) Tyson  wrote about the visit.  Ellicott and Gerard Hopkins, the uncle of Johns Hopkins, had been part of the Quaker delegation to visit the chiefs near Fort Wayne, in 1804.

B & O rail road sites in Howard County 1857

"Ellicott's Mills, fourteen miles from Baltimore, covering the bottom and slopes of the steep hills with dwellings, and their tops with churches and other public edifices." From excerpt below. Click on images to enlarge.

Ellicott's Mills and Bonnie Branch mill 1907

Now all gone, one mill on the Bonnie Branch river was preserved in photos and described in this 1907 article.  Wooden gears are also described from the Ellicotts' Gwynn Falls mill, and the problems they had with Oliver Evans, 200 years ago.

Christmas poem written at Ellicott's Mills in 1856 by M. C. P.

Someone from Ellicott's Mills - M. C. P.  (Pue?) wrote a poem about Christmas for the magazine The Little Pilgrim (Phila: April, 1856)