/items/browse?output=atom&tags=Hamilton <![CDATA[Explore 91ĘÓƵ]]> 2025-03-12T11:29:30-04:00 Omeka /items/show/672 <![CDATA[Lakein’s Jewelers of Hamilton]]> 2023-08-29T12:44:42-04:00

Dublin Core

Title

Lakein’s Jewelers of Hamilton

Subject

Hamilton, jeweler, Legacy Business

Creator

Richard F. Messick

Curatescape Story Item Type Metadata

Subtitle

Jewelry Store with a Personal Touch

Story

Like many old family-owned businesses, Lakein’s Jewelers was started by a newly arrived immigrant, 29-year-old Isadore Lakein, who arrived in the United States from Russia in 1912 with his wife Anna and their son Samuel. A second son, David, was born in 1915. Isadore started his jewelry business the year after arriving in the U.S. when he began selling a variety of goods door-to-door in the Fell's Point neighborhood of Baltimore. Lakein offered customers the option to pay in installments, and would return to collect regular payments. By 1929, he opened a store at 515 S. Broadway. His sons, Samuel and David, joined him in the enterprise.

Attention to detail and care for customers is imperative to the success of any small family business and Lakein’s is no exception. In a 2019 interview, present-day owner Warren Lakein shared how a customer had recently stopped in the shop, now located in Hamilton, to pick up a watch he left for repair—three years earlier. Despite the delay, the customer still found the repaired watch waiting and ready for pick up at the counter. The Lakein family applies the same customer-centered approach to the repair of watches of all kinds, whether it is a basic Timex, an expensive Rolex, a rare antique, or a sentimental treasure.

The threat of theft is present at all jewelry stores and Lakein’s has seen some losses. One old wrong was made right several years ago, when a plain manila envelope arrived at the store with no return address. The envelope contained a wedding band and an unsigned note reading: “I shoplifted it from your store about forty years ago, and I’m very sorry for that.”

The tradition of layaway and door-to-door service stayed with the family for generations. The business grew to include four locations in Baltimore including shops at 3221 Greenmount Avenue, the corner of Erdman Avenue and Belair Road, and at 5400 Harford Road in Hamilton. Isadore retired to Florida and started another location there before his death in 1962.

Warren Lakein, a current owner of Lakein’s Jewelers of Hamilton and grandson of the founder, grew up behind the Harford Road store in a small stucco house and recalled making house calls with selections of rings for people who requested something special. Lakein's continues to offer layaway accounts for up to eight months. Hundreds, if not thousands, of local Baltimoreans still shop at Lakein’s to buy special gifts for sweethearts or parents. Payments were made regularly for as little as one dollar per week back in the 1960s and 1970s. For some fortunate shoppers, those friendship and “going steady” rings led to engagement and wedding rings—including some still in use forty or fifty years later.

Customers have maintained their loyalty to the store for generations. Some customers own Lakein’s jewelry from forty to eighty years ago that has been handed down by their parents or grandparents. One customer received his grandmother’s engagement and wedding rings, which he later gave to his wife. They were purchased at the original store’s location just a few years after it opened on S. Broadway in 1929.

Lakein’s Jewelers is a remarkable reminder of the opportunities Baltimore offered to European immigrants in the early twentieth century. A hard-working door-to-door salesman from Russia could open a store in Fell's Point and grow the business over time to five locations. Regrettably, it also shows the challenges small businesses have faced in recent decades. Most of the stores have closed, including the original Broadway location, which closed in 2005. Fortunately, due to a loyal clientele and dedicated owners, Lakein’s Jewelers of Hamilton is still going strong.

Official Website

Street Address

5400 Harford Road, Baltimore, MD 21214
]]> /items/show/373 <![CDATA[Old Hamilton Library]]>
Designed by Baltimore architect Theodore W. Pietsch and built by Baltimore contractor R.B. Mason on a property donated through the organized efforts of the Woman's Club of Hamilton and the Hamilton Improvement Association, the Old Hamilton Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library is a handsome example of the work of an accomplished Beaux Arts architect and an enduring legacy of the enterprising efforts of civic and social organizations in promoting community development and civic life of northeast Baltimore during the early 20th century. In addition, the Old Hamilton Library is distinguished as one of a collection of libraries in Baltimore and across the nation built from the late 1900s through the 1920s with support from Pittsburgh industrialist Andrew Carnegie.

In May 1917, the Woman’s Club of Hamilton and Ms. E.W.H. Scott, a library organizer with the Maryland Public Library Association established a “library organization” with the goal of building a free public library in Hamilton. They combined their efforts with the Hamilton Improvement Association to raise funds and purchase a lot for the library at the northwest corner of Hamilton.

The building remained in use as a library for nearly three decades, providing books to patrons and serving as a social center for the broader community with exhibits from local painters and evening movie screenings. By the late 1940s, however, the growing number of library patrons living in northeast Baltimore made it difficult for the small building to keep up. After more years of efforts by local residents, construction began on a new library building designed by architects Cochran, Stephenson and Wing on April 2, 1957. In 1959, a new Hamilton Branch Library opened on Harford Road at Glenmore. The original building passed into use as commercial office building and remained occupied in this use by a variety of tenants through the early 2000s. 91ĘÓƵ worked with the Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street program to list the building on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.]]> 2018-11-27T10:33:54-05:00

Dublin Core

Title

Old Hamilton Library

Description

The Old Hamilton Branch Library at 3006 Hamilton Avenue is a historic branch library building constructed in 1920 to serve the community of Hamilton in the developing Harford Road corridor of northeast Baltimore. The library remained at this location through 1959 when a new Hamilton Branch Library building opened on Harford Road.

Designed by Baltimore architect Theodore W. Pietsch and built by Baltimore contractor R.B. Mason on a property donated through the organized efforts of the Woman's Club of Hamilton and the Hamilton Improvement Association, the Old Hamilton Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library is a handsome example of the work of an accomplished Beaux Arts architect and an enduring legacy of the enterprising efforts of civic and social organizations in promoting community development and civic life of northeast Baltimore during the early 20th century. In addition, the Old Hamilton Library is distinguished as one of a collection of libraries in Baltimore and across the nation built from the late 1900s through the 1920s with support from Pittsburgh industrialist Andrew Carnegie.

In May 1917, the Woman’s Club of Hamilton and Ms. E.W.H. Scott, a library organizer with the Maryland Public Library Association established a “library organization” with the goal of building a free public library in Hamilton. They combined their efforts with the Hamilton Improvement Association to raise funds and purchase a lot for the library at the northwest corner of Hamilton.

The building remained in use as a library for nearly three decades, providing books to patrons and serving as a social center for the broader community with exhibits from local painters and evening movie screenings. By the late 1940s, however, the growing number of library patrons living in northeast Baltimore made it difficult for the small building to keep up. After more years of efforts by local residents, construction began on a new library building designed by architects Cochran, Stephenson and Wing on April 2, 1957. In 1959, a new Hamilton Branch Library opened on Harford Road at Glenmore. The original building passed into use as commercial office building and remained occupied in this use by a variety of tenants through the early 2000s. 91ĘÓƵ worked with the Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street program to list the building on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.

Creator

Eli Pousson

Curatescape Story Item Type Metadata

Story

The Old Hamilton Branch Library at 3006 Hamilton Avenue is a historic branch library building constructed in 1920 to serve the community of Hamilton in the developing Harford Road corridor of northeast Baltimore. The library remained at this location through 1959 when a new Hamilton Branch Library building opened on Harford Road.

Designed by Baltimore architect Theodore W. Pietsch and built by Baltimore contractor R.B. Mason on a property donated through the organized efforts of the Woman's Club of Hamilton and the Hamilton Improvement Association, the Old Hamilton Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library is a handsome example of the work of an accomplished Beaux Arts architect and an enduring legacy of the enterprising efforts of civic and social organizations in promoting community development and civic life of northeast Baltimore during the early twentieth century. In addition, the Old Hamilton Library is distinguished as one of a collection of libraries in Baltimore and across the nation built from the late 1900s through the 1920s with support from Pittsburgh industrialist Andrew Carnegie.

In May 1917, the Woman’s Club of Hamilton and Ms. E.W.H. Scott, a library organizer with the Maryland Public Library Association established a “library organization” with the goal of building a free public library in Hamilton. They combined their efforts with the Hamilton Improvement Association to raise funds and purchase a lot for the library at the northwest corner of Hamilton.

The building remained in use as a library for nearly three decades, providing books to patrons and serving as a social center for the broader community with exhibits from local painters and evening movie screenings. By the late 1940s, however, the growing number of library patrons living in northeast Baltimore made it difficult for the small building to keep up. After more years of efforts by local residents, construction began on a new library building designed by architects Cochran, Stephenson and Wing on April 2, 1957. In 1959, a new Hamilton Branch Library opened on Harford Road at Glenmore. The original building passed into use as commercial office building and remained occupied in this use by a variety of tenants through the early 2000s. 91ĘÓƵ worked with the Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street program to list the building on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.

Street Address

3006 Hamilton Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21214
]]> /items/show/44 <![CDATA[Taylor's Chapel]]>
The Chapel has its origins in a Quaker meeting house that likely was built by Joseph Taylor in the mid-1700s on his property, called Taylor's Range (then in Baltimore County). Joseph was disowned by the Society of Friends for "speaking evil" of some fellow Quakers and refusing to apologize, and went off and built his own Quaker meeting house a little further away on the corner of his property. The Taylor Family kept this wooden building as a meeting house for a number of generations. Interestingly, the Quaker family allowed Bishop Francis Asbury, a leader in the founding of Methodism in America, to preach there in 1777. The conversion was surely slower that Bishop Asbury would have liked, but about thirty years later, the worshippers at the wooden building did indeed switch from Quakers to Methodists.

In 1853, Elijiah Taylor inherited the property and tore down the log meeting house to build the Methodist chapel that stands today. By 1930, however, regular services had ceased and the building sat vacant until the early 1960s, when a group of volunteers from St. John's of Hamilton United Methodist Church began taking care of it. From parent to child over a number of generations, this group still acts as caretakers of this little known jewel, and opens it up for weddings, baptisms and other events. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and still contains the original 1853 frescoes on its walls, among many other original features.]]> 2021-02-22T09:35:25-05:00

Dublin Core

Title

Taylor's Chapel

Subject

Religion
Architecture

Description

Who knew that tucked away inside the Mount Pleasant public golf course off Hillen Road sits a remarkably well preserved 150 year-old Methodist chapel. Taylor's Chapel has its roots to the Taylor family, which is one of the oldest in Maryland, stretching back to the 1600s. As brothers, John Taylor was one of the first commissioners of Baltimore County and Thomas Taylor ("Colonel Taylor" at the time) was a councilor to Lord Baltimore. The chapel was built on a tract Colonel Taylor's land called "The Ridge" where William Penn and Lord Baltimore first met to resolve their dispute over the boundary line between the colonies.

The Chapel has its origins in a Quaker meeting house that likely was built by Joseph Taylor in the mid-1700s on his property, called Taylor's Range (then in Baltimore County). Joseph was disowned by the Society of Friends for "speaking evil" of some fellow Quakers and refusing to apologize, and went off and built his own Quaker meeting house a little further away on the corner of his property. The Taylor Family kept this wooden building as a meeting house for a number of generations. Interestingly, the Quaker family allowed Bishop Francis Asbury, a leader in the founding of Methodism in America, to preach there in 1777. The conversion was surely slower that Bishop Asbury would have liked, but about thirty years later, the worshippers at the wooden building did indeed switch from Quakers to Methodists.

In 1853, Elijiah Taylor inherited the property and tore down the log meeting house to build the Methodist chapel that stands today. By 1930, however, regular services had ceased and the building sat vacant until the early 1960s, when a group of volunteers from St. John's of Hamilton United Methodist Church began taking care of it. From parent to child over a number of generations, this group still acts as caretakers of this little known jewel, and opens it up for weddings, baptisms and other events. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and still contains the original 1853 frescoes on its walls, among many other original features.

Creator

Johns Hopkins

Curatescape Story Item Type Metadata

Subtitle

150 year-old Methodist Chapel at the Mount Pleasant Golf Course

Lede

Who knew that tucked away inside the Mount Pleasant public golf course off Hillen Road sits a remarkably well preserved 150 year-old Methodist chapel?

Story

Taylor's Chapel has its roots to the Taylor family, which is one of the oldest in Maryland, stretching back to the 1600s. As brothers, John Taylor was one of the first commissioners of Baltimore County and Thomas Taylor ("Colonel Taylor" at the time) was a councilor to Lord Baltimore. The chapel was built on a tract Colonel Taylor's land called "The Ridge" where William Penn and Lord Baltimore first met to resolve their dispute over the boundary line between the colonies. The Chapel has its origins in a Quaker meeting house that likely was built by Joseph Taylor in the mid-1700s on his property, called Taylor's Range (then in Baltimore County). Joseph was disowned by the Society of Friends for "speaking evil" of some fellow Quakers and refusing to apologize, and went off and built his own Quaker meeting house a little further away on the corner of his property. The Taylor Family kept this wooden building as a meeting house for a number of generations. Interestingly, the Quaker family allowed Bishop Francis Asbury, a leader in the founding of Methodism in America, to preach there in 1777. The conversion was surely slower that Bishop Asbury would have liked, but about thirty years later, the worshippers at the wooden building did indeed switch from Quakers to Methodists. In 1853, Elijiah Taylor inherited the property and tore down the log meeting house to build the Methodist chapel that stands today. By 1930, however, regular services had ceased and the building sat vacant until the early 1960s, when a group of volunteers from St. John's of Hamilton United Methodist Church began taking care of it. From parent to child over a number of generations, this group still acts as caretakers of this little known jewel, and opens it up for weddings, baptisms and other events. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and still contains the original 1853 frescoes on its walls, among many other original features.

Watch our on this site!

Related Resources

Street Address

6001 Hillen Road, Baltimore, MD 21239
]]>