BNHA Two Sisters Wooden Artisan Houses

Built by Ann Bond Fell Giles as housing for the rapidly growing workforce in Fell’s Point, these houses are believed to be the sole survivors of their kind in Baltimore City. This type of residence was once the predominant housing stock of the middling class: caulkers, joiners, shopkeepers, blacksmiths, coopers, blockmakers, shipwrights, and sail makers.

In the 1980s, the buildings were acquired by the sisters Mary Leeke and Eleanor Marine Dashiell, Vassar graduates, local preservationists, road fighters, and great granddaughters of Fell’s Point sea captain Henry Dashiell. The houses are called the “Two Sisters Houses” in their honor.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the sisters purchased 24 properties in Fell’s Point, with the intention of saving them from demolition and creating a museum complex. Bankruptcy and death precluded the realization of this dream. The three properties the bankruptcy allowed them to retain sat vacant for 20 years. In 2004, Baltimore City condemned their two 18th-century wooden properties (this and 1627 Aliceanna). The properties were transferred to The Preservation Society, along with what remained of the family archive, library, and portraits. The Dashiell-Marine Collection represents four generations of a family whose history began and ended in Fell’s Point and whose lives were touched directly by most of the major events in American history.

Site summary courtesy of the Preservation Society of Federal Hill and Fell’s Point