About Baltimore's Mt. Clare

If you are thinking of buying or selling a home give me a call today and we'll talk about the market conditions and what your home could possibly be worth in today's market place if you are thinking of selling. You can save thousands by listing your home with Advance Realty Professionals If you are considering buying a home, there is no better time than now to buy. The tax savings and wealth building a lone is worth the plunge into todays market.

In keeping with saluting our heroes, during 2011 I am waving administrative fees active duty military, retired military and the families of fallen military, as well as policemen, firemen and emt's. If you enter into a contract by the New Year's eve I will waive the admin fee at settlement. This is a $395 savings. If you are thinking about buying or selling a home give me a call and receive full service real estate assistance from an experienced agent. Our office is open 7 days a week and we can be reached at 410-761-1550/410-744-2100 or I can be reached directly at 410-292-0100.

The War Came By Train - Tuesday Trip to the B & O Railroad Museum

My youngest son, Liam, is crazy for trains and has been since he was 2 years old and first saw "Thomas's Magic Railroad". During spring break he wanted to go to the B & O Railroad Museum in Baltimore. When he was younger we had a family membership to the museum and went 4 or 5 times a year. The family membership is $100 a year and is partially tax deductible and gives you unlimited trips to both the Baltimore and Ellicott City museums.

The Baltimore B & O Museum is located at 901 W. Pratt Street in Baltimore, MD 21223. There is plenty of parking among the outdoor exhibit of large train locomotives and rail cars.

The Ellicott City Station is located at 2711 Maryland Ave., Ellicott City, MD 21043 and on the web. If you visit here I recommend having lunch at the Ellicott Mills Brewing Company at 8308 Main Street in Ellicott City, they have a great menu as well as their own brew.

The Roundhouse exhibit contains the largest collection of Civil War railroad equipment in the world and is presented in a life size historic setting with signage, video presentations and kid-friendly activities. The War Came by Train exhibit commemorates the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War and will be on display from April 2011 until May 2015. Throughout the exhibit there are life size human figures dressed in period dress, they are so realistic, I caught myself wanting to walk up and talk to them.

The gallery exhibits contain artifacts from private and public collections. Each year these exhibits will change to correspond with a war year, 2011 focuses on 1861.

Narrated train rides will take place between Mount Clare Mansion, the site of Baltimore's largest Civil War encampment, and the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum. The B & O Railroad Museum Television Network will present episodes illustrating how the railroad impacted the war.

The Ellicott City Station will present changing exhibits, living history interpretations, gues speakers and an HO scale model railroad layout telling the story of the Civil War in the Patapsco Valley.

Many of the exhibits are interactive and kids of all ages can climb on the trains, sit in the driver's seat and touch things and really get a feel for what it would have been like to be the engineer of one of these huge trains.

For more information you should visit the B & O Museum on the web.

If you are thinking of buying or selling a home give me a call today and we'll talk about the market conditions and what your home could possibly be worth in today's market place if you are thinking of selling. You can save thousands by listing your home with Advance Realty Professionals If you are considering buying a home, there is no better time than now to buy. The tax savings and wealth building a lone is worth the plunge into todays market.

In keeping with saluting our heroes, during 2011 I am waving administrative fees active duty military, retired military and the families of fallen military, as well as policemen, firemen and emt's. If you enter into a contract by the New Year's eve I will waive the admin fee at settlement. This is a $395 savings. If you are thinking about buying or selling a home give me a call and receive full service real estate assistance from an experienced agent. Our office is open 7 days a week and we can be reached at 410-761-1550/410-744-2100 or I can be reached directly at 410-292-0100.

Do you like trains as much as we love trains? Almost from birth my youngest son Liam (now almost 10) has loved trains. In February 2003 we had record breaking snowfalls and the roof on the museum collapsed and damaged much of the display, he saw this on the news and cried and wouldn't rest until I put him in the car and drove down there so he could see for himself. From the time he was 3 we have had a family membership to the museum and visit often.

The museum is located on the site of the old Mt. Clare Junction railroad shops and is considered to be the birthplace of railroading in America. It was here within the Museum's 40-acre campus that Baltimore businessmen, surveyors, and engineers set about building the B&O Railroad in 1829 - laying the first commercial long-distance track, building the first passenger station, and inventing America's unique railroad. Railroad work has been conducted at Mt. Clare for over 130 years. And it continues today. The B&O Railroad Museum collects, preserves and interprets artifacts relating to early American railroading, particularly the Baltimore & Ohio, Chesapeake & Ohio, Western Maryland, and other mid-Atlantic railroads and hosts well over 200,000 visitors a year. The museum is part of the Smithsonian Museum and houses over 200 pieces of locomotive and rail cars from 1830 to modern times.

The museum is open daily from 10am until 4 pm Monday through Saturday and on Sundays from 11 am until 4 pm. The museum is conveniently located at the junction of Pratt Street and Poppleton just west of Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

From April through December you can ride the rails for the price of admission to the museum. Wednesday through Sunday when you visit the train museum you can also ride a restored train and during steam days you'll ride on an original restored steam train.

During the year the museum hosts many events including Santa arriving on a train at Christmas. Children can visit with Santa and also view the many exhibits. During the Christmas season local train groups are able to exhibit displays.

April 25 through the 27th, and again May 2 through May 4th Thomas the Tank Engine will be visiting the B & O. Kids (and parents too) will be able to ride in Annie and Clarabel on the rails.

Throughout the year there are many exhibits inside and outside the round house. In the yard you'll find a large scale train layout. And, housed in a railroad car you'll find an HO layout of Baltimore harbor and rail system. Occasionally, the restoration shops are open to tour so you will want to check the website often for events coming up. http://www.borail.org

Once you have visited the Baltimore site, you will also want to visit the smaller site in historic Ellicott City.

To live within walking distance of the museum is an easy commute to both Ft. Meade and Aberdeen Proving Ground and homes in this neighborhood range in price from $150,000 to $500,000. The neighboring communities are Washington Village (or Pigtown), Mt. Clare, Hollins Market, Union Square, Ridgely's Delite, Little Lithuania and others. There are also many opportunities to purchase homes for renovation and some of the neighborhoods qualify for historic tax credits.

If you are interested in purchasing a home in this neighborhood contact me and I'll be happy to help you out.

June Piper-Brandon, Advance Realty - http://www.gb-advancerealtyusa.com junepiperbrandon@advancerealtyusa.com