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      Hampden
     
   Everyone living anywhere around Baltimore has heard of the neighborhood  of Hampden. Most know of Hampden from the famous Hon Festival that is an annual even in Hampden every year. 
  To find the neighborhood, you need to know where you're going. It is sandwiched between Druid Hill and Wyman Parks, the increasingly sprawling Johns Hopkins University acting as a wall to the east. In earlier times, one might conclude, few Hampdenites left their neighborhood, even to chose a marital spouse. People said rather unkindly that close marriages stamped a "Hampden look" on its residents.

  The main drag is 700 to 900 block W. 36th St. Every neighborhood in those days has an informal restaurant whose diners represent that neighborhood in microcosm. One gets the current neighborhood news right there. The restaurant is the Ye-Eat on 36th near Roland Avenue. Inside, a small counter lines the left side of the wall, with narrow booths on the right. Further back are more booths, tables and chairs. The restaurant serves beer. Smoke fills the air. The smell of plain but good food also fills the air--and of course, coffee. Around noon on Saturday it is hard to get a seat.
  Next door is an old fashioned bakery. Often a small group waits outside, despairing that the #10 bus headed downtown will ever turn that corner onto 36th Street. Eventually the bus arrives. A two-story five and dime store, Murphy's, gave a solid anchor to W. 36th. There were a few drug stores. A man named "Bunny Nevins" acted as an informal mayor and historian. An entrepreneur tried to open a small indoor shopping mall on the site of the old Ideal movie house. That plan didn't work out. Modest restaurants, small shops, a Good Will store, bars rounded out the shopping area; smaller grocery stores but no supermarkets. Falls road marks the end of W. 36th Street. On Falls, just off 36th, another pharmacy and a decent Enoch Pratt library, one of the oldest branches....
  Crossing Falls Road , walking west where 36th Street ends, School Street slopes down a hill, leading to Robert Poole School. In 1966 the school is largely white. The voters are largely pro -"Your Home is your Castle" Mahoney. A rookie teacher puzzles why so many of the 7th and 8th graders are older than their grade. They've "failed" a grade. Some boys brag about their probation officers. Children toss slips on the teacher's desk, form letters requesting attendance. The rookie teacher eventually figures out that these must be completed and returned via the pupil to a probation officer or social worker. (Yet, some of the kids are well-behaved and eager to learn). Principle Margueritte Smith was a physical and actual large presence in this school. The occupations of the children's parents: milkman, postman, factory worker --and what's this! lawyer! Before and after school the students crowd into a small restaurant at the corner of Falls. Here, a
l3 year old girl sits on a stool eating her breakfast, a doughnut and a cup of coffee.
   In 1971 the Baltimore City Dept. of Social Services decides that its clients can best be served through a couple dozen local offices scattered around the neighborhoods. Hampden gets its office, a spanking new building on Falls Road. Looking inside, one spies the same decrepit BCDSS furniture. The office opens and people come in. (Shortly after, BCDSS decides on a new model: closing of the neighborhood centers and consolidation into three large centers. ) The Hampden office closes. If the people of Hampden need social services, they'd best get down to 36th Street and wait for that pokey #10 bus to turn the corner!                        
   Hampden's Hon Festival
     At this annual festival, you can bask in the local color which includes crabs of course, plastic flamingos for the yard (now there are purple flamingos to represent the football team, the Ravens), beer, pony rides, and flea and bargain markets.
   The festival celebrates the essence of what has characterized Baltimore for a long time, the basic "hon culture" where the friendliness of the "natives" is shown by their words of endearment (hon being the most popular as in "Hi hon!") even to complete strangers. Also, those attending this festival often wear the costumes and hair styles (the Beehive) that were popular in the 50s in Baltimore. The Beehive consisted of very teased hair, teased up to great heights and then smoothed out on the surface.
   Many artists and wealthier folks have moved to Hampden which has been a blue collar neighborhood (a hon neighborhood) to create a new admixture but everyone seems compatible.
On the main road in Hampden, 36th Street, you can find many restaurants, coffee shops, a grocery store, and other stores. The shops come and go, but fairly stable ones are Atomic Books, Avenue Antiques, Breathe Books (new age), David's (great used furniture), New System Bakery, Turnover Shop (Elm at 36th), Golden West Cafe, Frazier's on the Avenue, and an assortment of other eateries and, of course, the Café Hon where even now you are pretty sure to be addressed with a hon from your waitress.
   You can find the Hon restaurant in Hampden if you just look for the famous flamango which was recently replaced after a bit of controversary involving zoning and the cost of having the flamingo displayed but now that controversy is resolved and the bird is back in its rightful place. After all there are small flamingos all over the lawns in Hampden, so there should be a flamingo at the Hon Cafe.
The web site for Café Hon is http://www.cafehon.com/
   Hampden's Historic Buildings
   Because the history of Hampden is so associated with the history of Baltimore, sightseerers can roam about and see buildings that are from the past time when Hampden was a cotton mill town, capitalizing on the invention of the cotton gin that separated the unwanted cotton seeds from the desired cotton fiber. This was no small matter since the ships of the time needed cotton for their sails and this area once produced a good portion of the world's cotton.
   Especially worth seeing is the Stone Hill section of Hampden with the famous stone houses with stone walls 2 feet wide. These were the buildings for the managers of the cotton mills. A stroll along Bay Street and along parts of Keswick Avenue in Hampden will be like a stroll back in history if you are a visitor to this area.
  The workers at the mills were housed in the many row houses in Hampden which are of architectural interest in themselves. Walking about Hampden, one can observe its nature by looking at he buildings and yards of these rowhouses.
   There are also many historic churches in the community and, of course, there are the historic mills: Mt. Vernon Mills, Hooper mills and the Pool and Hunt Foundry.
   Some Hampden Photos:
 Photos and writings by Dorian Borsella and Carol Koh