View from the bridge over Patapsco River at Ellicott City in autumn, features the river with a rocky bed and the historic flour mill behind trees.
Our Scenic & Historic Rivers: A nature, history, and culture article series
The Patapsco River birthed America’s Industrial Revolution along its banks and holds many stories within its waters
It is called the “River of History” and was the center of Maryland’s Industrial Revolution. A 39-mile minor river with a wide mouth on the Chesapeake Bay that attracted exploration by Captain John Smith in 1608, the Patapsco, an Algonquian word meaning “back water,” eventually gave birth to the Port of Baltimore.
Early settlers to the colony of Maryland were attracted to the fertile green country surrounding this river, which flows east from a spring in Carroll County just a hop, skip, and jump from the source of the adjacent Patuxent River that turns south.
Along this tidal estuary, with the deepest harbor on the Chesapeake Bay, the Clipper ship was born in Fells Point and The Star-Spangled Banner was written during the bombardment of Fort McHenry in 1814. When our national red, white, and blue flag continued to wave, St. John’s college graduate and young Maryland lawyer Francis Scott Key penned “Oh say can you see…”
The Industrial Revolution from 1760–1840 was one of the greatest achievements in human history, perhaps second only to the harnessing of agriculture millennia earlier. It was a major turning point in history, marking a transition from hand-produced methods to new manufacturing processes utilizing steam- and waterpower. It was a time of canal construction, textile mills, iron foundries, and mass production.
Twilight reflections in a marina in Harbor East, located off the Patapsco River in Baltimore.
Cascade Falls is a popular attraction for hikers and visitors at Patapsco Valley State Park.
Forty-one tributaries flow into the Patapsco, which provided waterways for the export of agricultural goods at the port of Elkridge Landing, a town that rivaled the small Port of Baltimore in 1733. Tobacco hogsheads from the fertile farmland were rolled down “Rolling Road” (near present-day Catonsville) to be shipped to England from this inland port. Elkridge Landing, founded in 1733, was alive with manufacturing mills fueled by waterpower. The sounds of iron foundries making nails and horseshoes mingled with those of stagecoaches and horsemen on the new Post Road that paralleled the river. The Post Road, opened in 1741, would become the national historic 2,369-mile U.S. Route 1 from Maine to Florida.
In between the river and road, the oldest railroad in the United States and part of the first transcontinental railroad, the Baltimore and Ohio line (B&O), would wind. Iron from multiple foundries forged rails for the line that moved goods to the nation’s capital and beyond, across multiple viaducts, one of which was named in honor of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, signer of the Declaration of Independence. Located at Gwynns Falls, the Carrollton Viaduct was the first stone mason bridge for railroad use in the United States. Another famous viaduct, the Thomas Viaduct in Relay, Maryland, was built with eight arches on a curve. It was dubbed “Latrobe’s folly” by engineers who believed it would collapse when built in 1827. Yet, this National Historic Landmark remains standing as one of the world’s oldest railroad bridges and is still in use today by CSX transportation.
When the first common-carrier railroad line opened for business, the coaches were pulled by horses that could pull 36 tons for six miles in two hours. At the end of this distance, horses would be transferred resulting in the small town of Relay being built and the first railroad hotel. It was at Relay where the first challenge race between a horse and the small steam-powered Tom Thumb would take place in 1830. Though the horse won after the engine suffered a mechanical failure, the writing was on the wall.
By 1836, the B&O was building steam-powered locomotives. Granite from quarries along the Patapsco River watershed supplied building blocks for the viaducts required for rail transportation as it extended through the rugged river valley. In 1844, it was along the Patapsco River/B&O rails where the nation’s first telegraph line was constructed and Samuel Morse relayed the most famous telegraph message, “What hath God wrought,” from the basement of the U.S. Capitol building to a receiving site in Baltimore.
Supplied by water-power upriver, Ellicott Mills was opened by three Quaker brothers in the 18th century and became one of the largest milling and manufacturing towns on the East Coast, housing flour, saw, and plaster mills, plus a granite quarry. It became the first terminus for the B&O outside of the Port of Baltimore, eventually developing into the town of Ellicott City. And then, in 1868, heavy floodwaters rushed down the Patapsco washing away homes and the industries along its waterfront. In a day, everything was gone. No iron mill, no cotton mills, no grain mills, no navigable river, no port town of Elkridge Landing. The river would send rushing water down its course again and again, most recently in 2021, wiping out much of the town’s Main Street and historical sites where our nation’s commercial history was born. Downriver, the area of old Elkridge Landing is now Maryland’s largest and first state park, providing walking and equestrian trails, camping, fishing, and kayaking. Patapsco Valley State Park covers 16,000 acres through the 200-foot river gorge laced with waterfalls.
(Left) Baltimore’s Inner Harbor Harborplace, the World Trade Center, and the 1854 USS Constellation three-mast sloop-of-war. (Right) The B&O Thomas Viaduct, pictured here in 1987, spans the Patapsco River and Patapsco Valley between Relay and Elkridge. The viaduct still stands today. Photography by Roger Puta.
Fort McHenry is situated on a Baltimore peninsula jutting into the Patapsco River. This aerial photo was taken during a flag ceremony in April of this year.
The industries forged in this valley would move east to the Port of Baltimore. The Gilded Age was alive in Baltimore. Fueled by the B&O railroad and iron foundries, warehouses sprung up along Locust Point. The earliest known was built in 1785 by John O’Donnell and was the first to engage in the China trade for silk and enamel goods. Soon, the surrounding harbor was ringed with McCormick Spices, Allied Chemical, Procter & Gamble, Domino Sugar, and Bethlehem Steel, which employed 30,000 and gave birth to company towns Sparrows Point and Dundalk.
By the 2000s, they were all gone from the downtown harbor except Domino Sugar, with its electrified logo lighting up the waterfront. Despite the departure of major industries, the Port of Baltimore still is one of four ports along the East Coast with a 50-foot channel and closest seaport to the Midwest. It ranks first in automobile and construction equipment exports. It contributes approximately 150,000 jobs to the local economy, fuels the state treasury with $395 million in taxes, and averages $3.3 billion in total personal income.
Baltimore’s Inner Harbor remains a gateway to history—the downtown cityscape that was first a port, tells the story of our nation’s maritime heritage. Historical ships such as the USS Constellation, greet visitors with 200 years of history in one of America’s oldest seaports and hints toward the amazing upriver stories of Maryland’s first industrial centers, Elkridge Landing and Ellicott City. This is the Patapsco River, a “River of History.”
