Oct 19, 2016

In the days before people had running water in their homes, average Baltimoreans got clean by scrubbing down at one of the city’s municipal baths.

: Most of Baltimore’s public baths were built by railroad mogul Henry Walters, and thus bore his name. But they were operated by the city of Baltimore. Undated Photo. (Joshua Cosden/Baltimore Sun)

: Man bathing at the Walters Public Bath. Most of Baltimore’s public baths were built by railroad mogul Henry Walters, and thus bore his name. But they were operated by the city of Baltimore. Undated Photo. (Joshua Cosden/Baltimore Sun)

: Eastern Avenue Public Baths, photo dated 1939. (Baltimore Sun)

: Inside a public bath house, photo dated 1939. Users were restricted to a 20-minute shower, and there were plenty of signs on the tiled walls governing conduct: “Anyone caught taking towels belonging to the bath commission will be prosecuted by law;” Unnecessary noise prohibited;” “No smoking;” and “No shaving.” (Baltimore Sun)

: Outside a public bath in 1960, the year after the last public bath closed in Baltimore. (Baltimore Sun)

: Inside the public bath house at Greenmount and Monument. Mr Thomas Kreutzberg mops, 1959. (Ellis Malashuk/Baltimore Sun)

: Undated photo of a public bath at Bond Street and Eastern Avenue. (Baltimore Sun)

: Eastern Avenue Public Baths, photo dated 1939. (Baltimore Sun)

: Users were restricted to a 20-minute shower, and there were plenty of signs on the tiled walls governing conduct: “Anyone caught taking towels belonging to the bath commission will be prosecuted by law;” Unnecessary noise prohibited;” “No smoking;” and “No shaving.”

: “VICTIM OF PROGRESS,” read the caption to this 1962 photo of a bathhouse that had since been closed. “This old public bath house at Greenmount avenue and Monument street, boarded up for the past three years, has fallen prey to vandals and will probably be demolished soon. The city’s public baths were closed during the 1959 austerity drive.” (Edward Nolan/Baltimore Sun)

: Public baths were also a place to do laundry, as this photo from 1939 illustrates. “In those days you could even get a bar of soap for an extra nickel and wash your shirt, socks and underclothes, then sit around with other wanderers and gossip while your garments were hung up for drying,” said an article in The Sun in 1959. (Baltimore Sun)

: An early Baltimore portable bathhouse. Undated photo. (Baltimore Sun)

: Public baths were also a place to do laundry, as this photo from 1939 illustrates. “In those days you could even get a bar of soap for an extra nickel and wash your shirt, socks and underclothes, then sit around with other wanderers and gossip while your garments were hung up for drying,” said an article in The Sun in 1959. (Baltimore Sun)

: Public baths were also a place to do laundry, as this photo from 1939 illustrates. “In those days you could even get a bar of soap for an extra nickel and wash your shirt, socks and underclothes, then sit around with other wanderers and gossip while your garments were hung up for drying,” said an article in The Sun in 1959. (Baltimore Sun)

: Crowd gathered at the Walters Public Baths, undated photo. (Baltimore Sun)

: Municipal baths in Baltimore, photo dated 1938. (Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress)

: A man picks up his towel and soap at the Public Bath at Greenmount and Monument Streets. The photo is dated 1959, which is the same year the last public bath closed in Baltimore. (Ellis Malashuk/Baltimore Sun)

But if that phrase conjures images of men soaking luxuriously, chatting about the affairs of the day a la the ancient Romans, let these photos dispel any such romantic notions from your mind. Baltimore’s public baths were a functional affair, something like the showers at the YMCA gym.

The history of these baths is covered in a book by Marilyn Thornton Williams called “Washing `The Great Unwashed:’ Public Baths in Urban America 1840-1920,” which The Sun’s Fred Rasmussen reviewed in 2006.

According to Williams, the movement to create public baths came from urban social reformers during the 19th century as a response to an increase in urbanization, immigration, and the development of urban slums. Regular bathing was seen as a means of preventing disease, and also providing personal cleanliness and “a certain middle-class respectability” to even the very poor.

From the vault: Baltimore’s public baths

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