Sumwalt Run
Ghost Rivers
Sumwalt Run Ghost Rivers
The creek Sumwalt Run vanished from Baltimore’s landscape in the early 1900s, its deep, wooded valley buried beneath blocks of rowhouses, roads, and factories.
Sumwalt Run may have disappeared, but its waters and histories still flow unseen below these streets. Explore the twelve Ghost Rivers installation sites along the stream’s hidden path to discover its history and the ways that ghost rivers continue to shape our environment.
Sumwalt Run and the Ghost Rivers project are located on the traditional and unceded lands of the Piscataway and Susquehannock peoples, in present-day Baltimore, Maryland.
Visiting the sites
This website is a companion to the upcoming Ghost Rivers public art installation by artist Bruce Willen. Ghost Rivers installations at Sites 3–11 opened in October 2023. Sites 1, 2, and 12 are scheduled for completion in 2024.
Table Of Contents
Site 1: Charles Street at Wyman Park Dell
Meet Sumwalt Run & the buried streams of Baltimore
Site 2: Wyman Park Dell at 29th Street
The Olmsted plan & Baltimore’s urban development
Site 3: Howard Street
Green infrastructure, trees, stormwater
Site 4: 28th Street
Ice and water as commodities, Sumwalt’s Ice Pond
Site 5: Cresmont Avenue
Baltimore’s sewer system, sinkholes
Site 6: Remington Avenue
Lost streams and forgotten landscapes, Camp Bradford
Site 7: 27th Street
Listen to the stream, indigenous landscapes, Church of the Guardian Angel
Site 8: Lorraine Avenue
Remington history, a changing neighborhood, the impact of redlining
Site 9: 26th Street
“Little Appalachia,” bluegrass in Baltimore, Hazel Dickens
Site 10: 24th Street
Stream daylighting, imagining future landscapes
Site 11: 23rd Street
Three eras of ice, a changing climate, American Ice Co.
Site 12: Falls Road
Mills of the Jones Falls, Good Husband’s Row, a tunneled river