Page 46 - Port of Baltimore - September/October 2018

PORT VIEW 1930 | DUNDALK MARINE TERMINAL
STORY BY KATHY BERGREN SMITH
Historic Ramp at Dundalk Marine Terminal Played Key Role in History
During the Christmas season of 1944, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met secretly with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in Washington, D.C., to discuss
Allied plans. When Churchill departed, he left on a “flying boat” from the Baltimore Municipal Airport on the banks of the Patapsco River.
The seaplane terminal was opened in
1932. Pan Am operated its Clipper Service
from a ramp in what is now Dundalk Marine Terminal. This photo from 1930 shows the construction of the ramp. C.J. Langenfelder and Sons, a Baltimore contractor, hired Galesville,
Md.-based Smith Brothers to drive pilings to support the concrete ramp.
Commercial seaplane service was suspended during the war but the British used the terminal for their primary base in the U.S. The Army also used the airport as a base, both for seaplane and conventional crafts.
After the war, the airfield was renamed Harbor Field and served primarily civil aviators. By 1958, the field was closed and turned over to the newly formed Maryland Department of Transportation Maryland Port Administration to be converted into a marine terminal, which still operates today. 􏰀
[44] The Port of Baltimore ■ September/October 2018