Havoc on Harford Road: The Herring Run Flood of 1911
Stream rises more than nine feet in less than five minutes, with a current of about 50 miles per hour.
In the summer of 1911, the area now known as the Hall Spring entrance to Herring Run Park was a busy and bustling place. Millworker’s houses lined Green’s Lane, across from the current playground. Green’s Cotton Mill was sited along the Herring Run. Trolleys ran along the old alignment of Harford Road. Workers were beginning to build the concrete foundations of the bridge that carried Harford Road over Herring Run.
Before the concrete for the bridge’s elegant arches had even set in its wooden forms, a flash flood swept through the Herring Run stream valley on August 4, 1911.
The Baltimore Sun described the flood as a “tearing, ripping, bounding, and boiling body of muddy destruction.” The stream rose more than nine feet in less than five minutes, with a current of about 50 miles per hour. The homes along Green’s Lane were flooded, the waters carried off the framework of two of the arches of the Harford Road bridge along with two of the construction workers. Two men were marooned on top of a storehouse, and trolley tracks, trees, and other debris were hurled as far as Clifton Park by the deluge.
Almost fifty years later, residents remembered the sudden and shocking force of the floodwaters. Writing to the Baltimore Sun in 1959, George Fox, the principal of Garrett Heights School in 1911, recalled seeing the two of the bridge workers being thrown into the roiling water. As parts of the bridge were taken by the current, the men clung to tree branches. Fox wrote that “their cries for help were heart-rending,” but fortunately several people were able to find a steel reinforcing bar long enough to reach the men and pull them to safety.
Despite the sweeping scope of the destruction, people came together to repair the damage immediately. By August 30, 1911, the Baltimore Sun reported: “Herring Run Flood a Memory: All the damage done in the storm which raised Herring Run, in that immediate neighborhood, has been repaired.”
Sources:
“Flood and Fire in Big Storm: Herring Run Bridge Gone, Barns Burned – Two Inches of Rain Fell.” (August 4, 1911). The Evening Sun
“Flood Debris in Many Heaps: Traffic Out Harford Road is By Foot, 200 Men Are Busy Fixing.” (August 5, 1911). The Evening Sun
“Herring Run Flood a Memory.” (August 30, 1911). Baltimore Sun
“Our Readers Write: Herring Run Rescue.” (October 4, 1959). Baltimore Sun
Photo Credit: Maryland Department Photograph Collection: Enoch Pratt Public Library/state library resource center
Stream rises more than nine feet in less than five minutes, with a current of about 50 miles per hour.
In the summer of 1911, the area now known as the Hall Spring entrance to Herring Run Park was a busy and bustling place. Millworker’s houses lined Green’s Lane, across from the current playground. Green’s Cotton Mill was sited along the Herring Run. Trolleys ran along the old alignment of Harford Road. Workers were beginning to build the concrete foundations of the bridge that carried Harford Road over Herring Run.
Before the concrete for the bridge’s elegant arches had even set in its wooden forms, a flash flood swept through the Herring Run stream valley on August 4, 1911.
The Baltimore Sun described the flood as a “tearing, ripping, bounding, and boiling body of muddy destruction.” The stream rose more than nine feet in less than five minutes, with a current of about 50 miles per hour. The homes along Green’s Lane were flooded, the waters carried off the framework of two of the arches of the Harford Road bridge along with two of the construction workers. Two men were marooned on top of a storehouse, and trolley tracks, trees, and other debris were hurled as far as Clifton Park by the deluge.
Almost fifty years later, residents remembered the sudden and shocking force of the floodwaters. Writing to the Baltimore Sun in 1959, George Fox, the principal of Garrett Heights School in 1911, recalled seeing the two of the bridge workers being thrown into the roiling water. As parts of the bridge were taken by the current, the men clung to tree branches. Fox wrote that “their cries for help were heart-rending,” but fortunately several people were able to find a steel reinforcing bar long enough to reach the men and pull them to safety.
Despite the sweeping scope of the destruction, people came together to repair the damage immediately. By August 30, 1911, the Baltimore Sun reported: “Herring Run Flood a Memory: All the damage done in the storm which raised Herring Run, in that immediate neighborhood, has been repaired.”
Sources:
“Flood and Fire in Big Storm: Herring Run Bridge Gone, Barns Burned – Two Inches of Rain Fell.” (August 4, 1911). The Evening Sun
“Flood Debris in Many Heaps: Traffic Out Harford Road is By Foot, 200 Men Are Busy Fixing.” (August 5, 1911). The Evening Sun
“Herring Run Flood a Memory.” (August 30, 1911). Baltimore Sun
“Our Readers Write: Herring Run Rescue.” (October 4, 1959). Baltimore Sun
Photo Credit: Maryland Department Photograph Collection: Enoch Pratt Public Library/state library resource center
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