Anne's in Love: With Baltimore: Part II

Soon after Liz picked me up at the train station, we headed for the Edgar Allan Poe House & Museum on 203 North Amity Street. It's technically the Maria Clemm house, because it was owned by Poe's aunt Maria with whom he lived for a couple of years (in addition to several of his cousins, one of whom he married, named Virginia). Liz mentioned that the Poe place was not in the nicest part of town, and there'd be a security guard or cop on the corner to keep an eye on the comings and goings. She was right.

The Poe House is only open from 12-3:45 pm a few days a week, so we made sure to arrive early. As we approached the address, we saw a large man standing in front of the house. It soon became apparent that this guy was not a security guard in sweatpants, but just another tourist like us. He had an enormous camera around his neck. We parked, got out of the car, and walked to the entrance. The guy said, "The woman with the key said she'd be back in fifteen minutes." Apparently he'd been waiting awhile. I nicknamed the large sweatpant-ed man "The Ambassador," because he seemed to be the sentinel whose sole responsibility was to tell the other arriving tourists that "The woman with the key said she'd be back in fifteen minutes." She lied to the Ambassador. She didn't arrive for about 45.

So, there we are, me and Liz, standing out front of the Poe place with the Ambassador, and it was just a little more than awkward. I turned to read the informative plaque, which was prominently displayed next to the front door. "Oh, that's right," I recalled as I read it, "He only lived here a two years in the 1830's." A few summers ago, I finished a 400-page biography of Poe and knew that even though he died in Baltimore, he was born in Boston and lived in New York far longer than anywhere, and this museum wasn't going to be much more than a "Poe Slept Here" type of place.

Then the ambassador blurted out, "Yeah. I'm pretty sure he died here. In this house." I paused to think about what he said, and then gave the Ambassador a quizzical look. "No, I don't think so..." as Liz and I walked away from him to wait on the corner for the "woman with the key." I knew Poe didn't die in that house. He died over ten years later of unknown causes in a Baltimore tavern. I knew this fact because of the biography, but the Ambassador could have known it too, had he ONLY READ THE PLAQUE ON THE FRONT OF THE HOUSE IN WHICH HE WAS STANDING FOR AN HOUR:

You'd think that a dude, travelling alone, who came all this way from out of town to see the Poe House would read the friggin' plaque. Click to enlarge.

The other thing was that as more tourists arrived and waited for "the woman with the key" (and read the plaque, I may add), they wanted to take pictures of their children in front of the Poe house (see below). But the Ambassador apparently was none the wiser. Not budging from his spot at the front door, first in line, he'll be forever memorialized in everyone's shots checking his cellphone:

At any rate, the house has none of the original furnishings in it, but is interesting because of it's age and the tiny winding wooden staircase to the room on the third floor where Poe slept. I doubt the Ambassador was able to get himself up there. It was one at a time viewing with a lot of "Watch your head" warnings about the 19th century ceiling height and whatnot.

Here's the lot which lies directly across the street from the Poe house:

Here is the fuzz on the corner, and a few scenes from our wait for the "woman with the key." How cute are these tykes?

Children on Amity Street in Baltimore, MD 5/5/07

The last time Liz and I saw the Ambassador, he was on foot to the Poe gravesite along this street with the "woman with the key" calling after him, "Don't play around in any abandoned houses!" Liz said as she started up the car, "What a strange thing to say to someone. What kind of person would play in abandoned houses?"

"Oh, I don't know," I replied, "Me."

Part III: Poe's Final Resting Place