Painting by Greg OttoMontgomery Park
1800 Washington Blvd. | Baltimore, MD 21230
| Ph. 410.385.1235
home // overview // history.html
CELEBRATION The Montgomery Ward Catalog House and Retail Store was Baltimore's largest mercantile building and the city's first suburban department store when it opened on Aug. 1, 1925. Even then, Wards was quick to promote one of the site's best features – plenty of free parking– in early advertising campaigns.
FAMILIARITY For more than three quarters of a century, the broad Art Deco edifice has been a familiar sight in southwest Baltimore. Over the years, Wards added to the complex, but the main structure looks much as it did in the 1920s and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
WORKING TOGETHER Local government played an important role in attracting Wards to install major operations in Baltimore. In 1919, the Baltimore Association of Commerce approached Montgomery Ward to recommend the city for the company's eastern regional headquarters. Theodore F. Merseles, president of Montgomery Ward & Co., later said in a letter to The Baltimore Sun that the "fine public spirit and interest shown by officials and citizens of Baltimore was a major factor in influencing the company to select Baltimore for its Eastern Headquarters."
MEASURABLE SUCCESS The city's initiative paid off: Montgomery Ward brought 1,500 jobs to Baltimore, sold locally manufactured merchandise through its catalog and touted the city by prominently featuring "Baltimore" on all regional catalogs and advertising. With Wards arrival, mail receipts in Baltimore increased 10 percent; the city had to give the company its own postal zone.
PEAK OF PERFORMANCE The Baltimore catalog house was designed by Montgomery Ward's in-house Engineer of Construction, W.H. McCaully, and was built by Wells Brothers Construction Company. It was the seventh of nine industrial warehouses that Wards constructed around the country in the early 20th century when the mail order industry was at its peak. But the robust on-site retail store, featuring 30,000 items in 86 departments, was an early sign of impending change: the suburbanization of shopping and the decline of the mass merchandise catalog.
RENAISSANCE Today, the former catalog house has a new purpose: satisfying the increasing demands for flexible office space that offers both urban flair and suburban amenities. Montgomery Park perfectly serves those needs, paying homage to history while building for the future through job creation, economic growth and neighborhood revitalization.
And there's still plenty of free parking.
