The Baltimore house where Gothic writer Edgar Allan Poe lived briefly in the 1830s has been declared a Literary Landmark.
The Edgar Allan Poe House in Baltimore has been a museum for 70 years and is an official National Historic Monument. Now the redbrick house at North Amity Street is officially a Literary Landmark too. On Monday, 20 January, on what would have been the writer's 211th birthday, the museum was awarded the distinction by United for Libraries. Poe House is the very first Literary Landmark in the state of Maryland.
Speaking to CBS Baltimore, historic preservation officer, Jackson Gilman Forlini, said: "this house receives its breath of life from Poe’s writing. Without Poe’s literary achievements, the house would have been torn down many years ago."
Poe didn't live in the Baltimore for long but the city held great significance for him regardless. It was where he met his wife and where he kickstarted his career, taking the leap from a poet to short story writer. He's also buried in the city, on the grounds of Westminster Hall. Today, Baltimore pays tribute to the writer in a number of ways. Its NFL team, the Ravens, is named after one of Poe's most famous poems (The Raven) and the team's three mascot ravens are named Edgar, Allan and Poe.
Poe, a writer of macabre sensibilities, was born in Boston but studied in Virginia and lived in Philadelphia and Baltimore. In addition to the museum in Baltimore, there are museums in the Bronx, Richmond and Philadelphia and societies dedicated to him around the world, including in Denmark and the Czech Republic.
The Edgar Allan Poe House is open from Thursday to Sunday between 11am and 4pm. Admission charges apply. For more information, see here.
