Fells Point Fun Festival

(Fells Point Fun Festival flyer, UB Archives)


My research this week led me to the Fells Point Fun Festival, a locally popular event in Fells Point. The festival was started in 1967 with the intent of exhibiting the finer qualities of the area. The SCAR coalition was trying to battle back at a wave of negative sentiment regarding the appearance of Fells Point. The SCAR collection is replete with references to poor sanitation and widespread vagrancy in the areas saturated by bars. In effect, Fells Point was slowly moving toward classification as an inner city slum.

The Society for the Preservation of Fells Point created the Fun Festival to bring businesses and people together in the community. They posted advertisements in their newsletter, The Packet, to attract vendors and festival-goers. The August 2008 issue of The Packet described the Fun Festival as the "inauguration of the urban preservation movement in Baltimore." The festival was one of many ways that the community fought back against the tide of urbanization in an historic area.