Historian shows JHU families B'more

Zippy Larson, a local Baltimore historian, gave a lecture as part of Family Weekend this past Saturday. The operator of a Baltimore walking tour business, Larson touched upon the unique aspects of the different Baltimore neighborhoods in her talk.

"That's the whole vehicle for me [giving tours] – so I can learn, and you can come along," Larson said.

Dan Ferrara, Administrative Coordinator for the Office of Student Life and one of the coordinators of Family Weekend, invited Larson to Hopkins for this Family Weekend event.

He knew her through a colleague at Student Life, because Larson had recently also been involved with the University's B'More intersession program.

Ferrara thought that Larson's story would be interesting to parents and students alike.

The room was packed — people were standing by the windows because there were no more seats. However, most of the audience members were adults and not undergraduates.

Despite the older audience, Larson's message was received clearly. "[I wanted people to know that] Baltimore is thoroughly entertaining and highly educational," Larson said.

The spectators had mixed reviews of Larson's speech.

"I loved listening to the anecdotes and history of the different neighborhoods. However, I was a little disappointed because she did not give enough insight into the flavors of the neighborhoods today," Kim Sparber, the parent of a Hopkins undergraduate, said.

Others felt that Larson was only promoting herself and her business, not speaking about the different aspects of the neighborhoods, as the lecture appeared to promise.

Still other people enjoyed the hour-long discussion.

"She's great. I know Baltimore, and she knows more than I do," Sandy Pfeffer, a parent of a Hopkins undergraduate, said. "She gave a very authentic feel to parts of Baltimore not on the beaten path."

Larson has spent almost her entire life in Baltimore. She was born in 1932 in the neighborhood the Foot of Broadway, now called Fell's Point. Larson attended Baltimore City Public Schools, and trained to be a nurse at Sinai Hospital.

In 1977, Larson and her husband, who worked for Westing House, moved to Shiraz, Iran.

"All [the] Iranians I met talked about America. . . and I realized they knew more about it than I did," Larson said.

Larson moved back to Baltimore in 1978, and enrolled at Goucher College with a newfound desire to learn more about her beloved city.

She transferred to University of Baltimore, taking as many classes in Baltimore history as she could. One professor stood out in Larson's mind.

"He took us to the railroad museum, stood on a caboose and told us about the hobos who rode the rails," Larson said.

It was the little details such as the lives of the hobos on the B&O railroad that got Larson invested in "behind the scenes" aspects of Baltimore. She believed that the important parts of Baltimore's history were found in the stories of the elderly.

After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in History from the University of Baltimore, Larson decided to start her investigations with questions. She would visit classic places around the different neighborhoods and speak to the oldest people there.

She gathered different stories by asking simple questions such as, how long have you lived here? How long has your family been here? Which generation came to America?

Larson was so invested in the lives of others, that all she wanted to do was share their stories. She tried telling her friends and family everything she had heard, but realized she needed another outlet when one friend said to her, "Would you please shut up and find a tourist?"

So she did. Larson used these stories when she began giving walking tours of Baltimore. In 1982, she led her first tour leaving from the Inner Harbor, and walking east toward Little Italy.

This first tour cost five dollars a person for a three hour walk that focused on row houses, ground rent, and the Italian heritage of the area.

"At that time, there were twenty-three restaurants in Little Italy, twenty-one of them were owned by the Italian families who started them," Larson said.

As her tours grew in popularity, Larson began creating more and more "behind the scenes of Baltimore" tours. She aimed to find places not open to the public.

"I tell people when they call me for a tour, ‘you're not going to see another tourist, is that okay?'" Larson said.