7/22/2023 0 Comments Color me blue book"It was their own internet," she said, noting that the Blue Book went beyond just addresses. Still, the Historical Society's O'Neill said the Blue Book "doesn't have quite the same rigid hierarchy that it did in the old days." It's not in any way talking about race itself, and yet you look at the map on the website, and you see that it has a lot to do with those boundaries," Glotzer said. "It was so strange to me," said Glotzer, who spoke with residents who owned Blue Books. The Blue Book's demographic maps seemed to be doing the same thing, she said. Glotzer said areas like Roland Park, Guilford and Homeland were historically white, and the Blue Book registry was often used to ensure those listed married within the same area and income bracket "to keep money in the right type of families." Through research and a glimpse at a color-coded demographic map on the Blue Book's website, which features categories like "private schools," "upscale retail," "home is paid off," "advanced degrees," "well-traveled," and "'Soccer Mom' + Kids," Glotzer noticed that the map featured boundaries geographically similar to those seen at the height of segregation in the early 1900s. "One thing that it's doing is still reflecting patterns of racial discrimination that came with the rise of suburban housing in the early 20th century," Glotzer said. While preparing her doctoral dissertation at the Johns Hopkins University on housing segregation in Baltimore, she found that old habits die hard. Paige Glotzer, a Harvard University postdoctoral fellow in economics, history and politics, said the Blue Book has been a guide to unveil a legacy of discrimination in the city. Monaghan did not respond to multiple inquiries over several months for this story. An estimated 12,000 names appeared in the book nearly 55 years ago about 2,400 families were listed in 2002, according to a Baltimore Sun article at the time that featured former editor Jennifer Roebuck.Ĭontacted by The Sun, Blue Book editor William Macsherry declined to comment unless he got approval from publisher Hugh Monaghan. The debutante listing has dwindled to 25 young women in the 2016 edition, with just four events. Its social media following is small - 73 Facebook likes since launching in April 2014, its Twitter account features a mere 31 tweets, with no retweets. Today, the Blue Book has a website, with posts about art galleries, restaurants and social events.
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