The Monkton Hotel’s original entrance was along Monkton Road, which has since been rerouted and is much closer to the building. A long porch ran the span of the hotel, which over time crumbled and was demolished, though there are no records of when that occurred. Photo courtesy of the the Historical Society of Baltimore County.
A place to live, work and play — for over 150 years.
The Monkton Hotel, built in 1858, is on the National Registry of Historic Landmarks. The Hotel was a convenient stop on the railway between Baltimore and York, PA. The property has had many owners over the years, and now serves multiple use as mixed commercial and residential property. It’s a place for a handful of residents looking for a longer term rental and escape the hustle and bustle of city life. There is the Fishing Lodge which can be rented for one or more nights. And then there is the vibrant Monkton Hotel Cafe and Monkton Bike & Tube Rental right downstairs!
A Short History
Monkton Station, completed in 1838, and the surrounding Village was a principal stop on the railway that is nearly equidistant between York and Baltimore, and the Monkton Hotel and town grew up in part because of its proximity to both and as a stop in between. By 1852, Monkton was flourishing, and according to a local history written by Shirley Clemens, the area “was listed as convenient to mills, schools, houses of public workshop and the railroad station.”
The Hotel appears to have been built just before the Civil War under the direction of Samuel Miller, and was surely a backdrop for the ongoing conflict related to the Baltimore-York railway and transportation of slaves. Scott Mingus’s definitive book “Soldiers, Spies & Steam: A History of the North Central Railway in the Civil War” describes how in 1861 over 67,000 soldiers were transported from Harrisburg to Baltimore alone. Bridges along the railway were regularly sabotaged, and the Hotel was at the crossroads, quite literally. The Hotel also served the local community, such as a place for prayer and preaching on Sundays for the nearby Monkton United Methodist Church. Other landmarks, like the Milton Inn and the Old Gorsuch Tavern predated the Hotel and cropped up alongside the grist and saw mills that were dotting the landscape.
The Monkton Hotel, a part of the My Lady’s Manor National Register historic district and County historic district, is joined by the saddlery, the Town Hall, the Station Master’s House, two grist mills (one of which has since been washed away, the other is being restored) and the United Methodist Church, St. James Church and other similar properties all were part of a growing community in the same time period. The Hotel also became a destination for those who wanted to find relief from the city crowds, noise and pollution; even today, this is remarkably true as Monkton continues to remain a rural getaway from the urban and suburban development in and around Baltimore.
The rail line and Monkton Station remained active through 1972 when there was much damage as a result of hurricane Agnes. The NCR trail was later repurposed in its place, bringing thousands of visitors north and south on bike and foot. Recognizing the abandoned rail line’s potential as a recreational trail, the department purchased the abandoned line between Cockeysville and the Pennsylvania Line in the early 1980s. Thanks to volunteers and a great believer and advocate for the trail, Dr. Torrey C. Brown, then secretary of the Department of Natural Resources, the first section of the Northern Central Railroad Trail opened to the public in 1984.