Fells Point

And it was so rotted out.

And he said, oh, yeah, Divine was the last person to live in the house because it was kind of like abandoned that Fells Point demolished them.

But then Vince ended up buying the ones around it.

So that's actually where that was shot.

Oh! Because last time when Chris and I were down there, it was empty.

It wasn't open as anything.

Hey, Chris, what did you think of Fells Point, Baltimore, like when you first saw

it? I loved it.

Yeah, a lot of us have.

And a lot of brothers, like when we worked down at Fell's Point that night, a lot of brothers stopped.

A lot of violent things, a lot of fighting, stabbing,

shooting.

Yeah, you experienced, I mean, we've all experienced, um...

I mean, where was I the other day? I mean, I, it's, it's, like, yeah, I, I remember leaving liturgy one Sunday and I walked down to Fells Point, and, uh, I forget what it was.

Maybe I just went down there to grab a bite to eat after liturgy.

And I go down there, and this, like, homeless guy was literally like, "Don't get close to me, white boy.

That's why you know about Baltimore.

Fells Point and all that

... and then there were these, there were these grace, great, uh, house parties, uh, at a converted funeral home called The Mansion.

[laughs]

so strong was my desire that i thought a gratification of it would fully compensate for whatever loss of comforts i should sustain by the exchange i left without a regret and with the highest hopes of future happiness we sailed out of miles river for baltimore on a saturday morning i remember only the day of the week for at that time i had no knowledge of the days of the month nor the months of the year on setting sail i walked aft and gave to colonel lloyd's plantation what i hoped would be the last look i then placed myself in the bows of the sloop and there spent the remainder of the day in looking ahead interesting myself in what was in the distance rather than in things near by or behind in the afternoon of that day we reached annapolis the capital of the state we stopped but a few moments so that i had no time to go on shore it was the first large town that i had ever seen and though it would look small compared with some of our new england factory villages i thought it a wonderful place for its size more imposing even than the great house farm We arrived at Baltimore early on Sunday morning, landing at Smith's Wharf, not far from Bowley's Wharf.

We had on board the sloop a large flock of sheep, and after aiding and driving them to the slaughterhouse of Mr. Curtis on Loudon Slater's Hill, I was conducted by Rich, one of the hands belonging on board of the sloop, to my new home in Alice Anna Street, near Mr. Gardner's shipyard, on Fell's Point.

mr and mrs auld were both at home and met me at the door with their little son thomas to take care of whom i had been given and here i saw what i had never seen before it was a white face beaming with the most kindly emotions it was the face of my new mistress sophia i wish i could describe the rapture that flashed through my soul as i beheld it it was a new and strange sight to me brightening up my pathway with the light of happiness little thomas was told there was his freddy and i was told to take care of little thomas and thus i entered upon the duties of my new home with the most cheering prospect ahead i look upon my departure from colonel lloyd's plantation as one of the most interesting events of my life it is possible and even quite probable that but for the mere circumstance of being removed from that plantation to baltimore i should have to-day instead of being here seated by my own table in the enjoyment of freedom and the happiness of home writing this narrative been confined in the galling chains of slavery going to live at baltimore laid the foundation and opened the gateway to all my subsequent prosperity i have ever regarded it as the first plain manifestation of that kind providence which has ever since attended me and marked my life with so many favors i regarded the selection of myself as being somewhat remarkable there were a number of slave children that might have been sent from the plantation to baltimore there were those younger those older and those of the same age i was chosen from among them all and was the first last and only choice i may be deemed superstitious and even egotistical in regarding this event as a special interposition of divine providence in my favor but i should be false to the earliest sentiments of my soul if i suppress the opinion i prefer to be true to myself even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others rather than to be false and incur my own from my earliest recollection i date the entertainment of a deep conviction that slavery would not always be able to hold me with its foul embrace and in the darkest hours of my career in slavery this living word of faith and spirit of hope departed not from me but remained like ministering angels to cheer me through the gloom this good spirit was from god and to him i offer thanksgiving and praise chapter five chapter six of narrative of the life of frederick douglass an american slave written by himself by frederick douglass my new mistress proved to be all she appeared when i first met her at the door a woman of the kindest heart and finest feelings she had never had a slave under her control previously to myself and prior to her marriage she had been dependent upon her own industry for a living she was by trade a weaver and by constant application to her business she had been in a good degree preserved from the blighting and dehumanizing effects of slavery

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We would make them no answer, and leave them to find out as best they could.

Then they would curse and swear at us, telling us that they would take the devil out of us in a very little while, if we were only in their hands.

while in jail we found ourselves in much more comfortable quarters than we expected when we went there we did not get much to eat nor that which was very good but we had a good clean room from the windows of which we could see what was going on in the street which was very much better than though we had been placed in one of the dark damp cells upon the whole we got along very well so far as the jail and its keeper were concerned immediately after the holidays were over contrary to all our expectations mr hamilton and mr freeland came up to easton and took charles the two henrys and john out of jail and carried them home leaving me alone i regarded this separation as a final one it caused me more pain than anything else in the whole transaction i was ready for anything rather than separation i suppose that they had consulted together and had decided that as i was the whole cause of the intention of the others to run away it was hard to make the innocent suffer with the guilty and that they had therefore concluded to take the others home and sell me as a warning to the others that remained it is due to the noble henry to say he seemed almost as reluctant at leaving the prison as at leaving home to come to the prison but we knew we should in all probability be separated if we were sold and since he was in their hands he concluded to go peaceably home i was now left to my fate i was all alone and within the walls of a stone prison but a few days before and i was full of hope i expected to have been safe in a land of freedom but now i was covered with gloom sunk down to the utmost despair i thought the possibility of freedom was gone i was kept in this way about one week at the end of which captain auld my master to my surprise and utter astonishment came up and took me out with the intention of sending me with a gentleman of his acquaintance into alabama but from some cause or other he did not send me to alabama but concluded to send me back to baltimore to live again with his brother hugh and to learn a trade thus after an absence of three years and one month i was once more permitted to return to my old home at baltimore my master sent me away because there existed against me a very great prejudice in the community and he feared i might be killed in a few weeks after i went to baltimore master hugh hired me to mr william gardner an extensive shipbuilder on fell's point i was put there to learn how to it however proved a very unfavorable place for the accomplishment of this project mr gardner was engaged that spring in building two large man-of-war brigs professedly for the mexican government the vessels were to be launched in the july of that year and in failure thereof mr gardner was to lose a considerable sum so that when i entered all was hurry there was no time to learn anything every man had to do that which he knew how to do in entering the shipyard my orders from mr gardner were to do whatever the carpenters commanded me to do this was placing me at the beck and call of about seventy-five men i was to regard all these as masters their word was to be my law my situation was a most trying one at times i needed a dozen pair of hands i was called a dozen ways in the space of a single minute three or four voices would strike my ear at the same moment it was fred come help me to cant this timber here fred come carry this timber yonder fred bring that roller here fred go get a fresh can of water fred come help saw off the end of this timber fred go quick and get the crowbar fred hold on the end of this fall fred go to the blacksmith's shop and get a new punch hurry fred run and bring me a cold chisel i say fred bear a hand and get up a fire as quick as lightning under that steam-box halloo nigger come turn this grindstone come come move move and bows this timber forward i say darkey blast your eyes why don't you heat up some pitch halloo halloo halloo three voices at the same time come here go there hold on where you are damn you if you move i'll knock your brains out this was my school for eight months and i might have remained there longer but for a most horrid fight i had with four of the white apprentices in which my left eye was nearly knocked out and i was horribly mangled in other respects the facts in the case were these until a very little while after i went there white and black ship carpenters worked side by side and no one seemed to see any impropriety in it all hands seemed to be very well satisfied many of the black carpenters were freemen things seemed to be going on very well all at once the white carpenters knocked off and said they would not work with free colored workmen the reason for this as alleged was that if free colored carpenters were encouraged they would soon take the trade into their own hands and poor white men would be thrown out of employment they therefore felt called upon at once to put a stop to it and taking advantage of mr gardner's necessities they broke off swearing they would work no longer unless he would discharge his black carpenters now though this did not extend to me in form it did reach me in fact my fellow-apprentices very soon began to feel it degrading to them to work with me they began to put on airs and talk about the niggers taking the country saying we all ought to be killed and being encouraged by the journeymen they commenced making my condition as hard as they could by hectoring me around and sometimes striking me i of course kept the vow i made after the fight with mr covey and struck back again regardless of consequences and while i kept them from combining i succeeded very well for i could whip the whole lot of them taking them separately they however at length combined and came upon me armed with sticks stones and heavy handspikes one came in front with a half brick there was one at each side of me and one behind me while i was attending to those in front and on either side the one behind ran up with a handspike and struck me a heavy blow upon the head it stunned me i fell and with this they all ran upon me and fell to beating me with their fists i let them lay on for a while gathering strength in an instant i gave a sudden surge and rose to my hands and knees just as i did that one of their number gave me with his heavy boot a powerful kick in the left eye my eyeballs seemed to have burst when they saw my eye closed and badly swollen they left me with this i seized the handspike and for a time pursued them but here the carpenters interfered and i thought i might as well give it up it was impossible to stand my hand against so many all this took place in sight of not less than fifty white ship carpenters and not one interposed a friendly word but some cried kill the damned nigger kill him kill him he struck a white person i found my only chance for life was in flight i succeeded in getting away without an additional blow and barely so for to strike a white man is death by lynch law and that was the law in mr gardner's shipyard nor is there much of any other out of mr gardner's shipyard i went directly home and told the story of my wrongs to master hugh and i am happy to say of him irreligious as he was his conduct was heavenly compared with that of his brother thomas under similar circumstances he listened attentively to my narration of the circumstances leading to the savage outrage and gave many proofs of his strong indignation at it the heart of my once overkind mistress was again melted into pity my puffed-out eye and blood-covered face moved her to tears she took a chair by me washed the blood from my face and with a mother's tenderness bound up my head covering the wounded eye with a lean piece of fresh beef it was almost compensation for my suffering to witness once more a manifestation of kindness from this my once affectionate old mistress master hugh was very much enraged he gave expression to his feelings by pouring out curses upon the heads of those who did the deed as soon as i got a little the better of my bruises he took me with him to esquire watson's on bond street to see what could be done about the matter mr watson inquired who saw the assault committed master hugh told him it was done in mr gardner's shipyard at midday where there were a large company of men at work as to that he said the deed was done and there was no question as to who did it his answer was he could do nothing in the case unless some white man would come forward and testify he could issue no warrant on my word if i had been killed in the presence of a thousand colored people their testimony combined would have been insufficient to have arrested one of the murderers master hugh for once was compelled to say this state of things was too bad of course it was impossible to get any white man to volunteer his testimony in my behalf and against the white young men even those who may have sympathized with me were not prepared to do this it required a degree of courage unknown to them to do so for just at that time the slightest manifestation of humanity toward a colored person was denounced as abolitionism and that name subjected its bearer to frightful liabilities the watchwords of the bloody-minded in that region and in those days were damn the abolitionists and damn the niggers there was nothing done and probably nothing would have been done if i had been killed such was and such remains the state of things in the christian city of baltimore master hugh finding he could get no redress refused to let me go back again to mr gardner he kept me himself and his wife dressed my wound till i was again restored to health he then took me into the shipyard of which he was foreman in the employment of mr walter price there i was immediately set to caulking and very soon learned the art of using my mallet and irons in the course of one year from the time i left mr gardner's i was able to command the highest wages given to the most experienced caulkers i was now of some importance to my master i was bringing him from six to seven dollars per week i sometimes brought him nine dollars per week my wages were a dollar and a half a day after learning how to caulk i sought my own employment made my own contracts and collected the money which i earned my pathway became much more smooth than before my condition was now much more comfortable when i could get no calking to do i did nothing during these leisure times those old notions about freedom would steal over me again when in mr gardner's employment i was kept in such a perpetual whirl of excitement i could think of nothing scarcely but my life and in thinking of my life i almost forgot my liberty i have observed this in my experience of slavery that whenever my condition was improved instead of its increasing my contentment it only increased my desire to be free and set me to thinking of plans to gain my freedom i have found that to make a contented slave it is necessary to make a thoughtless one it is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision and as far as possible to annihilate the power of reason he must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery he must be made to feel that slavery is right and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man i was now getting as i have said one dollar and fifty cents per day i contracted for it i earned it it was paid to me it was rightfully my own yet upon each returning saturday night i was compelled to deliver every cent of that money to master hugh and why not because he earned it not because he had any hand in earning it not because i owed it to him nor because he possessed the slightest shadow of a right to it but solely because he had the power to compel me to give it up the right of the grim-visaged pirate upon the high seas is exactly the same chapter ten CHAPTER XI.

i now come to that part of my life during which i planned and finally succeeded in making my escape from slavery but before narrating any of the peculiar circumstances i deem it proper to make known my intention not to state all the facts connected with the transaction my reasons for pursuing this course may be understood from the following first were i to give a minute statement of all the facts it is not only possible but quite probable that others would thereby be involved in the most embarrassing difficulties secondly such a statement would most undoubtedly induce greater vigilance on the part of slaveholders than has existed heretofore among them which would of course be the means of guarding a door whereby some dear brother bondman might escape his galling chains i deeply regret the necessity that impels me to suppress anything of importance connected with my experience in slavery it would afford me great pleasure indeed as well as materially add to the interest of my narrative were i at liberty to gratify a curiosity which i know exists in the minds of many by an accurate statement of all the facts pertaining to my most fortunate escape but i must deprive myself of this pleasure and the curious of the gratification which such a statement would afford i would allow myself to suffer under the greatest imputations which evil-minded men might suggest rather than exculpate myself and thereby run the hazard of closing the slightest avenue by which a brother slave might clear himself of the chains and fetters of slavery i have never approved of the very public manner in which some of our western friends have conducted what they call the underground railroad but which i think by their open declarations has been made most emphatically the upper ground railroad i honor those good men and women for their noble daring and applaud them for willingly subjecting themselves to bloody persecution by openly avowing their participation in the escape of slaves i however can see very little good resulting from such a course either to themselves or the slaves escaping while upon the other hand i see and feel assured that those open declarations are a positive evil to the slaves remaining who are seeking to escape they do nothing towards enlightening the slave whilst they do much towards enlightening the master they stimulate him to greater watchfulness and enhance his power to capture his slave we owe something to the slaves south of the line as well as to those north of it and in aiding the latter on their way to freedom we should be careful to do nothing which would be likely to hinder the former from escaping from slavery i would keep the merciless slaveholder profoundly ignorant of the means of flight adopted by the slave i would leave him to imagine himself surrounded by myriads of invisible tormentors ever ready to snatch from his infernal grasp his trembling prey let him be left to feel his way in the dark let darkness commensurate with his crime hover over him and let him feel that at every step he takes in pursuit of the flying bondman he is running the frightful risk of having his hot brains dashed out by an invisible agency let us render the tyrant no aid let us not hold the light by which he can trace the footprints of our flying brother but enough of this i will now proceed to the statement of those facts connected with my escape for which i am alone responsible and for which no one can be made to suffer but myself in the early part of the year eighteen thirty eight i became quite restless i could see no reason why i should at the end of each week pour the reward of my toil into the purse of my master when i carried to him my weekly wages he would after counting the money look me in the face with a robber-like fierceness and ask is this all he was satisfied with nothing less than the last cent he would however when i made him six dollars sometimes give me six cents to encourage me it had the opposite effect i regarded it as a sort of admission of my right to the whole the fact that he gave me any part of my wages was proof to my mind that he believed me entitled to the whole of them i always felt worse for having received anything for i feared that the giving me a few cents would ease his conscience and make him feel himself to be a pretty honorable sort of robber my discontent grew upon me i was ever on the lookout for means of escape and finding no direct means i determined to try to hire my time with a view of getting money with which to make my escape in the spring of eighteen thirty eight when master thomas came to baltimore to purchase his spring goods i got an opportunity and applied to him to allow me to hire my time he unhesitatingly refused my request and told me this was another stratagem by which to escape he told me i could go nowhere but that he could get me and that in the event of my running away he should spare no pains in his efforts to catch me he exhorted me to content myself and to be obedient he told me if i would be happy i must lay out no plans for the future he said if i behaved myself properly he would take care of me indeed he advised me to complete thoughtlessness of the future and told me to depend solely upon him for happiness he seemed to see fully the pressing necessity of setting aside my intellectual nature in order to contentment in slavery but in spite of him and even in spite of myself i continued to think and to think about the injustice of my enslavement and the means of escape about two months after this i applied to master hugh for the privilege of hiring my time he was not acquainted with the fact that i had applied to master thomas and had been refused he too at first seemed disposed to refuse but after some reflection he granted me the privilege and proposed the following terms i was to be allowed all my time make all contracts with those for whom i worked and find my own employment and in return for this liberty i was to pay him three dollars at the end of each week find myself in caulking tools and in board and clothing my board was two dollars and a half per week this with the wear and tear of clothing and caulking tools made my regular expenses about six dollars a week this amount i was compelled to make up or relinquish the privilege of hiring my time rain or shine work or no work at the end of each week the money must be forthcoming or i must give up my privilege this arrangement it will be perceived was decidedly in my master's favor it relieved him of all need of looking after me his money was sure he received all the benefits of slaveholding without its evils while i endured all the evils of a slave and suffered all the care and anxiety of a freeman i found it a hard bargain but hard as it was i thought it better than the old mode of getting along it was a step towards freedom to be allowed to bear the responsibilities of a freeman and i was determined to hold on upon it i bent myself to the work of making money i was ready to work at night as well as day and by the most untiring perseverance and industry i made enough to meet my expenses and lay up a little money every week i went on thus from may till august master hugh then refused to allow me to hire my time longer the ground for his refusal was a failure on my part one saturday night to pay him for my week's time this failure was occasioned by my attending a camp meeting about ten miles from baltimore during the week i had entered into an engagement with a number of young friends to start from baltimore to the camp-ground early saturday evening and being detained by my employer i was unable to get down to master hugh's without disappointing the company i knew that master hugh was in no special need of the money that night i therefore decided to go to camp-meeting and upon my return pay him the three dollars i stayed at the camp-meeting one day longer than i intended when i left but as soon as i returned i called upon him to pay him what he considered his due i found him very angry he could scarce restrain his wrath he said he had a great mind to give me a severe whipping he wished to know how i dared to go out of the city without asking his permission i told him i hired my time and while i paid him the price which he asked for it i did not know that i was bound to ask him when and where i should go this reply troubled him and after reflecting a few moments he turned to me and said i should hire my time no longer that the next thing he should know of i would be running away upon the same plea he told me to bring my tools and clothing home forthwith i did so but instead of seeking work as i had been accustomed to do previously to hiring my time i spent the whole week without the performance of a single stroke of work i did this in retaliation saturday night he called upon me as usual for my week's wages i told him i had no wages i had done no work that week here we were upon the point of coming to blows he raved and swore his determination to get hold of me i did not allow myself a single word but was resolved if he laid the weight of his hand upon me it should be blow for blow he did not strike me but told me that he would find me in constant employment in future i thought the matter over during the next day sunday and finally resolved upon the third of september as the day upon which i would make a second attempt to secure my freedom i now had three weeks during which to prepare for my journey early on monday morning before master hugh had time to make any engagement for me i went out and got employment of mr butler at his ship-yard near the drawbridge upon what is called the city block thus making it unnecessary for him to seek employment for me at the end of the week i brought him between eight and nine dollars he seemed very well pleased and asked me why i did not do the same the week before he little knew what my plans were my object in working steadily was to remove any suspicion he might entertain of my intent to run away and in this i succeeded admirably i suppose he thought i was never better satisfied with my condition than at the very time during which i was planning my escape the second week passed and again i carried him my full wages and so well pleased was he that he gave me twenty-five cents quite a large sum for a slaveholder to give a slave and bade me to make good use of it i told him i would things went on without very smoothly indeed but within there was trouble it is impossible for me to describe my feelings as the time of my contemplated start drew near i had a number of warm-hearted friends in baltimore friends that i loved almost as i did my life and the thought of being separated from them forever was painful beyond expression it is my opinion that thousands would escape from slavery who now remain but for the strong cords of affection that bind them to their friends the thought of leaving my friends was decidedly the most painful thought with which i had to contend the love of them was my tender point and shook my decision more than all things else besides the pain of separation the dread and apprehension of a failure exceeded what i had experienced at my first attempt the appalling defeat i then sustained returned to torment me i felt assured that if i failed in this attempt my case would be a hopeless one it would seal my fate as a slave forever i could not hope to get off with anything less than the severest punishment and being placed beyond the means of escape it required no very vivid imagination to depict the most frightful scenes through which i should have to pass in case i failed the wretchedness of slavery and the blessedness of freedom were perpetually before me it was life and death with me but i remained firm and according to my resolution on the third day of september eighteen thirty eight i left my chains and succeeded in reaching new york without the slightest interruption of any kind how i did so what means i adopted what direction i travelled and by what mode of conveyance i must leave unexplained for the reasons before mentioned i have been frequently asked how i felt when i found myself in a free state i have never been able to answer the question with any satisfaction to myself it was a moment of the highest excitement i ever experienced i supposed i felt as one may imagine the unarmed mariner to feel when he is rescued by a friendly man-of-war from the pursuit of a pirate in writing to a dear friend immediately after my arrival at new york i said i felt like one who had escaped a den of hungry lions this state of mind however very soon subsided and i was again seized with a feeling of great insecurity and loneliness i was yet liable to be taken back and subjected to all the tortures of slavery this in itself was enough to damp the ardor of my enthusiasm but the loneliness overcame me there i was in the midst of thousands and yet a perfect stranger without home and without friends in the midst of thousands of my own brethren children of a common father and yet i dared not to unfold to any one of them my sad condition i was afraid to speak to any one for fear of speaking to the wrong one and thereby falling into the hands of money-loving kidnappers whose business it was to lie in wait for the panting fugitive as the ferocious beasts of the forest lie in wait for their prey the motto which i adopted when i started from slavery was this trust no man i saw in every white man an enemy and in almost every colored man cause for distrust it was a most painful situation and to understand it one must needs experience it or imagine himself in similar circumstances let him be a fugitive slave in a strange land a land given up to be the hunting-ground for slaveholders whose inhabitants are legalized kidnappers where he is every moment subjected to the terrible liability of being seized upon by his fellow-men as the hideous crocodile seizes upon his prey i say let him place himself in my situation without home or friends without money or credit wanting shelter and no one to give it wanting bread and no money to buy it and at the same time let him feel that he is pursued by merciless men hunters and in total darkness as to what to do where to go or where to stay perfectly helpless both as to the means of defence and means of escape in the midst of plenty yet suffering the terrible gnawings of hunger in the midst of houses yet having no home among fellow-men yet feeling as if in the midst of wild beasts whose greediness to swallow up the trembling and half-famished fugitive is only equalled by that with which the monsters of the deep swallow up the helpless fish upon which they subsist i say let him be placed in this most trying situation the situation in which i was placed then and not till then will he fully appreciate the hardships of and know how to sympathize with the toil-worn and whip-scarred fugitive slave thank heaven i remained but a short time in this distressed situation i was relieved from it by the humane hand of mr david ruggles whose vigilance kindness and perseverance i shall never forget i am glad of an opportunity to express as far as words can the love and gratitude i bear him mr ruggles is now afflicted with blindness and is himself in need of the same kind offices which he was once so forward in the performance of toward others i had been in new york but a few days when mr ruggles sought me out and very kindly took me to his boarding-house at the corner of church and lespinard streets mr ruggles was then very deeply engaged in the memorable darg case as well as attending to a number of other fugitive slaves devising ways and means for their successful escape and though watched and hemmed in on almost every side he seemed to be more than a match for his enemies very soon after i went to mr ruggles's he wished to know of me where i wanted to go as he deemed it unsafe for me to remain in new york i told him i was a calker and should like to go where i could get work i thought of going to canada but he decided against it and in favor of my going to new bedford thinking i should be able to get work there at my trade at this time anna my intended wife came on for i wrote to her immediately after my arrival at new york notwithstanding my homeless houseless and helpless condition informing her of my successful flight and wishing her to come on forthwith she was free in a few days after her arrival mr ruggles called in the rev j w c pennington who in the presence of mr ruggles mrs michaels and two or three others performed the marriage ceremony and gave us a certificate of which the following is an exact copy This may certify that I joined together in holy matrimony Frederick Johnson and Anna Murray as man and wife in the presence of Mr. David Ruggles and Mrs. Michaels.

It's got the mayor of Baltimore there with a Baltimore strong hoodie on.

And it's got all these happy, mostly white people with their thumbs up saying, for a Fells Point, Baltimore, our community is back.

Yeah.

Thank you, Mayor Scott.

No more teen takeovers.

Safe streets, strong businesses, a better Baltimore.

Fells Point thanks Mayor Brandon Scott.

Keep it up.

So my partner and I run Offagato.

It is the cat cafe in Fells Point.

We're lucky to have a good landlord, but talking to our neighbors, we found out a lot of them don't.

And in the past year, we've had about five businesses across the street alone within view of the front of our cafe that have been closed.

I knew this issue was bad, but after founding this effort and meeting so many other small businesses, I don't think I even scratched the surface in terms of understanding of just what some folks are dealing with.

And I think before we dive into kind of some of the specifics of the bill and everything, I just want to share a story that I think really hits home why this is so important.

Ernestine, a small business owner who is part of our effort, opened a dream business, a community deli in Fells Point.

It was going really well.