Right in front of you, you’ll spot a grand, yellow mansion with enormous white columns and an elegant staircase-just look for the building that seems fit for royalty hiding behind the trees!
Welcome to the Evergreen Museum & Library, where history meets opulence and a little bit of mystery hangs in the air. Take a second and imagine the year is 1878. You’re standing outside the brand-new home of John W. Garrett, the president of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad-a man whose family could probably afford more trains than most people have socks! The Garretts didn’t just want a house; they wanted their own “slice of Europe in Baltimore.” So, they began transforming a simple Italianate home into a 48-room Gilded Age palace set on 26 beautiful acres. Can you picture Victorian ladies in gowns and men with top hats marching up these steps? Maybe you'll even hear the as we step back in time.
Inside, the Garretts were all about living big. Imagine a wing with its own bowling alley-talk about living the “high score” life. Thomas Harrison Garrett, John’s son, loved to impress friends with a billiard room and a gym. You might smell rich cigar smoke, hear laughter echoing through hallways, and see the shimmer of 23-karat gold in the bathroom. Later, they went even further: Thomas’s son John Work Garrett turned the bowling alley into an art gallery and built a private theatre-where the Russian artist Léon Bakst painted the stage. Sometimes, the place feels like it’s one inspiration away from turning water into champagne! Every room is packed with treasures: a red Asian-inspired sanctuary filled with Japanese and Chinese art, glowing Tiffany glass, or Dutch marquetry that would make a royal jealous.
Even more magical is the library. Picture the hush of ancient leather-bound books-over 30,000 of them, including Shakespeare folios older than your granddad’s oldest joke. Tucked away are natural history volumes, original art plates, and American treasures, like the first booklet ever printed in colonial Maryland. Somewhere inside, you can almost hear the as scholars and curious visitors search for secrets.
Evergreen stayed in the Garrett family until 1952, when they generously handed it over to Johns Hopkins University. Today, visitors wander through a mansion where the air hums with stories of art, travel, and invention. Who knows-maybe if you press your ear to a library wall, you’ll hear the faint laughter of the Garretts, still debating who bowled the last strike.
