Greenbook: A Local Guide to Chesapeake Living - Issue 6 | Page 19

Neighborhood spotlight
greenbook
J. Melvin Premier properties

Bay Ridge, MD
Story By: Liz Osborn - 443.699.2689

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ay Ridge is a large but compact neighborhood founded at the end of a long peninsula that
juts into the Chesapeake Bay. The area began as a humble weekend resort community that
appealed to Washington, DC and Baltimore commuters. However, over the past two decades,
it has become one of the most affluent and expensive waterfront neighborhoods in Anne Arundel County.
Historical records show ownership of Bay Ridge began in the late 1600s, when farmer Thomas Tolly
staked out a large plot on the peninsula. A succession of owners cultivated the land until the late 1700s,
when Henrietta Margaret Hill Ogle and her husband Benjamin (governor of Maryland from 1798-1801)
purchased “Ogleton” a 470-acre plantation.
In the late 1800’s, a grand 150-acre resort and amusement park was built on Tolly Point. Serviced by
an interior road and water ferries, the “Queen Resort of the Chesapeake” hosted