In Key Bridge collapse, Baltimore lost a piece of its cultural identity

BALTIMORE– Generations of Maryland workers — longshoremen, sailors, steelworkers and crabbers whose livelihoods depend on the Port of Baltimore — watched in disbelief this week as an iconic symbol of their maritime culture crumbled into the Patapsco River.

The deadly collapse of the historic Francis Scott Key Bridge has shaken Baltimore to its core.

“What happened was quite a travesty,” said Joe Wade, a retired longshoreman who remembers fishing near the bridge as a child. “I’m not a crier, but…I got emotional.”

Baltimore was a port long before it was incorporated as a city – and long before the United States declared its independence from Great Britain. Many of the city’s brick row houses were built to house fishermen, dockworkers and sailors. They earned a reputation for being pioneering and tough, unafraid of rough seas and long days.

It’s a cultural identity that endures among modern watermen like Ryan “Skeet” Williams, who makes a living harvesting crabs from the Chesapeake Bay.

“We are rough and salty,” he said. “You build your own life.”

Williams relied on the Key Bridge to connect his small maritime community outside Baltimore to Maryland’s Eastern Shore, the lifeblood of the state’s robust fishing industry. Many of his friends and relatives used the bridge for their daily commute.

Scott Cowan, president of the International Longshoremen’s Association Local 333, said the union represents about 2,400 people whose jobs are now at risk. Shipping traffic through the Port of Baltimore cannot resume until the underwater wreckage is cleared.

“They always say it’s the port that built the city,” said Cowan, who followed in his father’s footsteps decades ago when he became a longshoreman.

The disaster early Tuesday marks the latest blow to a city whose storied history is often lost in conversations about its more recent struggles: poverty, violent crime and population loss.

Six members of a road construction crew were killed after a 1,000-foot freighter lost power and crashed into the bridge, eliminating a key chunk of Baltimore’s skyline and halting maritime traffic to one of the East Coast’s busiest ports .

In the aftermath, some experts wondered whether the span’s support columns should have been better protected from the giant container ships that would routinely sail past them. But Baltimore is an old city with an aging infrastructure that often receives little attention from national politicians.

Officials have promised to rebuild the Key Bridge, but that could take years.

“This is no ordinary bridge. This is one of the cathedrals of American infrastructure,” US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said at a press conference in Baltimore earlier this week. “So the road to normality will not be easy. It won’t be soon. It won’t be cheap.”

Baltimore became a world leader in shipbuilding early in its history. It later became a major transportation hub with the addition of a railroad connecting the East Coast to the Midwest and beyond.

During the War of 1812, British forces attacked Baltimore in hopes of weakening its industrial and maritime power. But American troops successfully defended Fort McHenry in south Baltimore, and the invasion inspired Francis Scott Key to write the national anthem after he witnessed an American flag flying defiantly overhead after a night of heavy bombing.

More than 150 years later, construction began on a bridge that would be named after him.

The Key Bridge opened in 1977 and spanned 1.6 miles at the entrance to the Port of Baltimore, allowing residents to cross the waterway without driving through the city. It provided a direct link between two water-oriented working-class communities that emerged during World War II – when nearby steel mills produced hundreds of massive warships to aid in the defense effort.

Baltimore’s history is filled with iconic characters, from rogue pirates and corrupt politicians to beloved poet Edgar Allan Poe and jazz legend Billie Holiday. Despite everything, the port was a relative constant.

It has enabled countless people to earn a decent living by showing up and putting in the hours, including immigrants and other disenfranchised groups. And it has remained an economic engine, adapting and evolving even as other local businesses closed their doors due to the decline in industrial production.

It currently handles more cars and agricultural machinery than any other port in the country. Last year alone, the country handled $80 billion in foreign cargo, Maryland Governor Wes Moore said at a news conference earlier this week.

“The collapse of the Key Bridge is not just a crisis in Maryland. The collapse of the Key Bridge is a global crisis,” he said. “The national economy and the global economy depend on the Port of Baltimore.”

The men who died in the collapse were filling holes during a night shift. While police quickly stopped traffic after the ship sent out a distress signal, they didn’t have time to alert the construction crew — a group of Latino immigrants actively pursuing the American dream.

Two survivors were rescued almost immediately and divers found two bodies the next day. The remaining four victims are still missing and presumed dead.

Advocates say their deaths take on greater significance in the context of the myriad challenges immigrants face in the US. The men performed physically demanding work for relatively low wages. They worked at night to ensure that Maryland commuters were not inconvenienced.

It’s no surprise that these already disenfranchised workers are the ones who ultimately paid the ultimate price, says Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president of the Baltimore-based nonprofit Global Refuge. Immigrants will almost inevitably also be involved in the bridge’s reconstruction, she added.

The workers came to Maryland from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras in search of higher wages and better opportunities for themselves and their families.

By settling in the Baltimore area, they contributed to a long history of immigration that has played a key role in shaping the city’s culture and commerce. That history is inextricably linked to the port.

Between the Civil War and World War I, Baltimore became one of the nation’s largest gateways for European immigrants. In 1868, an immigration pier opened in south Baltimore, not far from the historic battlefield where the Star-Spangled Banner originated.

Many immigrants passed through the city on their way to the Midwest, but others stayed and settled. Those without specialized skills or higher education worked at the docks and rail yards, often alongside African Americans who came north to escape slavery. Their contributions are commemorated at the Baltimore Immigration Museum, which is housed in a historic building built in 1904 to house European immigrants.

“Baltimore became a true melting pot of cultures,” says local historian Johns Hopkins, who directs the nonprofit organization Baltimore Heritage.

In more recent decades, Latino immigrants have settled in and around Baltimore, although other cities have received larger influxes, likely because they are experiencing greater job growth.

CASA, an immigrant advocacy group based in Maryland, has been in contact with two of the families whose loved ones are still missing. Both men – Maynor Suazo Sandoval and Miguel Luna – were husbands and fathers who left their home country more than fifteen years ago.

“These construction workers are absolutely essential,” said Gustavo Torres, the organization’s executive director. “At a time when there is so much hatred toward the immigrant community, we look to Maynor and Miguel’s calm leadership and appreciate how they preserve our society so that Americans can live comfortably.”

Many longshoremen and thousands of others used the Key Bridge every day.

They, along with their neighbors, woke up Tuesday morning to news of its demise and quickly logged onto social media, still in disbelief. They watched video footage showing every detail of the catastrophic collapse, repeating the horrific sequence until it finally seemed real.

Watching much of their city’s infrastructure crumble like a toy, some Baltimoreans felt an uneasy sense of shock, shocked by the realization that anything could happen.

In the days that followed, many residents stopped at various viewpoints near the collapse site to inspect the wreckage and pay their respects. Some remembered how the bridge took shape in the 1970s and arched majestically over the water.

“It was always there. It was a milestone,” said Niki Putinsky, who lived for years in a small residential area at the foot of the bridge. “I just didn’t think anything could bring it down like that.”

The entire city is grieving, said Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott, whose father moved to Baltimore as a young man to work at the port. But there’s a reason why Baltimoreans are known for their perseverance and perseverance, Scott said.

“You can’t talk about Baltimore – past, present and future – without talking about the Port,” he said. “And this will be the latest example of Baltimore’s recovery. That’s really ingrained in us here. We don’t give up, we ignore the noise and we keep that gritty chip on our shoulder.”

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Associated Press video journalist Nathan Ellgren contributed to this report from Baltimore.