Merryman Lane

Merryman Lane is a diagonal alley in the Waverly neighborhood of Baltimore City that runs between 32nd and 33rd Streets and Barclay Street and Greenmount Avenue. The lane borders the former site of School 115, also known as the Waverly School. Roberta Sheridan was the first African American woman to be hired as a public teacher in predominantly black Baltimore City (and indeed, in all of Maryland), and she taught at this school beginning in 1888. For a long time, all that remained of this historic landmark was a parking lot and a trash-filled lot.

Following a long trajectory of painting murals as part of the designs of gardens installed by the Civic Works Community Lot Team, Emily C-D was invited by Lot Team director Ed Miller to develop artwork to commemorate the historical significance of the site and compliment the plantings of the recently installed garden that had already done much to transform the space. Together with the Lot Team, Emily worked with Jessie Unterhalter and Katey Truhn (as the artist trio Can Collective), members of the Waverly Main Street Association, and several local historians in order to conceptualize artwork that honored the history while activating the present space. Based on their research, and influenced by the native flora of the garden, Can Collective designed and had fabricated steel silhouette sculptures of Ms. Sheridan and her students, which were installed among the plants and around the pathways. The sculpture garden honors the historical struggle and achievements of African Americans in education in Baltimore, MD. Once a space of segregated learning, the triangle-shaped lot below Merryman Lane has become a reflective gathering place for everyone, where the plants and the art are the teachers.