XVI. The Horseshoe Bend in the Falls

To the north, the obstacle to development was the horseshoe
bend in the Jones Falls which stood in the path of Calvert
Street. Overlooking the Falls, just outside the original Town
boundary, was a seven and one-half acre bluff of land. In 1747 it
was still titled in the name of Charles Carroll of Annapolis but
Baltimore Town Commissioner Alexander Lawson also had some
interest in it. In that year the Commissioners employed surveyor
Nicholas Ruxton Gay to lay out lots on this high ground along
with convenient streets and alleys (Figure 6). Carroll
transferred outright ownership to Lawson in May of 1757.72 The
Lawson tract is represented on Figure 9.

Barely a month before, Charles Carroll of Annapolis sold the
land opposite the Lawson tract to Dr. William Lyon. The Lyon's
tract was a wooded marsh of approximately thirteen and one-half
acres. In 1759, only two years after acquiring the parcel, Lyon
sold it to a butcher named Andrew Steiger who cleared it for
pasturage for his cattle; the tract was called Steiger's Meadow.
The Jones Falls served as a boundary between the two parcels; the
deeds described each tract as "bounding on it"; Lawson and
Steiger were cross-current riparians73 (Figure 9b) .

Although Alexander Lawson had no success in marketing his
building lots on the bluff, he was able to sell several larger
parcels. In 1765 he sold eighty feet of ground east of Calvert
Street to the Presbyterians, who completed their First Church in

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