Signs of People
Victor Gustav Bloede
"I live on the street by the post office, so when I walk the dog, I'll see myself in this sign. This post office has been here since the forties. The basement is a fallout shelter in case there's ever a nuclear war." Josh Noppenberger, construction program manager for public safety projects.
"As kids, we'd go down to Bloede's dam in the summertime and slip and slide on it when it was covered in algae, jumping into the Patapsco River. The dam was demolished in a huge explosion in 2018 because it was no longer functional, was dangerous for swimmers, and blocked fish migration. I love history, I'm fascinated with connections. Bloede built quite a nice house in Eden Terrace called Arden and raised his family there. They suffered a terrible tragedy during the Christmas holidays when he lost a son to pneumonia and, a day later, their house burned down.”
Victor Gustav Bloede
Catonsville's most noted scientist and philanthropist, Victor Gustav Bloede, perfected the formula for the glue for postal stamps. His formula was used by the federal government for about 50 years, beginning in 1916. This technique helped revolutionize mail delivery in the United States, as reliable adhesive postal stamps enabled people to prepay for postage and send letters from neighborhood mailboxes or their own homes, rather than having to go to the post office.
Bloede was a brilliant chemist born in Germany who moved to Catonsville in early 1886 to be closer to his manufacturing plant about three miles east of Catonsville. Bloede's family settled first in New York, where he studied chemistry and developed his first patent around age 18. He invented the first ink stain-removing pen in 1869 and designed the first submerged hydroelectric plant, known as the Bloede Dam, completed in 1908.
Bloede invested heavily in the development of Catonsville. He helped bring electricity to parts of town and the surrounding area, advocated for affordable public transit to Baltimore via trolley, co-founded the First National Bank of Catonsville (640 Frederick Road), and funded a hospital for tuberculosis patients. Dedicated to a life of continual curiosity, Victor Gustav Bloede worked in his lab until his death at age 88.
Bloede's first home in Catonsville, Arden, circa 1891-1900. Courtesy of Baltimore County Public Library.