The mall was a development of the Mondawmin Corporation, a firm set up in 1952 by James Rouse and Hunter Moss under the Moss-Rouse Company.

It is a common misconception that poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow suggested to Macaulay that he should name the estate after a Native American god of corn, Mondamin, referenced in the poem "The Song of Hiawatha."

[6] In 1949, Alexander Brown Griswold approached James Rouse and asked what he could develop on 46 acres of property on the outskirts of Baltimore City.

Vacant space was occupied by the department of social services, where 35 people were held hostage in May 1977 by an unemployed man facing court action.

They performed a large-scale renovation in 1983, sectioning the vacant Sears into smaller store spaces and adding a parking garage to the west end of the structure.

[citation needed] With the acquisition of the Rouse Company by Chicago-based General Growth Properties, in 2004, Mondawmin Mall became a GGP holding.

[citation needed] During the 2015 Baltimore riots, police protected the Mondawmin Mall for a short period of time, eventually closing in the mid afternoon.

Mondawmin Mall was prominently featured in the movie Species II, 1998, starring Michael Madsen and Marg Helgenberger.