As Woodbridge becomes Marumsco, more than the name changes

People who live behind the fast-food joints, car repair shops and strip malls lining a nondescript stretch of Route 1 in southeastern Prince William County can be forgiven for not knowing where they are.

They think they live in Woodbridge. And until last week, they did.

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Thousands of Prince William County residents who thought they lived in Woodbridge were surprised to learn that, according to the 2010 Census, that's no longer true. In consultation with county officials, the Census Bureau has sliced away about three-quarters of Woodbridge's former territory and renamed it Marumsco.

But now they live in a place called Marumsco.

Marumsco is one of Prince William's seven new "census-designated places." It effectively consumed most of Woodbridge, gobbling up about 80 percent of the land mass and almost 90 percent of the residents.

But nobody bothered to tell the Marumscans. And many of them say they want no association with the name, even if they live in subdivisions called Marumsco Acres and Marumsco Woods, send their children to Marumsco Hills Elementary School or visit the barber at the Marumsco Shopping Plaza.

The demographics of Marumsco and the new, smaller Woodbridge are strikingly different, a gap that some residents said gives Woodbridge more panache.

"I'm glad I'm moving if I can't say I live in Woodbridge anymore," said John Armstrong, 62, a government contractor whose house has been foreclosed on. "To me, Woodbridge suggests upscale and successful. Marumsco is just a shopping center."

After every 10-year U.S. Census, many places are given new names in the sprawling, unincorporated suburbs of Maryland and Virginia. The census bases its maps on the advice it gets from local officials.

In Prince William, places such as Marumsco, Bull Run Mountain Estates and Neabsco - all new designated places - exist solely on census maps, and the designation has no effect on how the areas are governed or policed, or how the mail is delivered.

But because place names can reflect and amplify the identity of those who live there, new names can be contentious.

John Kent Cooke aroused indignation when he named the Landover property around Redskins Stadium "Raljon" in tribute to his sons Ralph and John. But he stuck to it, until new team owner Dan Snyder reclaimed the old name.

Marketers for National Harbor initially considered a separate Zip code for their massive, upscale development so they wouldn't have to share one with the less- flashy Oxon Hill.

The mountain that Alaskans call Denali is still called Mount McKinley by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names.

"Names are very important to people," said Richard L. Forstall, a former census official who served on the federal board when the Denali vs. McKinley naming debate erupted 30 years ago. "They have associations, mainly for local people."

The name Marumsco, an Algonquin Indian name meaning island rock, was adopted for subdivisions of small tract houses with two or three bedrooms, one bathroom and no garage that predominate in the neighborhoods off Route 1. In recent years, many of the homes with choice views of the Potomac River have been torn down and replaced by showplace mansions with three-car garages that at the peak of the housing boom sold for more than $1 million.

Today, those neighborhoods are filled with "for sale" signs, and many of the grander homes have been emptied of furniture.