Md. Street's Soul Hasn't Strayed Far From Roots

As Other Inner Suburbs Stumble, Area Grows Into Nest of Prosperity

Renny Rice is back home on Mason Street, dining at the table where he ate as a kid, living by himself now except for the two cats and the memories of his mother, who died in the back bedroom three years ago.

Harry and Helen Remmers have never left. They moved in a few doors down just after their house was built in 1949 and raised 12 children in a home that expanded with the family, growing from two bedrooms to four.

Mauricio and Ana Salinas were the first Latinos to move in. Now, years later, they have prospered and aged and are getting ready to move away. They will leave behind Lori and Tim McGovern and their new baby. And Vietnam veteran Jim Broeker, who says the street seems to be crawling with a fresh generation of kids, including his three.

The 2500 block of Mason Street, just off Georgia Avenue in Montgomery County's Glenmont neighborhood, is a stretch of 16 small homes built almost five decades ago. Long enveloped by sprawl, Mason Street has aged gracefully, resisting the poverty, crime and neglect that now define many of the nation's inner suburbs.

Helped by proximity to the Metro, immigration and the strong local economy, the solid little houses have maintained their value for an increasingly diverse group of residents.

They have sheltered some from youth to old age. They have served as a refuge for others. They have seen older immigrants arrive and flourish and newer immigrants become first-time homeowners. They have housed natives of Haiti, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Brazil. And, lately, they have seen young couples arrive to begin lives and families, just as other generations did decades ago.

Far from the posh mansions and townhouses of the outer Washington region's development, the homes of Mason Street are, at first glance, unremarkable: wood-frame boxes that suggest the pieces on a board game. They are throwbacks -- products of the desperate post-World War II housing shortage and the idea that the average citizen ought to be able to afford a home. Designed with a living room, two bedrooms and a 60-by-120 foot piece of land, they constituted the American dream house.

In many ways, they still do.

Desperate for a Home

The first time Harry Remmers traveled out along Georgia Avenue to see Mason Street, it was a dirt road. Georgia Avenue was then two lanes. There was an old grammar school nearby and a roadside tavern but little else. It was the boondocks.

A January 1949 newspaper ad described the Mason Street homes as one-story bungalows with two bedrooms and a "full" basement.

"Seemed pretty nice," Remmers said.

Mason Street was part of an early suburban development built on 73 acres just west of Glenmont's old elementary school, a mile north of Wheaton.