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

Not only was his family Latino, but Salinas and his wife were also bringing children to a block at a time when there were none.

The entire length of the block, Mauricio said -- "no kids."

The children of the 1950s were gone. The young postwar couples had aged and retired. Now, here came immigrants.

The Salinases had arrived in the United States from El Salvador more than a decade earlier. Ana came for a visit and soon found she made more money baby-sitting in Washington than she had as a secretary back home. Mauricio followed seven months later, finding work as a waiter. Thirty years later, he still has the seven one-dollar bills the restaurant owner tipped him his first night on the job.

"It's very important to me, the first money I made in this country," he said.

On Mason Street, the reception was slow to thaw. The Salinases were particularly hurt when a next-door neighbor died and it was months before anyone told them. And Mauricio described one former resident as "a very nice person, a couple years late."

Now Mauricio Salinas is 61; Ana Salinas is 57. They're very much at ease on a block that is home to immigrants from, among other places, Brazil, Ecuador and Nicaragua. But they feel it is time to go, and in a few weeks they are moving to a retirement community in Laurel.

They will leave reluctantly: In this house, Ana sprinkled holy water when they moved in. Here, the children grew up, and Mauricio fixed up the basement. Here, 10 years ago, Ana recovered from breast cancer, and the compassion of their neighbors finally emerged.

It will be hard to leave, they said, but the house will stay in the family. Their youngest son, David, 25, is moving in. He can keep an eye on things, his parents joked, and they'll still be close enough to keep an eye on him.

Air of Youthfulness

The newest resident of Mason Street arrived on a cold, windy night last month. It was snowing lightly when her father's Honda stopped outside the house with the statue of the Virgin Mary in the front yard.

Myriam McGovern had been born the night before in Holy Cross Hospital, and now her father, Tim, carried her across the lawn, while her mother, Lori, ushered her sister Therese, 2, up the front steps.

Tim McGovern, 27, information systems manager at the Heritage Foundation, and wife Lori, 26, are among Mason Street's latest arrivals.