Same Town, Different Communities

Longtime Black Residents, Latino Newcomers Live Together and Apart in North Brentwood

A photo from the late 1930s of neighbors William H. Thomas, left, and Mack Brown. "Change comes," said Eleanor Traynham, 71, Thomas's granddaughter. (Courtesy Of Eleanor Traynham)

Ask older residents of historic North Brentwood their recollections of the town, and they go into a reverie about kids playing house-to-house and about how the town was self-contained with businesses and shops. Mostly, it was black, and the generations who had lived there gave the place its essence.

But "change comes," said Eleanor Traynham, 71, who was born and raised in the town, in Prince George's County, and returned in 1992. And "you have to be able to adapt to change."

On a late afternoon, children run across the lawns of modest three-bedroom homes, young mothers carry groceries, and fathers in coveralls arrive home from work. These families are Latino. A few yards away, much older residents are checking mail or working on their cars or greeting each other with late-day banter. They are black.

In a town changing without overt rancor, they are neighbors without the neighborliness, separate groups leading lives that don't touch, even though their property lines do. It's a new challenge for this historic place -- re-creating community.

It's a challenge that plays out against a backdrop of seismic demographic shifts. In 2003, Latinos overtook African Americans as the nation's most populous minority. Fueled by a boom in construction and low-wage service jobs, the Washington region had the ninth-largest Latino population gain in the country from 2000 to 2004.

In Prince George's, most of the Latino population, which doubled from 1990 to 2000, is concentrated inside the Beltway in the northwestern part of the county. As more Latinos graduate to homeownership, the relative affordability of housing in communities there has accelerated the pace of change.

In North Brentwood, population nearly 500, off Rhode Island Avenue just outside the District line, these shifts play out door-to-door. Since 2000, the historically black town has become 25 percent Hispanic.

Some black residents are concerned about what these changes mean for their community, even as they worry about seeming intolerant. Newer Hispanic residents say they get along with everyone, and if there is subtle awkwardness to their brief hello-goodbye exchanges with black neighbors, they're too busy working and raising their families to notice.

Originally settled by black Civil War troops, North Brentwood became the first incorporated black town in Prince George's -- and one of the first in the state -- in 1924, a thriving hamlet of single-family homes and businesses.

It had a tavern with a dance floor where such stars as Pearl Bailey performed. In 2003, the town was put on the National Register of Historic Places. Today, along leafy streets, small cottages border towering home construction and wide new additions.

One recent late afternoon, Santos Benitez, 27, a construction worker, was caring for his four children, ranging from 3 months to 10 years old, while his wife worked. The Salvadoran immigrant moved from a house in Northeast Washington two months ago. "This house is a lot bigger," said Diego Benitez, 10, who was skating in the driveway with his brothers Jonathan, 6, and Brian, 7. Santos Benitez said his neighbors didn't talk much, except when one came over to complain about his dog.

Hiawatha Crank, 55, a plumber and diesel mechanic originally from South Carolina who moved to North Brentwood in 1980, said the community feel reminded him of home. He noticed the first Latino family five years ago. "Man, it seemed like after that happened, the sky broke loose, and they came from everywhere," he said.