A Community Built On a Shared Need

The organization will cover an area extending south from Braddock Road, between Union Mill Road and Ox Road/Route 123, to the Occoquan River. Cole said about 30,000 people live in the area, 3,000 of them 65 or older. Dues have been set at $100 a year.

"That's the challenge for us," said organizer William W. Cole, 77. "If you want to pick up three people to go to the grocery store, they're not going to be neighbors."

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The hitching post is long gone, but people still drop by Davis's General Store to pick up salt lick, horse feed, house paint, guns or the latest gossip.

Last week, the talk was about the bailout plan on Capitol Hill, and what the halting economy would mean, and how their neighbors are now two sorts of people. Brian Bennett, who bought the store 20 years ago, said there are the newcomers -- young folks with big money who moved into the mansions carved out of old farms -- and old-timers whose children are graying.

To outsiders, the area seems like a wealthy enclave, with a touch of horse country for the middle- and upper-classes. But appearances mask the number of house-rich older people whose wealth is locked into their homes and who get by on modest pensions.

Bennett said he would like to know more about the Clifton-Fairfax Station village, which to him seems like a reasonable idea.

"Houses are little farther apart, and the driveways a little longer, but the needs are still the same," he said.