If you're a College Gardens resident, you may not know...
... that you live on a 250-year-old farm
... that you're part of a radical experiment in urban design
... that you may have paid more for your car than the original owners did for your house
... that you live near a piece of Watergate history*
Here you'll find some historical background on:
the land College Gardens was built on and what was here before it
the development of College Gardens as a community
* "One and a half miles north of the Rockville depot was Westmore, a minor stop on the B & O rail line. It was intended to serve the late 19th-century subdivision of "West End Park," but this huge planned development failed in the depressions of the 1890s. Long after the train ceased to stop here, the area developed as Woodley Gardens.
"During the Senate Watergate Subcommittee hearings, conspirator James McCord revealed that at a public telephone booth in this area he received orders to carry out the Watergate burglary in 1972."
...... from the "Historic and Architectural Guide to The Rockville Pike" by Eileen S. McGuckian
.......(Peerless Rockville Historic Preservation, Ltd. 1997)
Many thanks to Bill Hickman and Paul O'Brien for providing the copies of sales brochures and other information used in this site, and especially to Bill for keeping records of CGCA history and issues through the years and his generosity in sharing them.
Some of the information the Anderson farm and its history is from an article in the November, 1982 CGCA newsletter (author unknown) and from the book Rockville: Portrait of a City by Eileen McGuckian, Hillsboro Press, 2001.
Thanks to Mary and J.P. Richard and to Zelda Young for information on the history of the Anderson Farm.
This site can be expanded in many directions. It can serve as a source of interesting information about our community as well as a stimulus to investigate more aspects of the history of College Gardens and the land it occupies.
You can help!
If you have saved copies of photos, brochures, or other original material related to the early days of Plymouth Village/College Gardens, please let let us know! We can scan and return material to you quickly and in its original condition.
If you're willing to spend a bit of time to write down some of your recollections of living in College Gardens in its earlier days, please share them with us by email or on paper.