Northwood News ♦ December 2007

Caddington Chit-Chat

By Linda S. Perlman

I had just turned two years old when my parents moved into a new home in Dan Ostrow’s Forest Knolls development.  This house, a “Hunter Split” model, according to the sales brochure, featured “four levels of living space for maximum value, beautiful contemporary lines, oversized family and dining room with high vaulted ceiling, and huge kitchen, magnificently equipped, perfectly located.”  The sales price in November 1957 was approximately $19,000.

Caddington Avenue was named for Ward Caddington, a Democratic party official in Montgomery County.  The developer, Dan Ostrow, president of Forest Knolls, Inc., was apparently a bit of a scoundrel who disappeared for a time to Tahiti or South America, causing great consternation among new homeowners who wanted problems with their houses fixed and prospective homeowners who worried about the completion of their homes and loss of their deposits.  The situation deteriorated to the point that Ken Young (then of 1114 Caddington, later Democrat precinct chair for most of the 1960s) proposed picketing the Forest Knolls sales office, a motion voted down by the fledgling, long defunct, Forest Knolls neighborhood association.  Mr. Young recalls representatives of the builder coming to his house to inspect unfinished and defective items and having to run an extension cord approximately 50 yards to a neighbor’s house in order to power the refrigerator.  Eventually, most of the problems were fixed.

Forest Knolls Elementary School (then serving grades K through 6) opened in September 1960, just in time for me to enter Mrs. Walton’s kindergarten class.  The Forest Knolls school district included the area bounded by Caddington, Loxford, and Hannes and then “behind the school” (as we called it) approximately to Eisner.  The rest of the children in the NFCCA area would have gone to Four Corners Elementary School, now redeveloped into The Oaks senior apartments.  There was a babysitting co-op which my mother helped organize; Esther Kaufman (1132 Loxford) ran a nursery school from her home for a time; and residents joined together to open Forest Knolls Pool where I took swimming lessons and spent a large part of my summers.

Everyone walked to school in those days.  The neighborhood was predominately white, with a sizeable Jewish (but not Orthodox) population.  Families had only one car.  Most mothers stayed at home and didn’t work outside of the home until their children were well along in school.  Houses only had one or two (corded) phones; we had a party line (phone number JU8-5747) for many years and had to wait until the line was free to make a call.  Black and white televisions were the norm; I was envious of a friend who had an early color TV.  I rode my bike, roller skated on the sidewalk, played kickball, joined Brownies and then Girl Scouts (we met at the Rec Center), bowled at Woodmoor Shopping Center (the bowling alley location is now the Silver Spring Stage), bought school supplies at Larry’s 5-and-10 and candy at Doc’s drug store, and shopped at the newly opened Wheaton Plaza.

I moved back to Forest Knolls in August 2006.  Physically, the neighborhood looks much as it did when I was a child.  Trees are bigger; additions and decks have been built onto houses; many driveways have morphed from narrow concrete strips to fill front yards; and multiple cars and trucks crowd the streets and yards.  The population, similar to the rest of Montgomery County, is much more racially and culturally diverse.  Forest Knolls Elementary School still educates neighborhood children and the pool continues to provide summer recreation for children and adults.  Northwood High School has reopened, changing the name of its sports teams from the politically incorrect “Indians” to the “Gladiators.”

A few of the original Forest Knolls families remain, including my next-door neighbors, the Soo Hoos, and the Lundens on Chiswell.  There is still no 1202 Caddington, an unsolved mystery.  The “plenty of closet space” and “huge kitchen” promised by the sales brochure are small by today’s standards, although I suspect that such boasts were puffery even in 1957.  After having lived in a condominium for the previous 18 years, where maintenance was the responsibility of the condominium association and repairs were initiated by filling out a work order form at the front desk, I am discovering the “joys” of homeownership and the work involved in maintaining and improving a 50-year old house.  Still, it’s nice to be back and to sit on the back screen porch enjoying the evening ... under the glare of Northwood’s new stadium lights.

Stadium Lights at Northwood

The Northwood High School scoreboard is directly behind my house and my neighbor’s house.  New stadium lights illuminating the football field and track have been installed to facilitate night football games and other events.  I went to a Montgomery County Public Schools meeting on the proposed stadium lighting in late March 2007.  The lighting was presented as a done deal; the type of lights and a contractor to install the lighting had already been chosen.  The stadium lights, it was promised, would shine on the athletic field only and not on the adjacent residences.  That representation may be true, if the area between the field and the residences is level; instead, my yard is downhill from the field.  The lights are bright in my back yard, but I don’t mind because:  (1) this allows me to engage in outdoor activities or back yard lawn work in the evening, and (2) there aren’t that many evening games and the games don’t last that long.

More annoying is the loudspeaker announcement of the game (although I was pleased to note that Northwood’s football team beat Blair on September 14th for its first victory since the school reopened) and accompanying “music.”  I complained about the loud hip hop (or whatever it was) music to my father.  However, I did so in the car when my radio was tuned to a classic rock/oldies station.  My father simply pointed to the car radio and noted that my opinion of today’s teen’s music was probably similar to his opinion of the music I listened to as a teenager.  A poignant reminder that there’s still a generation gap, but now I’m the older generation!

[“Chit-Chat” was the name of the Forest Knolls Elementary School mimeographed literary publication produced in 1966-1967 by Mr. Beegle’s 6th grade class.  Linda Perlman is the NFCCA treasurer for FY 2007-2008.]   ■