BCPL History and Genealogy - Perry Hall around 1950: A Suburban Community Develops.
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Perry Hall around 1950: A Suburban Community Develops
by David Marks
Historian, Perry Hall Improvement Association

During the First and Second World Wars, many residents of Perry Hall served their country, some paying the ultimate sacrifice. When Perry Hall Elementary School opened in 1956, a plaque recognizing these soldiers was placed at the base of the school flagpole. Old and weathered, it is the only permanent structure acknowledging these Perry Hall veterans.

Perry Hall's contributions to the war effort did not end with this memorial plaque. Like most Americans, residents conserved supplies and grew Victory gardens during the war, and Perry Hall's farms furnished crops for soldiers and other sectors of the economy. Immediately after the war, Perry Hall residents banded together to collect crutches, wheelchairs, and other equipment for veterans returning home. It was one of our finest moments: a spirit of compassion and unity reflective of a small town pulling together during difficult times.

Out of this effort came the Perry Hall Improvement Association. No formal organization had ever been needed to unify the Perry Hall community, where families knew each other and problems could easily be solved through the neighborhood grapevine. During the Great Depression, for example, families often bartered their crops. since money was virtually useless. The Second World War, however, brought an end to the Great Depression, a surge in industrial development, and a mass exodus of city residents to the suburbs. It was inevitable that Perry Hall would grow A permanent organization was needed to lobby for the needs of the changing community.

The first meeting of the Perry Hall Improvement Association was held on July 31st, 1945, as the Second World War was coming to a close. Forty-nine residents were present. From that original meeting, an organization evolved which has fought for appropriate zoning, development, and community standards for over a half-century.

The Perry Hall Improvement Association was able to obtain the community's first street lights, at Joppa, Forge, and Cross Roads and Stirred and Boer Avenues. It prevailed on the State Roads Commission to lower the speed limit through Perry Hall from 50 to 30 miles per hour. It lobbied the school system for extra bus stops for the community's students, who then attended Stemmers Run High School.

The organization's most active efforts have been in opposing projects deemed detrimental to the greater Perry Hall community. Shortly after it was founded, for example, the association worked with St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church and local home owners to oppose an open-air movie theater on Belair Road. Had this been built, a drive-in theater would now be resting at the location of the present-day Belmont neighborhood. The association also opposed a greyhound race track on Forge Road, a trailer camp on Cliffvale Avenue, and several junk yards throughout Perry Hall.

Rather than just being reactive, the Perry Hall Improvement Association has lobbied for new projects to serve the community's growing population. Its most successful endeavor, for example, was the Northeast Library Association, formed to acquire a new public library in Perry Hall. That effort culminated in 1963, when the Perry Hall library was dedicated by Baltimore County Executive Spiro T. Agnew, Congressman Clarence Long, and dozens of local leaders.

During those early years, the Perry Hall Improvement Association was a social nucleus for the community It hosted dances, parties, and Bingo nights at the old Perry Hall School, now the Gribbin Center. it also started a Perry Hall tradition, the Halloween parade, which began in 1949 with a procession of church groups and Scouting units down Belair and Ebenezer Roads. Perry Hall activist Buddy Butt always played his trademark accordion.

Back in those days, the community was small enough to still have parades down Belair Road. Perry Hall was changing, though, and signs of postwar urbanization were everywhere. William Schaefer built hundreds of brick bungalows in the area between Belair and Ebenezer Roads, while other neighborhoods were popping up off of Baker Lane and Walter Avenue.

In 1956, the Perry Hall Medical Group opened their building at Belair Road and Cliffvale Avenue, with offices for doctors and a dentist. Perry Hall's first drug store opened there in the same building. Meanwhile, land was being churned down the road for Perry Hall's first shopping center, which opened in 1961 on Ebenezer Road. Perry Hall Shopping Center, as it was then known, included the community post office, a branch of Maryland National Bank, Read's, Woolworth' s, and one of the first bowling alleys in the community.

A visitor to Perry Hall at mid-century would have found a rural village at the threshold of suburbanization. The community was still a collection of farms and forests, but the scattered housing developments and new buildings signaled an impending wave of growth which would change the place forever.

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The text version of this page was last revised on 26 August 2008.
The graphics version of this page was last revised on 26 August 2008.
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