If ten generations of a Rockville family possessed the stamina to stand on the corner of Middle Lane and Washington Street, what would they have witnessed over the years? 

Arriving in the 1740s, this family rolled their tobacco crops past this spot and down the main road to market.  They would have marveled at Gen. Edward Braddock’s army marching through  toward the frontier in 1755.  Life among the tiny shops and crude homes could be exciting, especially when men talked of revolution and the settlement was selected as the seat of the new Montgomery County in 1776.  That designation solidified the settlement’s importance, although for generations afterward it was just as well known as a stop on the Great Road.

Our local family called their village “Rockville” in the early 1800s.  Washington Street, Middle Lane, and Court House Square showed on the 1803 plan.  Other residents built houses along Washington Street, which would remain the major thoroughfare heading north from the town along the main road to Frederick.  A few substantial homes and commercial establishments were constructed of brick, but most took advantage of wood from local forest stands.      

After the Civil War this low-lying, often marshy, area became home to freedmen and women.  Just behind Rockville’s main commercial streets, it was convenient to jobs while maintaining the segregation dictated by the times.  By the 1880s, a lively mix of houses, businesses, churches, a meeting hall and a primary school, thrived in this area bounded by Washington and Middle on the southwest and fields and the railroad on the northeast.  Generations of our local family watched this bustling black community evolve in the center of Rockville.

Decades passed, and the business district declined even as the population rose.  In 1951, the long-requested Rockville Bypass opened.  This short stretch – which was quickly named Hungerford Drive -- handled through traffic and created a triangle north to where it intersects with Washington Street.  As businesses sought less expensive sites away from the worsening traffic, parking, and building conditions, this area just north of the traditional business district filled in.

In the 1950s, a developer named N. Richard Kimmel bought land from long-time residents and absentee landlords in this area.  Black elementary students moved to the new Rock Terrace school, and Clinton AME Zion Church moved to Lincoln Park.  By 1957, our local family patronized the new One Stop Shop strip center, with the Coop, W.T. Grant’s, jewelry store, and plenty of convenient surface parking.  They watched successive business owners, Mayors and Councils, and residents debate revitalization of the old business district, reluctantly agreeing that a Federal urban renewal program seemed the best solution.

The 45-acre Mid-City Urban Renewal Project, planned in the early 1960s and modified subsequently over the next two generations, demolished buildings from East Montgomery Avenue to Monroe Street, and changed the street pattern.  Middle Lane and Washington Street marked the northwestern boundary.  The section of this project on East Middle Lane was initially projected for a parking garage and perhaps a department store.  Later developers planned a hotel and office buildings, but nothing materialized.  From about 1965 through 2005, this area of today’s “Town Square” remained a parking lot owned by the City.

In the 1960s, new civic and commercial buildings arose in the triangle. Beall Avenue was cut through.  Rockville Volunteer Fire Department moved into their new station on Hungerford Drive, and Suburban Trust opened a major branch bank and office building on Washington Street. 

Our family visited the Rockville Mall in the 1970s, enjoying Peking Duck and dipping in the fountain that flowed down the steps into Courthouse Square, but truly preferred shopping elsewhere.  They watched the GBS building, Executive Office Building, and Judicial Center fill the skyline.  With hopes rekindled by Arthur Cotton Moore, who proposed urban design updates, they welcomed Metro and Rockville Arts Place.  In the 1990s, their children delighted in the residential-commercial mix of the Victoria and joined in celebrating the destruction of the Mall and renovation of the Red Brick Courthouse.  They were pleased with the City’s new park in Courthouse Square, with a fountain, stone walls, and oval public area. 

By the turn of the new century, a new iteration of Town Center – Phase I, the block known as Town Square – began to take shape.  Foulger Pratt’s tall office building in the southeast corner was a prelude to the rest of the block.  The Mayor and Council adopted the Town Center Plan in 2001, and the former One Stop Shop strip center was razed three years later.  In its place Federal Realty and RD Rockville built new shops with residences above – reminiscent of mixed use on the old main street.  Aided by County and State, the City provided parking infrastructure and guided design.  A beautiful new library opened in 2006, followed by the Arts and Innovation Center a year later. 

These days, our local family visits each new restaurant and shop around the Town Square, attends a variety of free events, and strolls around at all hours.  They enjoy Peerless Rockville’s contributions that remind patrons of the old town – gateway towers with historical facts, themed exhibits and vias, photographs in each garage, and Doc Vinson’s soda fountain in the library.  And all of us appreciate the renewed energy in the center of our town.