Ken-Gar
As you walk down Plyers Mill Road continuing beyond the Firehouse and “Gasoline Alley,” you’ll see a railroad bridge and a sign for Ken-Gar.
Ken-Gar had its beginnings in 1892, when Henry Copp subdivided his twenty acres of land along the north side of the Metropolitan Branch of the B&O Railroad tracks, west of Kensington. Ken-Gar was accessed by a county road, known today as Plyers Mill Road. It once connected Ken-Gar to Garrett Park, but now the road terminates at a rocky cliff overlooking Rock Creek. In 1894 the first lots in this relatively isolated enclave were sold, but sales were slow for several years. Many lots were combined by a single owner and used for farming in the early years. The sparsely settled community retained a rural character, with most residents raising their own food. In 1903, this started to change when trustees of the nearby Lee African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church bought a lot at the corner of Walmesley Street and Plyers Mill Road to build a new church. Over time, families settled around this new church, which also served as Ken-Gar’s first school until the county built a two-room school next door. In 1921, Baptist members of the community bought a lot at the southeast corner of Hampden and Vaughn Streets and fulfilled their life-long dream of building the First Baptist Church. The community continued to develop around these two churches. A major change came when the county integrated its schools in 1955, and the two-room schoolhouse was closed. Its students were transferred to Kensington Elementary School a few blocks away.
