Brookeville - Mt. Zion / Early Builders in Sandy Spring: The Robert Hill Story

Brookeville - Mt. Zion, also, Early Builders in Sandy Spring: The Robert Hill Story. Sandy Spring African American Heritage Trail. , Brookeville - Mt. Zion , In the 1880s, Mt. Zion was a well-established Black settlement in Montgomery County, having two dry goods stores, post office and grocery store owned by Thomas Brown and approximately 25 residences., Located at the intersection of Zion and Brookeville Roads, free blacks were already attracted to this site, however the settlement expanded after the war. The Historic District included sixteen contiguous residencies, with the Mt. Zion Methodist Church located at the intersection of Zion and Brookeville Roads. Mt. Zion blacks secured a living by working on tobacco farms in the area, and as-masons, carpenters and blacksmiths in neighboring communities. They grew much of their own food on their own lots and many worked as tenant farmers. Many residents sought work and worship in Sandy Spring. They built their residencies South of Brookeville Road and East and West on Zion Road. Most of the original homes in Mt. Zion have been destroyed or abandoned, however, few remain that are representative of the ear. The Selby house located at 19914 Zion Road, the Snowden house at 19808 Zion Road was built around 1900, lived in until 1960. The DeLa Cruz house located at 19919 Zion Road is the only intact original house, and remnants of the Prather house at 20014 Zion Road still remain., For a while emancipated slaves in Mt. Zion community worshiped in a log cabin on the plantation of Charles Brooke, Brookeville. In the 1860s blacks purchased a one-acre plat on the Southwest corner of the intersection from James Stabler for religious and educational purposes. The Methodist Episcopal church was erected at this site and stood until the 1960s when it was destroyed by fire. The new contemporary church is now located at the original site. In the 1920s a 2.5 story church parsonage was built behind the church. The church was used as a school until around 1870 when the Griffith School was built in honor of the Thomas Griffith family. By 1872 a new school was built in part by appropriations from the Maryland School Assembly. The school closed in 1957. In the 1860s a Catholic church stood at the Northeastern corner of the intersection however by 1865 the church closed and moved to Brookeville because of the loss of membership., Oakley Farm, Located in Mt. Zion-Brookeville , In 1764, Quaker, Colonel Richard Brooke, a Revolutionary War hero, purchased a plantation upon which he built a named house named Oakley. When Richard Brooke died in in 1788, his only child Ann married William Hammond Dorsey. The family preferred to live in Olney or in Dumbarton Oaks in Georgetown. Ann died in 1802 and William and their five children moved back to Oakley. After William's death in 1818, their son Richard B. Dorsey had a working farm and owned 23 slaves. In 1836, Dr. William Bowie Magruder purchased Oakley., Three log cabins were erected on this property which housed 22-37 slaves, some black and some indentured white slaves that were farm laborers, carpenters, blacksmiths, servants and midwives. Oakley Cabin, the only surviving slave residence is an authentic representation of log cabins of the period. The chestnut and oak logs and rafters are true representations of the 19th Century architecture., Sitting on a two-acre tract, Oakley Cabin, inhabited until 1976, is a living history museum operated by Montgomery Parks ([email protected]). The newly renovated cabin reveals the history of the residents who lived there. The main room displaying an open hearth and artifacts discovered by archaeologists are on display., Early Builders in Sandy Spring: The Robert Hill Story , The first generation of freedmen and women between 1830-1860 had few resources and capital to establish their own homesteads. As a group they had little capital and could only claim small parcels in less desirable locations. For their dwellings, they naturally turned to skilled builders and carpenters among them to construct simple log and frame dwellings. By the 1860s most of these early dwellings have been lost to fire, deteriorated or condemned have been replaced by multigenerational buildings that met County zoning codes. Notable carpenters including Remus Q. Hill from Cincinnati, represented the second generation of black Builders., The third generation (1920-1940s) of black builders and carpenters from the Sandy Spring area is best represented by Robert H. Hill, who was born in 1904 on a farm in Sandy Spring. His parents, Sam T. Hill and Mary Hill, raised 18 children on a prosperous farm located near the intersection of Norwood Road and Route 108. Hill attended the Sharp Street Colored School taught by the Quakers where he developed an interest in "building things." Bob Hill honed his skills in carpentry and building by working with older Sandy Spring carpenters on construction jobs from his uncles and cousins who were in the building business. Working with local carpenter Robert Awkard he learned to dig the foundation of a house, design a second floor, square a building up, lay block, frame and build a house. By profession he was a builder. His company, the Sandy Spring Construction Company employed several of his brothers and family members over a 50 year period., During the 1940's and 1950's, when procuring a bank loan was nearly impossible for many people of color in Montgomery County, Mr. Hill built more than 150 homes from the ground up in an effort to provide housing for such victims of overt housing discrimination. He also provided equal opportunity home loans at very low interest rates, effectively opening the gates of home ownership to many grateful to raze the cruel and harmful wall of housing discrimination fostered hope and possibilities in an era when there was little of either for countless disenfranchised citizens. The Montgomery County Office of Human Rights inducted Robert Hill into the Human Rights Hall of Fame. His passion was baseball., [Caption:] , The house at 18313 Brooke Road is a good example of the early agrarian houses built by blacks during the late Nineteenth century.