02-16-2023 Howard Mag - Flipbook - Page 9
WELCOME
Takea Little of Randallstown catches her 3-year-old daughter, Jayiah, who jumps into her arms from the pool deck at the Roger Carter Community Center
in Ellicott City.
DOUG KAPUSTIN | BALTIMORE SUN MEDIA GROUP
S
et squarely between the nation’s capital and Baltimore, Howard County is a well-blended mix of the
bucolic, the urban and the suburban.
Spread out over 252 square miles are sights as diverse
as a quaint historic district; high-tech research parks; a
mall with more than 200 stores; parks with rivers and
forests; a lakefront city center; fields dotted with livestock; three arts centers and two outdoor amphitheaters.
The county can boast of such accomplishments as
having the first national railroad terminus and one of the
largest planned cities in the country.
Demographically, the county is considered affluent,
well-educated and diverse. With a population of about
332,000, Howard has a median household income of
$124,042, the highest in the state and among the highest
in the nation, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. More
than 62% of residents over 25 have a bachelor’s degree
or higher. And nearly half of residents identify as racial
minorities.
THE WAY WE WERE
The county’s first settler, a Puritan named Adam Shipley, was granted a home near the Patapsco River in what
is now Elkridge in 1687.
Farms, many planted with tobacco, sprouted along the
rivers, and the county’s farmers became its leaders. The
family of Charles Carroll, a signer of the Declaration of
Independence, acquired 13,000 acres of fertile fields and
howardmagazine.com | Winter 2023 |
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