Demography and History

Throughout much of its extent -- especially in the older neighborhoods of Harmony Hills and Wheaton Woods, Aspen Hill is a barrio, a Central-American ghetto located in the shadows of Montgomery County, Maryland, which is otherwise one of the most affluent counties in the US. Aspen Hill is characterized by massive home overcrowding and housing code violations, and an immense demographic divide in which almost all residents born before 1960 are middle-class whites and almost all residents born after 1980 are Spanish-speaking Central Americans or the US-citizen children of Central Americans. There is a sizable minority of English-speaking African immigrants and their US-citizen children. Aspen Hill, Maryland, has the highest level of foreign-born residents in Montgomery County and has largely been abandoned by US-born citizens of non-hispanic derivation, at least by those of an age putting children into the public schools. A considerable number of retirees remain resident, being more prevalent in the northern parts of the community, especially in the English Manor and Sycamore Creek neighborhoods. There is also a thriving all-ages Jewish community, much of it centered around the religious schools such as the widely respected Melvin J Berman Hebrew Academy on Arctic Avenue near the intersection with Aspen Hill Road.