Marie O'Donnell was the first child to play in Kentlands after Otis Beal Kent gave the land that name. In the picture on the left, the Arts Barn is visible, and the child stands in front of the house which is now white with black trim and stands at the entrance to the Old Farm district of Kentlands. The house was doubled in the early nineties before it became one of the early properties of what we now know as the present community. Kentlands was then a part of Rockville and was not annexed into Gaithersburg until the plans for the current community were under way. Marie rode the school bus to school in Rockville.

Ms O'Donnell called Kent "Uncle Otis," and he occasionally referred to her as his "granddaughter." She moved to Kentlands at approximately the age of two and has fond memories of sitting on Kent's lap while he played Beautiful Dreamer for her.

Marie O'Donnell now lives in West Virginia.

 Continued from Columns

that I am glad that music is part of what you all have done with the estate.   He would be very pleased with that and with the protection of wildlife.   He had a soft spot for animals.  One of the things I remember fondly was helping my grandfather feed the dogs in the kennels near the "big house."   Uncle Otis always had lots of cats.  I especially remember "The General," a huge gray tom cat who used to lay on his desk while he was working.

While looking through the pictures of the renovations done to the manor house I did have a question about the information given for what some of the rooms had previously been used for.   Entering the house from the front door, the first room to the left from the entry hall was Uncle Otis's office.  To the right was the music room, which had a beautiful red oriental rug.  When you went through this room and just to the left of the fireplace you entered the library.   I remember when he had this room redone.  He bought the beautiful blue oriental rug, and was very particular about having the floor refinished so that what showed around the border of the carpet would be a complementing color.  As I had mentioned before, Uncle Otis had his law books and the other books re-bound to match the colors in the carpet.  The lighting in the ceiling was recessed and the transition from the ceiling to the walls was done so there were no corners and the light reflected off and down into the room.  I was a beautiful room, and, as I said before, it was my favorite.

When coming into the entrance hall, if you went forward and to the left of the grandfather clock into the small hallway, just to the right was the "chocolate" bathroom.  At least that's what I called it.  In the early 50's there wasn't that much choice of color in plumbing fixtures, and it was unusual to see anything but white.  The chocolate bathroom was done in a color that was about the same shade of brown as chocolate milk.

I didn't notice in any pictures on the website of the stain glass window at the first landing, and was wondering if it is still there or not.  It was beautiful and Uncle Otis had it installed because there was no window there and he wanted it to appear that there was.   The window was installed with fluorescent back lighting.  He took great pride in showing this to visitors.  One of the Christmas cards I have from him is a picture of the window.