Simple markers of the Friends burying ground form truncated ranks before the Community House, right, and the distant home office of the Mutual Insurance Company. Philip Thomas, who died in 1754 at age 20, was the first Quaker to be buried here. No stone marked his grave; early burials were unmarked with only written records kept. Then came wooden markers, and finally stone, but these were resisted: In the early 1800's Joseph Stabler of Auburn used oxen to plow up the gravestones. Strict Quaker rules also governed the right of burial. The body of Quaker pioneer James Brooke was barred for his violation of the Friends prohibition against oath-taking: He swore allegiance to Maryland during the Revolution.

Gold fever gripped the three Robison brothers, seen here at the family barn on Chandlee Mill Road: Francis Pole (left, standing), Hillis (with dog), and Phil (right, standing). Hillis joined the Klondike gold rush in 1898, and two years later Pole and Phil lit out for the Montana diggings. The Annals note that in 1908 Francis Pole Robison and wife Mary Bentley of Bloomfield became the first Sandy Spring bride and groom "to begin their wedding journey in an automobile."