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Burton Barr ended up in Rehoboth Beach because it was as far as his family could get on a tank of gas. It was the mid-1970s and the country was in a gas crunch.
The Barrs used to visit Ocean City, Md., on just one tank, round-trip, he said.
But after they discovered they could get to Rehoboth Beach from their home in Prince Georges County, have enough gas left over to tour the area, and still return home on the same tank, Sussex County became their second home.
In the late 1970s, he said he bought a lot in Angola by the Bay from Butch Emmert.
“It was a weekend place that turned into a full-time home,” he said.
Then, in 1987, he bought a home in Rehoboth’s Schoolvue neighborhood, across the street from the Rehoboth Elementary School.
Outside his one-story ranch-style home, Barr showed a small plot where he and his wife, Marion planted, roses, not his favorite, and other perennials - a largely self-maintaining garden. It works well for the couple since they spend half the year in Waikiki visiting their daughter and they just finished packing for their fall trip.
In days past, he said, he and his wife meandered down Stockley Street by the elementary school to the beach. Nowadays, they enjoy watching pick-up games in the school fields, across the street.
“Sometimes I walk over and lean on the fence or just watch here from my kitchen table,” he says. Occasionally, he said, he is asked to join in and help with the games.
Rehoboth, though, is a changing town, he says.
He’s relieved that the fields across from his house will remain open space, he said.
“My concern was they were going to sell the school property. This is one reason we are very happy with the area. We don’t mind a little traffic that the school generates. It means something’s going on.”
Elsewhere, he said, the growth in the area is uncontrolled.
“What was once a farm field is now sprouting homes. It’s overwhelming. It used to be a country drive out to Old Landing,” he says. “Off to the side, you see houses and condos even past Red Mill Pond.”
He recalls when the Route 1 was just four lanes, lined with flowerbeds from Route 24 to Rehoboth. “It was a pretty drive then. Even on weekends, it wasn’t that bad.”
Before he retired, on Friday afternoons, the Barrs would leave D.C. and on Sunday evenings, they would leave Rehoboth after the television program “60 Minutes.”
Born in Harvey, N.D., the 77-year-old retiree has traveled around the U.S. as a statistician with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Quick to poke fun at himself and others, Barr reclines at his kitchen table and adjusts his gold-rimmed glasses with a wide grin.
He’s lived in North Dakota, Indiana, Kansas and Washington, D.C.
But few can say they have membership to as many local organizations as Barr, affiliated with the younger and older generations.
“I’ve been very active in the National Association of Retired and Federal Employees – its immediate past state president,” he says.
Nationally, he belongs to the AARP, American Legion and Masonic Temple.
In D.C., he’s a member of Alma’s Temple of the Shrine.
Locally, he’s an honorary member of the Angola-by-the-Bay Men’s Club as its former treasurer, Sussex Pines Country Club, the Sussex Amateur Radio Association and the Sussex County Master Gardeners. He and his wife used to tend a big plot filled with geraniums, impatiens and gladiolas in Georgetown.
But they got tired of dragging hoses and driving out to their garden, he said. Besides, these days, they would rather spend time with their family scattered across the U.S.
Now that he’s retired, he frequently visits his four daughters, who live around the country. He’s proud of his granddaughter who studied at the London School of Economics and is getting her doctorate from American University. His grandson, he says, is building a home outside Salt Lake City.
While living in Rehoboth, however, it’s the simple things to which he contributes.
As an active member of the Westminster Presbyterian Church, he volunteered to cook for the foreign students, a task he looks forward to next year.
“I made meatloaf for one batch and beef stew for another batch,” he said.
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