 Early land purchases and rezoning included Howard County Board of Trade member J Frank Gwynn's farm along Font Hill in 1955 by the Development and Investment Corporation of Maryland.The 715-acre parcel of land was purchased by the Howard Research and Development subsidiary of the Rouse Company in 1968 from the Gudelsky family that sought to rezone the area for high-rise apartments in the 1960s.The "Mandel" site was proposed to be a "Central Park" for Columbia featuring a high school, county office buildings, and a replacement for the Carr's Mill Landfill in 1974.