Variety Store

Recent filings in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Maryland, Baltimore City:Jan. 2Shark's Tooth Bar & Grill Inc.,6-10 Crain Highway, Glen Burnie, filed for protection under Chapter 11. Principal: Ronald R. Roark, president. Assets: $49,000; liabilities: $47,000Jan. 6Barbara R. Freeman,1409 Morling Ave., Baltimore, as an individual operating a variety store, filed for adjustment of debts under Chapter 13. Assets: $66,961; liabilities: $128,774.59Deborah Marie Beale,2035 Wetterhorn Drive, Bel Air, an individual d/b/a DMB Group Homes Inc., provider of assisted living for the elderly, filed for adjustment of debts under Chapter 13. Assets: $134,130; liabilities: $174,820Linda J. Whitby, M.D.,1052 Old Turkey Point Road, Edgewater, operating a medical practice, filed under Chapter 11. Assets: $447,500; liabilities: $1,016,376.

Baltimore CityBURGLARY: Northern District -- Someone entered the ABC variety store in the 3000 block of Greenmount Ave. through a side window over the weekend and stole 12 pagers and 40 cans of soft drink, all valued at more than $1,000.BURGLARY: Northern District -- Electronic equipment valued at nearly $30,000 was damaged or destroyed by someone who entered a building owned by WBFF-TV in the 3500 block of Parkdale Ave. between July 19 and yesterday. The intruder also broke several windows and splashed paint on walls.

Mid-Atlantic Realty Trust said at its annual meeting yesterday that it will launch renovations and expansion projects at two shopping centers in Baltimore and Harford counties.As part of the projects, a Super Fresh is to open as a new anchor grocery store at the Rosedale Plaza.Also, a Gap and Old Navy store will open at Harford Mall in October, the company said."These are two very significant transactions most REITs can't pull out of the bag," F. Patrick Hughes, president of the Lutherville-based real estate investment trust, told shareholders.

Norman E. Moxley Sr., a contractor, shopping center developer and former Howard County commissioner who helped preside over the county during its postwar transformation, died Wednesday of complications of a stroke at Bon Secours Nursing Center in Ellicott City. He was 90.Mr. Moxley spent his entire life on an 800-acre farm that had been in his family since the 1800s. He later developed part of the farm, now known as Normandy, with his son and nephew.Dropping out of school to help his father with farm work, Mr. Moxley worked as a blacksmith and later began a successful plastering business in the late 1920s.

D emolition has begun at the corner of Park Avenue and Lexington Street, once one of the busiest places in Baltimore to buy a pair of shoes or a dress. Or see a movie. Lexington Street, which functioned like a long and delightfully chaotic shopping mall, has long fascinated me. Nothing in the suburbs could match it. I spent many a Saturday in the shops the wreckers are starting to level. Much of the block was occupied by the W.T. Grant variety store, a five-and-dime that had three full floors for retail.

SAM WALTON: MADE IN AMERICA, MY STORY. Sam Walton with John Huey. Doubleday.262 pages. $22.50.SAM WALTON: THE INSIDE STORY OF AMERICA'S RICHEST MAN. Vance H. Trimble. Dutton.308 pages. $19.95. "Hello, friends, I'm Sam Walton, founder and chairman of Wal-Mart Stores."No prelude, no justification, just hello. The folksy, easy-reading tone of the autobiography of Sam Walton, a down-home good old boy, is established in the first sentence of the book's foreword.From that point on, Walton and co-author John Huey take readers through the amazing story of the rise of the nation's premier retail company and the equally amazing tale of the nation's wealthiest individual.

Get your hair trimmed and styled. Apply for a loan. Leave the car for an oil change, and drop off the kids in the game room. Stock up on socks, detergent, printer cartridges, milk, ground beef, bananas, paint and mulch. You could, in one trip, get a rotisserie chicken for dinner, some extra tennis balls and a rifle. It's one-stop shopping the Wal-Mart way, at "supercenters" up to twice the size of a typical Wal-Mart. For the world's largest retailer, it's also the future. With $165 billion in annual sales, 4,100 stores and more than a million workers, Wal-Mart has reached unparalleled dominance in the history of retailing.

Mount Airy's growth was twined around that of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, the method settlers used to head west -- Cumberland and beyond -- in its early years.In the 1830s, settlers built homesteads on Parr's Ridge, which runs diagonally from the southwest to the northeast quadrants of Carroll County.The ridge divides the county into two major drainage basins:*Streams to the north and west drain into the Monocacy River and eventually the Potomac River.* Streams to the south and east flow into the Patapsco or Gunpowder rivers and the Chesapeake Bay.B & O engines used to struggle mightily to pull trains up and over the ridge.

Anna Bernadette Gaver, a former display artist who painted the face of Babe Ruth for an Orioles parade, died of cancer complications Saturday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The Northeast Baltimore resident was 84. Born Anna Meli in Baltimore and raised on South Paca Street, she was one of nine children born to Sicilian immigrant parents. She attended St. Jerome's Parochial School and was a 1936 graduate of Southern High School. While working as a seamstress at the old Adalman Coat Co., she attended the Maryland Institute College of Art's night school -- often walking to her classes from her home in South Baltimore.

Lt. Gov. Brown to separate from his wife Maryland Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown announced yesterday that he plans to separate from his wife of 15 years, Patricia Arzuaga. He did not provide a reason. "We continue to have great admiration and respect for each other," they said in a joint statement. "We ask for everyone to respect our privacy during this time of transition for our family." Brown and Arzuaga, both of whom grew up in New York and moved to Maryland after graduating from Harvard Law School, said that he will live close to their Mitchellville home so they both can be "actively engaged as parents" to their two children.