Couple likes Baltimore enough to move here

Susan Reimer

January 27, 2008

Debra Thomas and Terry Shepard moved from Houston to Baltimore's Otterbein neighborhood for their retirement years. (Sun photo by Amy Davis / January 18, 2008)

Debra Thomas and her husband, Terry Shepard, found Baltimore in the answers they gave to one of those preferences quizzes you might get from an online dating service.

"Which is more important to you? Opera and professional theater? Or local college sports?

"Local emergency medical care? Or good restaurants and bookstores?"

And when the couple and the city finally met, it was just like one of those matchmaker commercials -- love at first sight.

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"It was one of those perfect Baltimore fall days," remembers Thomas. "The trees were shining with color and the water in the Inner Harbor was dazzling and bright."

That was in October 2000. The couple, a pair of public affairs officers for Rice University and newlyweds themselves, were planning to retire to a brand-new city, defying statistics that indicate nine out of 10 boomers will choose to retire at "home."

It would be six years before they could leave Houston and settle into a darling rowhouse in Otterbein. But their hearts have been in Baltimore since that brilliant October afternoon.

"It was the perfect day, a perfect breeze," said Shepard.

"And we were charmed by everyone we met," said Thomas. "This is a city that really lives up to its reputation as Charm City."

At a time in the city's life when Sunday night means The Wire and another black mark on its soul, at a time when even an ambitious football coach might rather be the No. 2 guy in Dallas than be the top guy here, Debra Thomas and Terry Shepard are a breath of air as fresh as that fall breeze off the harbor.

They did their retirement research, considered a list of cities that fit their criteria, decided on Baltimore, and have been in love with the city ever since.

"Baltimore was made for us," said Thomas. "Everyone here is so happy and warm. But it is funny, when we tell them how we got here, they are surprised.

"Everybody loves this town, but it never occurs to them that someone else might actually choose it."

Thomas, 59, and Shepard, 57, met in 1994 through a professional association while he was working for Stanford University and she was working for Bryn Mawr College.

They married in 1998 and Thomas joined her husband in California. But they wanted a fresh start in a city that would be new to both of them, and when Rice came recruiting, the pair moved to Houston in 1998.

And almost immediately, they thought about retiring.

"We were told it takes three years to get used to Texas," remembered Thomas. "They told us, 'You may never like it, but you'll be used to it.'"

"It really is a whole 'nother country," said Shepard.

The couple asked their financial adviser how soon they could retire. "And he said, 'It depends on where you want to live.'"

They purchased a workbook titled Places Rated Almanac by David Savageau, and took the 72-question preference quiz --"Which is more important, nearby national parks or number of stormy days a year?" -- compared their scores to charts in the book on such topics as ambience, housing, transportation, crime, jobs, climate, health care, recreation and education -- and came up with a list of a half dozen possibilities.