Before 1991, Putnam Park wasn't a park at all.

Deborah L. Kershner says she used to walk past the area, a small lot on the corner of Putnam and Canard Streets in Cambridge, on her way to high school.

"We had to walk around the weeds onto the street and into the oncoming traffic just because it was so overgrown," Kershner says.

According to neighborhood lore, the lot began to change for the better in 1991, when Spanish teacher Manuel Uribe became concerned about the safety of his students who walked past the park at night to get to his house.

Residents say he was the first one to begin cutting down the weeds in the lot.

The neighbors joined in, and soon, the abandoned lot had become a center of the residential neighborhood.

"I'm sure we don't all go to the same church or synagogue, we don't all go to the same stores, but we all go to the same park," says George B. Spofford, who lives across the street from the park.

But now the park is threatened by a developer-not an unfamiliar story in Cambridge.

The city is lending some support, but Putnam Park is just one in a series of local areas threatened by development.

What differentiates this story of developer versus neighborhood is that the park is entirely the neighborhood's creation.

The lot is not public land, despite the sign proudly announcing that it is "Putnam Park."

And the residents are not letting the park- now a quiet site for educating schoolchildren, gardening and meeting with neighbors- disappear without a fight.

The History of the Lot

The property of a private owner until a March sale, Putnam Park has gained the support of the City Council and neighborhood residents in the fight to keep it accessible.

Arlington resident Richard Valente owned the lot before its recent sale to developers.