Evening Star Newspaper, December 29, 1929, Page 70

their terms, merely stipulating that the streets should be so laid out as not to interfcre with his house. Realizing that he was soon destined to become a man of great wealth, he was now determined o see that his daughter had proper educational and social training. She was, therefore, placed in the home of Luther Martin at Baltimore, who, at that time, was the attorney general of Maryland. She attended school with his daugh- ters and ere long developed into a magnificent young woman and a social favorite. Davy Burns and Washington, by strange coincidence, passed on to the great beyond in the same year—1799. Marcia inherited his fortune. It was not long, of cours:, until good- looking young men were attracted to the Burns cottage seeking the hand and possibly the fortune of the charming Marcia. Among these numerous suitors was the handsome John Peter Van Ness, a member of the Hous: of Repre- sentatives from New York. John Peter was born in the village of Ghent, N. Y., in 1770, and was educated at Columbia. A popular critic of that period spoke of him as being “well bred, well read and well fed.” It is said that he was a favorite political protege of Aaron Burr, who was then the Vice President of the United States. There is an old story to the effect that one evening Burr and his young friend put on their best suits and made a formal call on the popular Marcia, and that from that time on Burr performed the cere- monies of matchmaker. It is evident that he made a success of it. 1In 1802, when John Peter was 32 and Marcia 22, they presented themselves before a minister and solemnly repeated the love, honor and obey words. John Peter at once assumed control of the manage- ment of the Burns estate. It was rumored in New York at the time of the wedding that the gather of John, a proud old Knickerbocker and a distinguished officer in the Revolutionary War, started to raise a big row when he heard that his son was going to marry a Washington girl of humble birth, but that his anger turned to quiet joy when he became aware of the extent of her possessions. It is interesting to observe that William P. Van Ness, a brother of Marcia's husband, served as a second to Aaron Burr in his un- fortunate duel with Alexand'r Hamilton. He secreted Burr for a time in the Van Ness home known as Kinderhook, where Wash- ington Irving once resided, and which later became the hom: of Martin Van Buren. . G married to the first belle of Wash- > ington did not make much of a hit with: the New York' political followers of Van Ness. They were outspoken in their belief that he should have marrisd one of the home-town girls. Rumors of his deep intersst in Wash- ington affairs added fuel to their indignation. Things came to a crisis when he permitted himself to be elected major of a District of Columbia military company. - His home folks Jooked upbn this as an act of downright dis- loyalty to the district which had sent him to Congress. A committee hurried to Washing- “ton and presented a “constitutional” protest to Congress, which, after due hearing, resulted in John Peter Van Ness being expelled from that body. But this failed to worry the genial -Johr Peter. He was as debonaire as ever and continued to love Marcig and enjoy the com- fortabl: life of the National Capital and the many other good things resulting from a hand- -some bank account. Some years later, “Gen.” Van Ness, as he became known, decided that the original -Burns house was too small for the character of entertainment he enjoyed. With $60,000 of Marcia's fortune he erected a big brick man- sion a short distance from the cld log house. Some of the details of the new house were copied from the White House. It was the only residence in Washington, besides the White House, that sported a porte cochere. Attached to the new home was a conservatory filled with rarz plants. It was the first home in Wash- ington to be equipped with hot and cold water. ‘The marble mantels, designed by Thorwaldsen and imported from Italy, together with the rich draperies and carpets, were th= talk of the town for many years. No one in Washington entertained more Javishly than the Van Ness family. Their an- nual dinner to the members of Congress was always th: biggest social event of the year. Many authorities make the claim that more anen in public life, and their families, visited at the Van Ness mansion than at any other private home in Washington. It was in this home that Ann, their only child, was born. Bhe was educated in a sclect boarding school in Philadelphia. The reception given in her honor upon her return home from school in 1820 is said to have been the most brilliant ever staged up to that time. Marcia Van Ness was not as much given to ‘worldly pleasure as was her popular husband. Bhe was very religious and sought to train her ‘daughter along similar lines by daily reading to her from the Bible and talking to her about ‘the various characters of the Scriptures. Within a year after her return from school, the dainty Ann was courted and won by Arthur Middleton, of South Carolina, a son ‘of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. A year later Ann died. Her in- fant babe was buried in the same grave with her. ‘This loss well-nigh broke the hearts of her Pparents. From that day until her death Marcia Van Ness lost all interest in social life. Bhe fitted up a little chapel in one of the Fooms of the old cottage where she was born #and spent most of her life, and here she came ‘each day to pray. ' INJRS. VAN NESS was the founder of the y Washington City Orphan Asylum, an in- stitution which is still in existence and doing ‘splendid work. After the death of her daugh- ‘ter, Mrs. Van Ness devoted much of her time #o finding homeless children and placing them ‘in this orphanage. This institution was gen- ‘erously provided for in her will. Her portrait, ‘with a group of little orphans about her, still @races the walls of the orphanage. The funeral of Mrs. Van Ness, in 1832, was "THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGT ON, D. C. DECEMBER 20, 102, Mrs. John Peter Van Ness, who was the first belle of Washington. one of the most notable ever held in Wash- ington. Her husband, at the time of her death, was occupying the position of mayor of Wash- ington. Her guard of honor at the funeral consisted of the little orphans to whom she had been so kind. & The mausoleum in which her body was placed, had been erected some years previously, at a cost of $30,000. It was modeled after the circular Temple of Vesta at Rome. It was lo- cated on H street between Ninth and T:nth. Fourteen years later, in 1846, the body of John Peter Van Ness was placed by the side of that of his wife. By 1872 the growth of the city made it necessary to remove the mausoleum to Oak Hill Cemetery at Georgetown. This is the cem- etery, by the way, in which rest the remains of John Howard Payne, author of “Home, Sweet Home.” The downtown square on which the mausoleum stood was sold for $160,000, the proceeds being paid to the heirs of Arthur Middleton. Eighty years ago the Van Ness mansion passed into the hands of Thomas Green of Virginia. He was the first occupant after the decath of Gen. Van Ness. He lived there until the late seventies. The assassination of Presi- dent Lincoln once more brought the property into national prominence. A wild story was started by some excited person to the effect that the Booth conspirators, according to previous plans, had arranged to kidnap Presi- dent Lincoln and hide him in the cellar of the mansion, and from there convey him across the Potomac River to Virginia. As a result of the spreading of this story, Mr. Green and his wife were placed under arrest and kept in the old Capitol Prison for six weeks. An investiga- tion completely exonerated them. In 1879 the mansion became the property of Gov. Swann of Maryland. It was never again This Is My Fear. By David Morton. The wind has gathered up a world of woe And brought this heavy trouble to the trees— And this is what we hear beyond the glow Of evening lamplight, on such nights as these; So thin a thing as window glass divides This snner peace of ours from something ... .. . there . . Whose black shape throngs the darkness where it rides, An evil omen on the innocent air. Perhaps our door was never tall enough For such a one to stoop and enter in, Perhaps, because we kept a little love . . . But I can have no faith in what is thin As window glass, or roof, or door, or wall, Or love, that is most pitiful of all. ' pressure. occupied as a residence. For a time the base- ment-was used as a tough be:r joint, and the beautiful lawns became the gathering place of boisterous picnickers. The historic place ‘even sunk so low as to become the headquarters of th: city scavengers and swill collectors. In time it became known as the haunted house. Colored p:zoplé living in that neighborhood re- lated many weird tales about green-faced ghosts peering from the windows, and hecad- less snow-white horses galloping in and out of the driveway between 3 and 4 in the morning. In 1902 the property was purchased by the George Washington University. It was then a roofl:ss wreck. Sufficient repairs were made to make it possible for it to be used a few years by their school of engineering. 4 In 1908 it was purchased by the creators of the Pan-American Union, and the old build- ing was replaced by the pres:nt white marble palace, one of the most beautiful and most uszful buildings in the world. Handkng of Holiday Mail. 'HE efficiency with which the vast quantity of Christmas letters and cards is handled is due in part to a simple but highly effective system of distributing clerks in the post offices. When the mail is received, it is first sorted as to other stations within the city or for dispatch to other cities. When the clerk gets a batch of cards and letters for delivery within the territory served by his branch, he sepa- rates them in a sorting case by routes. He must know every street served by each cacrier, and the numerical limits on these streets when two or more carriers serve portions of it. When the carrier reports to work, he takes the matter waiting for him in his portion of the case and then distributes it through his route case, which puts the let‘crs in the vrder in which he walks along his route. By this method large quantities of mail are handled in a very short time. A clerk can separate from 30 to 40 letters a minute and sometimes, under pressure, can do even better. An hour's work at this speed will ‘ake care of a large amount of correspondence. Papers, magazines and small packages are separated in the same manner, except that in their case the bins into which they are tossed for the carriers are larger. e Color Aids Fruit Sales. WHEN an American buys fruit, color has . been found to be the first consideration. If the color is good, the buyer then considers size, maturity, freedom from blight and dam- age, and other factors, but expert marketmen have found that unless the color is right, the prospective purchaser will never get near enough even to examine for other defects. For that reason, color of fruit has rapidly be- come a prim= requisite, if the producer is to dispose of his crops. Explosion Loses Its Roar. . Tl-m tremendous roar produced by dynamite explosions is reduced to a little click at the Pittsburgh experimental station of the Bureau of Mines, but along with that click go pres- sures running up as high as 20,000 pounds a square inch. The explosions are set off within iron bcmbs, provided with gauges to record the ‘The confining of the explosion to a small area such as the bomb prevents the awe- u‘x:plrlngmotcbedemmuonmtheopm air. Simple. Teacher—Can any one tell me how macarond s made? Johnny—First you take a big long hole and then you wrap some dough around it. o