Evening Star Newspaper, July 26, 1931, Page 68

"6 Washington’s Growth in Half BY JOHN CLAGETT PROCTOR. Y, my, how Washington is grow- ing! Even during the depression it seems to be expanding in every direction. Just a few days ago the writer went to Bladens- burg over a route he had not traveled for probably two years, though the time did not seem so long. He went by way of the Bunker Hill road until it intersects with the Queens Chapel, which once took us by the old Ram’s Horn Inn, noted for its “fluent” hos- pitality during the pre-Volsteadian days. Marvelous! The writer could hardly believe his own eyes. At one point he saw streets and houses where farm products were growing the last time he motored that way. And up the road a few blocks, just outside the District line, was & large brick bullding right down in the middle of a big fleld with nothing else around it. When he drew near he saw over the front the name, “Mount Rainier High School.” Indeed, more than ever before, he realized that Washington was growing by leaps and bounds, for he has known the eity when there were few houses beyond the city limits—when Florida avenue was Boundary strest—when Anacostia was Uniontown and when what is now Potomac Park was but an unhealthy, marshy area, and the cause of more chills and fever than all the rest of Washington's low- land combined. It is truly astounding how the District has developed. “Washington in embryo,” as early Washington has been called, after all, to many, does not seem so long ago. Indeed, many a man just past the meridian of life can look back into the past and see the Capital City as almost a mere town, compared to its half mil- lion of people who live here today. He can even see the country’s Capital as it has de- veloped from broad commons, waste land and open streams to a city of mammoth office build- ings, huge apartment houses and miles of broad, finely paved boulevards in place of un- improved streets full of ruts and mudholes. Of course, there is no one living whose per- sonal recollections will go back to the begin- ning of the city, but ample evidence is extant to tell us of the conditions existing here from the earliest days of the District, and many na- tives of the reminiscent age who are living will gladly talk to you by the hour of the time, within memory, when goats, hogs, geese and cattle roamed over the unoccupied fields. ATURALLY, when wqg of an older genera- tion refer to the peculiar conditions of the past, the younger folk cannot fully appreciate the situation as we do, for, after that seeing is believing is just as it ever was. However, the past is an open book ber, 5, 1859, and be convinced of its tru ness: “The Goat Nuisance.—So much mischief has been done lately by goatish intruders into the running at large, of which, in the fourth ward and in the vicinity of English Hill, have committed various depre- dations and outrages in the dwellings and premises of sundry citizens; and to those of- fenders the attention of the police constables in whose district it is, is especially directed.” Naturally Washington has taken a great step forward even during our time. Sanitary conditions especially have improved at least 100 per cent during the past 50 years, when the " THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JULY 26, 1931 Swampoodle and Its Characteristic Qualities in the Days of Lawless Acts—Reminis- cences of a Woman Who Knew the Old Cdpital and Its People—Dupon* Circle Section. E Early Washington Houses ot Fifteenth street and Massachusetts avenue. The freezers of ice cream, then such a big treat; The old-fashioned pumps and the hydrants, now gone, And the old oyster man with his bucket and horn; When men all wore boots and threw boot- Jacks at cats, When none but poor people were lving I s flats; The old National Rifies, the Light In- fantry— Their chapeaux, in fancy, my eyes still can see; And Allison Naylor—mustache black as T mnfih eand his horses—immaculate white; When we would use corn silk to make eiga~ rettes, And on our ball team it was safe to make bets; When The Star office stood where the post office stands, And each colored man's funeral had one or more bands; When out at the Schuisen, in Summer, each year, Your thirst could be quenched with abund- ance of beer; When Abner’s and Driver's and Beyer’s held sway, To make pleasant evenings and drive blues away; When Shepherd held office and we had & vote “And Jake Budd was acting with others of When girls all wore jersies and did up In circles of spitcurls with infinite care; When bangles and hoopskirts and basques were the style, And gay Dolly Vardens were worn for awhile; When locse Mother Hubbards, to wear on the street, Was not just exactly the thing, or discreet; ‘When women wore bustles and padded their form, And wore emough clothes for at least to keep warm; When girls who used lipstick or rouge on their face ‘Were thought to be bordering onto disgrace; When cute Minnie Warren, 30 clever and small, With Commodore Nutt played at Odd Fel- lows’ Hall; When the Dime Museum, across from The Star, Had Nalley or some other scrapper to spar; When the cancan and “Black Crook” were “White Wings” were snug, 'Way back in the aays when Babe Bedford was hung; When the old soap-grease man would give you a piece Of his long bar of soap for your crock of hog grease; ‘When a big copper cent & horse cake could buy, Or a round ginger cake or some Washing- ton 5 Early homes. in Columbia Heights. To the left, on Euclid stre>t, home of John corner, @t Fourteenth street, home of t O £ -t ot ! gt e i ke Fii L HiE . gt Bl il 2 i ! > and ponies and funny in Summer—oh, how mem’ry To Port Foote or to Glymont or Mount Ver- 01 i boat (n one foot of water they say she could Up Occoquan Creek with the botiom = She churned up the mud to our childish Whuwnivnhmglrltnmquht And wrote words of slush in her autograph The old Southern mammy—an obsolete type— With pail on her head and smoking her When Prank Ward sold milk and Bob Cal- lahan booze, - And John B. McCarthy was writing up news? And 50 I could mention a whole lot of stuff, But for the time being I've said quite Some time, later 3 on, I will give some more e Of the really old “dope” I still have in store. I'll simply conclude as I started, and say, Do you not remember, Old Timer, the day? REGARDING Swampoodle in the early days, it was, indeed, all it has ever been pice tured to be. It was a bad place for the poundmaster; the policeman sidestepped AR li . Recent complaints of property owners in the immediate neighbore probably excite the officers to ree i r TR igl? yE B3 across another item which, ale how mean and contemptible people ean be, still refers to a condition alluded to, when the early Washing- be from Swampoodie or whatevef E§i§§ Fr s middle, Mrs. Wood's residencag ustice Harlan of the United States Supreme Court. ¥ {