As an example of Arlington’s gradual change from a rural to an urban county, a milk can is used to collect coins from parking meters in the 1950’s.
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The photo above is of an unidentified industrial area of Arlington flooded by the Potomac River.
If you look carefully, you can see the Washington Monument in the distance. The photograph is dated from the mid-20th century, and the Virginia Room is looking for more information about this photograph.
We have an answer! Alert readers emailed the Virginia Room to let us know that this area is in fact Georgetown, near the Key Bridge. The silos belong to the Washington Flour Company. Thank you for your help!
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Do you know anything about this area of Arlington? Do you remember the Potomac flooding? What about other floods in Arlington? Please let us know!
Boy Scouts today are still working on merit badges, and Eagle projects, doing community service such as food drives, and enjoying camping and outdoor adventures.
Walter DeGroot’s Oral History in the Virginia Room describes Scouting in the 1940’s.
For Truman’s 1946 inauguration:
“We marched down Pennsylvania Avenue and whatever that street is in front of the White House and then from there we dispersed. And I was so proud of myself. And it was cold that day. It was cold.”
Camping on the Columbia Pike farm and greenhouse property owned by the father of a fellow scout, Jimmy Goings, from the Arlington Methodist Church Boy Scout troop:
“It was a kind of a neat place to go camping. The boys would get on the AB&W; bus, and get off at Mr. Going’s, and drag our tents and the sort up the hill. We camped up there a lot. Behind that there was a very large stone quarry. It was more like a gravel pit. That’s about where Hechinger’s used to have a big store on Route 7 there. And of course Route 7 was the Bailey’s Crossroads Airport. I think we boys used to hike…just to get the cold water from the [Carlin] spring, and then go back over to the camp.”
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The first outdoor recreation area in Arlington was developed at Arlington Spring on the banks of the Potomac near Arlington House.
George Washington Parke Custis, the father-in-law of Robert E. Lee, was a hospitable man who kept many artifacts in Arlington House and dedicated his life to the preservation of the memory of his step- grandfather and adoptive father, George Washington.
Arlington Spring was initially used as a place to entertain family and friends, but in 1824 Custis opened it to the public in for a Fourth of July celebration. Arlington Spring contained a kitchen, dining hall and dancing pavilion, and up to 200 visitors a day came by boats, canal boats and later steam excursion boats to attend sheep shearing contests, political speeches or for recreation. Field tents used by George Washington during the Revolution were used on special occasions such as the Revolutionary war hero Marquis de Lafayette’s visit to Arlington in October 1824. It was reported that 2,000 people attended the Fourth of July celebration at Arlington Spring in 1848.
This Arlington Spring illustration is from an 1853 drawing in Harper’s magazine by Benson Lossing.
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The Evans Autorailer was a unique gasoline powered bus with retractable flanged pilot wheels with the ability to run on railroads. Six were acquired by the struggling Arlington & Fairfax Railway Company in June 1936, with an investment from Evans Product Company of Detroit. It was planned for these trolley replacements to run on rails through Rosslyn and convert to rubber tires to complete their trip over the Key Bridge into Georgetown. However, the Capital Transit Company successfully defended their exclusive franchise across the bridge, and the line ceased operation in January 1939.
Several of the autorailers were then acquired by the Washington and Old Dominion Railroad to use for line maintenance. This photo shows a W & O D autorailer converted for line maintenance with an added platform. The Fowler Carbonics building seen in the photo’s background later became the Cherry Smash soda plant in Arlington.
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WWII brought much growth and development to Arlington.
But as one can see from this photo of the interchange of Arlington Boulevard. with Washington Boulevard, c. 1950, much of Arlington was still quite undeveloped several years after the War was over.
Trivia Note: Generally, only Boulevards, Drives, Highways and Roads cross the county in unbroken continuity (“streets,” whether numbered or named, rarely do). Arlington Boulevard is such a road and is the dividing line between North and South Arlington.
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Among the many stately and historic homes located in Arlington County, the Rixey Mansion deserves a special mention.
Set on one of four farms owned by Washington resident and Assistant Surgeon General of the U.S. Navy Dr. Presley M. Rixey, the Rixey Mansion was built to replace the property’s old farmhouse which burned down in 1907. The mansion was constructed in 1919-1920 under the supervision of Dr. Rixey and architects Frank Upman and Percy C. Adams and was thought to be one of the most sophisticated and elaborate residences of its time, boasting an exquisite stairway, a grand drawing room, banquet room, and a first floor covered with marble, designed in a black and white geometric pattern.
After Dr. Rixey’s death in 1928, the farm was purchased by Mrs. Ida K. Polen and was used as a tea house. In 1937, following a fire at the Washington Golf and Country Club, the house was temporarily used as a dining facility until a new building was completed.
In 1948, the estate was purchased by the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary and upon the establishment of Marymount College in 1950, the Rixey mansion became the central building or “Main House” of the university.
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Clay deposits on the shore of the Potomac supported a considerable brick making industry in Arlington until well into the 20th Century.
In 1905, there were 10 plants using local clays to produce brick for sale in Washington, chiefly a red brick but some a buff color. In his 1907 Brief History of Alexandria County, Virginia , Crandal Mackey states, that Alexandria County (the former name for Arlington) “manufactures more brick than any county in the United States.”
One of the largest plants was West Brothers Brick Company. Founded shortly after the Civil War, it remained in operation until the land was taken over by the federal government in 1942 to build the Pentagon. Brick manufacturing eventually ceased in the area with the construction of Shirley Highway and the Pentagon.
Trivia Note
During the great flu epidemic of 1918, Perry West, grandson of the founder of West Brothers, noticed that the men who got the flu seemed to be those who never touched alcohol…so, as a preventative measure, he arranged for his workers to start the day with a dosage of 2 ounces of whiskey followed by 5 grains of quinine, with an additional dose at the end of the work day!
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The long standing heavy metal group Pentagram may never have had a best selling album or inked a lucrative contract with a major record label, but they have become legends to a modest, but fanatical worldwide fan base and have garnered critical raves from some of the most important rock writers and artists of the modern era.
Formed in Arlington in 1971 by lead vocalist Bobby Liebling and drummer Geof O’Keefe, the band soon began developing and perfecting their sound. Though unmistakably influenced by contemporaries such as Black Sabbath and Uriah Heep, the band were no mere copyists, boasting an unusually melodic vocalist in Liebling and an uncommon sense of subtlety, texture and drama in the guitar playing. Word of mouth led to a rehearsal for Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of Kiss and a demo recording for Blue Oyster Cult’s producer and manager but a major label contract eluded the band.
After weathering numerous lineup changes over the years, Bobby Liebling remains the constant in the group, though recent live appearances have been few. Numerous releases documenting all phases of Pentagram’s career are easily available.
Listen to Pentagram – “Star Lady” [5MB .WMA file] Copyrighted materials, used by permission.
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Football program
Washington-Lee High School is currently undergoing a major renovation [2007], but when it opened in 1925 it was considerably smaller and the community quite different from what it is today.
The following is from an oral history with Sally B. Loving, who taught at W-L for many years.
"When the site was decided upon, some said it was located in a spot in north Arlington equally difficult to reach from all points. And that was about the truth, because the County was not built up and it [the school] was way out in…the field so to speak. The [original] Washington-Lee building cost $200,000, plus $231,339 for equipment.
There were between 450 and 500 students there in 1925, when we entered the building. And when they first got in the building, we had to wait for the arrival of the chairs, so we either sat on the floor or stood. But that was the very beginning.
Washington-Lee was perhaps . . . the beginning of unifying the County, since the students came from Cherrydale, Clarendon, Ballston, Columbia Pike, and so forth. But it didn't take long. . . before you could realize what section of the County they came from. This is if there was a fire the night before: their loyalty went to their community (the fire department), and each one was sure that his fire department got there first. But gradually the spirit grew, as we grew up at Washington-Lee, and the spirit was good."
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