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Do you recognize this intersection?

This photograph above was taken around 1937. The signpost on the far right reads “Clarendon” in the center and “Ballston” on the bottom, but we have not identified the road or neighborhood where this photograph was taken.

The original photograph is here in the Center for Local History at the Central Library, if you are interested in taking a closer look. The Library holds many photographs where the people and places are unknown. The staff always welcomes input on these unidentified works.

What About You?

Do you recognize this intersection? Do you have old photographs of a similar location? Let us know what you remember!

For a century the company called Rucker Reality has been part of the Arlington business community.

The company was founded in 1906 by George H. Rucker who was the county clerk of Alexandria County from 1899 until his death in 1919. Rucker and his wife Elizabeth began purchasing land in the county in 1899, and by 1906 they had acquired a large tract that he filed for subdividing as “Rucker’s Addition to Clarendon.” That same year Rucker started an insurance business and was a founding officer of Virginia Real Estate Title Company. By 1909, the company had grown and he asked two of his brothers-in-law, Ashton C. Jones and N.A. Rees to join him in the business.

When George Rucker died suddenly in 1919, at the height of his business career, Ashton Jones replaced Rucker in managing the business and in 1920 created the subdivision Ashton Heights. The company was also involved in developing many areas such as Lee Heights, Cherrydale, Tara-Leeway Heights, Ballston and the Westover Shopping Center.

Over the years the company diversified and eventually became the George H. Rucker Realty Corporation. Today, all ownership shares of the privately held company are still owned entirely by descendents of the founders, except for some stock option incentive shares held by the company president and CEO. The Virginia Room holds copies of many important Rucker Realty documents and has some photos of their Clarendon offices.

What About You?

Did you or your family have dealings with Rucker Realty? Let us know what you remember!

In 1919, the Arlington County Department of Health was one of the first full-time county departments for health services in the nation. 

A home well inspection, 1942.

Unique for this type of county service, the Department received most of its funding from private rather than public resources.

The Department of Health was organized to improve the county’s state of public health by enforcing laws regulating sanitation and disease. Over the years, the Department evolved into a social agency serving the community and enhancing the quality of life through many local social programs.

Researchers interested in the early development and organization of municipal health systems and health care services should find this collection (RG 21) from the library’s Community Archives very valuable. The photograph above, a well house inspection from 1942, is from that collection. Information about RG 21 can be found in the library catalog and a full finding aid is available in the Virginia Room.

Today, the Department of Health has become the Arlington County Department of Human Services. 

What About You?
What do you remember about the Health Department? How did you interact with them? Let us know what you remember!

Arlington Hall, located at Route 50 and George Mason Drive, was a girls finishing school founded in 1927.

The school suffered financial problems in the 1930s, and finally became a non-profit institution in 1940. In 1942 the facility faced condemnation and was taken over by the Secretary of War under the Second War Powers Act. The property was deemed essential for the war effort, and the school became the headquarters of the Army Signal Corps, later the Intelligence and Security Command; at this time it became known as Arlington Hall Station.

Arlington Hall Station was one of only two primary cryptography operations in the United States during World War II, concentrating mostly on Japanese codes. Along with the Pentagon and other war agencies, Arlington Hall Station provided employment for many women who came to the area looking for work, as you can see in the photograph above.

In the post-war years, Arlington Hall Station continued to do work dealing with espionage and diplomacy. It housed a large portion of the Defense Intelligence Agency, founded in 1961, and today the National Foreign Affairs Training Center and the Army National Guard Readiness Center operate out of Arlington Hall.

The Arlington Community Archives holds materials pertaining to the site, including histories and photographs, and holds several yearbooks and other documents dating to Arlington Hall’s time as a girls school.

What About You?

What do you remember about Arlington Hall? What was Arlington like during World War II? Let us know what you remember!

In 1957, there were 46,206 registered voters in Arlington County, and there were 37 election precincts.

25 years before, when the first County Board members were elected under the current County Manager system of government on November 3rd, 1931, only 6,700 people voted in 11 districts around the county.

How did Arlingtonians vote in the 1950s? Voting machines! The photograph above shows county employees moving voting machines in August, 1956. The Public Buildings Division of the Department of Public Service had 32 employees during the 1956/1957 financial year. Besides caring for all county buildings, except public schools, the unit handled the maintenance, set up and storage for all 110 of the county’s voting machines.

The information here can be found in the 1956/1957 Arlington County Annual Report. These reports, found in the Virginia Room, give statistics and descriptions of all departments of the county government from the 1940s into the 1980s. They provide a wonderful snapshot of Arlington County for any given year.

What About You?

Do you remember elections in Arlington? What was it like to vote? Let us know what you remember!

Oral History Excerpt with Tally Bowman

Speaking of a neighborhood woman who was a member of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union who gave “interesting” Halloween parties:

“She used to give Halloween parties to all the children in the neighborhood and show them these movies on people drunk…they were silent movies. And these men [in the films] would get their paychecks and go to a saloon, you know, and then go out…and our kids had never seen anything like that and…this was trying to teach them not to do this sort of thing I guess. And it was a couple of Halloweens before we found out. She had lots of cookies and lots of punch, that’s the only thing [the kids] would talk about . . .

“Then one year a friend of Mrs. Bowman’s said to her, ‘Well, you know what happened at our house last night?’ Bill, her oldest boy…about seven years old…her husband was late coming home…he was a lawyer in the government and he had real high job over there. She said, ‘Well, I wonder what happened to Daddy?’ And he said, ‘Well, maybe he stopped by the saloon and got some beers.’ And she said, ‘Where did you get that from?’ So on questioning him and feeding him some ice cream and cake, she found out that he found it out over there at the Halloween party!

“When the neighbor who had been giving the ‘parties’ was confronted she thought what happened was great, but she quit giving the parties because she refused to give up showing the movies, and her ‘secret’ was out! Everyone, however, according to Mrs. Bowman, had a good laugh over it!”

The quote above is from our oral history collection, which you can find in the library catalog. Oral history tapes and transcripts are available in the Virginia Room.

What About You?

What kind of Halloween parties did you attend in Arlington? What was trick-or-treating like? Let us know what you remember!

Clarendon in the 1940s

In 1900 when Clarendon was established as a village, it consisted of 25 acres intersected by Wilson Boulevard and bounded by Jackson Street on the west and Highland and Herndon Streets on the east.

An electric trolley line furnished transportation, and the Clarendon Citizens Association organized a firefighting force in 1909.

By the 1940’s, when this photograph was taken, Clarendon was Arlington’s “downtown” area, the place to shop, with not only Yeatman’s Hardware, pictured in the upper right, but also a Sears, J.C. Penney’s and Woolworth’s in the main Wilson Boulevard corridor. This photograph is where Wilson Boulevard merges with N. Hartford and N. Highland Streets.

What About You?

What was Clarendon like in the 1940s and 1950s? How has it changed over the years? Let us know what you remember!