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local history news

Home For The Holidays

Post Published: December 23, 2010

 

Built by English architect George Hadfield for George Washington Parke Custis (step-grandson and adopted son of George Washington), Arlington House was home to Robert E. Lee from 1831 to 1861, and the annual holiday season was a time of much celebration for the Lee and Custis families.  The annual return to Arlington House was an occasion near and dear to all family members. Indeed, beginning in 1831, Robert E. Lee returned to Arlington on 20 out of 30 Christmases, all while he was an active duty soldier.

The house was decorated with ivy, pine, holly, and myrtle.  Mistletoe was hung from lanterns and arches, and a great yule log was brought to the fireplace on Christmas Eve and lit from a piece of the log from the previous Christmas.  Gifts, including books, skates, dolls, and many others were exchanged by family members, followed by morning prayer and breakfast.  A holiday feast of turkey, ham, plum pudding and mince pie was served later in the day.

The Christmas of 1860 would be the final one at Arlington for the Lee family, as Virginia seceded from the Union in April of 1861, and the estate was occupied by U.S. Army troops in May of that same year.

What About You?

What are your Arlington holiday memories? We want to hear from you!

December 23, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

The Consumer Brewery

Post Published: December 3, 2010

Before the Era of Brew Pubs, There Were Local Breweries


By providing their communities with a convenient source of beer, local breweries gave tavern owners and other customers another option besides relying exclusively on larger commercial breweries.

The Consumer Brewing Company was Arlington's local brewery of note.

Built in 1896 in Rosslyn under the direction of noted local architect Albert Goenner (who was also responsible for the building of the original Arlington County Courthouse), the building was located above the site of the old Aqueduct Bridge. Rosslyn at this time was a notorious area, home of many taverns, gambling establishments, brothels, and the like. The building itself was a distinctive red brick structure with turrets on the ends, a clock tower in the center, and a large smokestack at the back. Around 1904, the business was reorganized and William McGuire became president of the brewery, changing the name to the Arlington Brewery, which continued operations until 1920 when Prohibition went into effect.  The building subsequently served as a lithographic print shop and warehouse until its demolition in 1958, when the property was used for the construction of a Marriott motel.

The photograph above is a view of Rosslyn and the Aqueduct Bridge from Georgetown. The brewery and smokestack is in the upper right section of the image.

Much of the material for this particular blog post was taken from an excellent article written by Virginia Room volunteer Willard J. Webb for the October 2000 edition of the Arlington Historical Magazine. Willard passed away on Nov. 23, 2010, and is still greatly missed.

What About You?

What are your Consumer Brewing Company memories? We want to hear from you!

 

December 3, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages, Unboxed Tagged With: local history news

Arlington’s Friday Night Lights

Post Published: November 2, 2010

Arlington and Fairfax have a football rivalry that goes back many years!

The insert to the game program for the Washington-Liberty (formerly Washington-Lee) Generals/Fairfax Rebels football game on Friday, Sept. 11, 1964, reads:

“The Generals are defending their Northern Virginia Championship tonight when they come up against their first and one of the toughest teams of the season – the Fairfax Rebels.

“Fairfax’s 18 returning lettermen that helped leave last year’s game scoreless will be W-L’s biggest headache. General Coach John Youngblood also feels Fairfax is going to have the heaviest team in the league.

“Coach Youngblood claims that depth is the team’s problem and that he will be depending on half a dozen men to play both ways… [b]ut Coach Youngblood is optimistic about the whole thing. ‘We will beat them if we can manage to get more points.'”

What About You?

What are your Arlington high school football memories? We want to hear from you!

November 2, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: Center for Local History, News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

Haunted Arlington: Arlington’s X-files, Pt. 2

Post Published: October 1, 2010

With Halloween lurking just around the corner, it seems only appropriate that we should rummage through some of Arlington’s own “X-Files” and blow the dust off of an incident alleged to have happened at Arlington Hall, a girls finishing school turned intelligence post that was profiled in a previous Our Back Pages. Though anecdotal in nature, this recollection from an anonymous military policeman has much more detail than is the norm and is a fascinating story.

One evening, while on patrol, the policeman overheard various discussions on his police radio about a number of odd occurrences in a certain building. In fact, the building was one in which the policeman himself had previously heard strange noises while on duty. During the course of the evening, MPs assigned to the first floor desk in the building were hearing footsteps from the floor above. The footsteps had the characteristics of a person walking on a hard, wooden floor, and then stepping onto a carpeted, softer surface. After a supervisor was summoned to the scene, this activity was heard again, causing the supervisor and additional personnel to investigate the second floor, to no avail. At the same time, a second patrol which was en route to the scene, noticed what appeared to be a female figure clad in a floral print dress who repeatedly entered and exited an upstairs ladies bathroom, pausing to regard her reflection in front of a mirror. After observing this behavior, the patrol notified the MPs at the downstairs service desk, who again investigated the area in which this activity is alleged to have taken place, with a similar lack of results.

One would think that all of this is mysterious enough, but, it was later learned that the building in which this incident occurred was rumored to have been haunted by the ghost of a young woman from the time when Arlington Hall was a girls finishing school. Supposedly, after becoming pregnant by a stable hand, the young woman took her life out of fear of the embarrassment and shame that it would have brought to her family.

What about you?
Do you have a spooky tale to tell? Tell us about any hauntings or mysterious occurrences that you have encountered in Arlington.

October 1, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

Clarendon Circle

Post Published: September 3, 2010

One of the busiest areas of Arlington can be found in Clarendon, where Washington Boulevard, Wilson Boulevard and Clarendon Boulevard all meet. In the early 1900s, the presence of the trolley in Clarendon led to an outgrowth of merchants and businesses in that neighborhood.

Although the names, owners and buildings themselves may have changed over time, what has remained constant is the steady parade of shoppers, pedestrians, and commuters that flock to the businesses and restaurants in Clarendon. Long before malls and multiplex cinemas became the mainstays of the present day consumer, customers packed the Ashton Theater, Little Tavern, Sears, and numerous other businesses in Clarendon.

Clarendon Circle was conceived around the time of the onset of World War I, when a parcel of land donated by Arthur J. Porter was used to make the circle.  Sometime in the late 1920s-early 1930s, the American Legion began construction on a War Memorial Monument in the center of the circle, supposedly using stones from a retaining wall from the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which was being dismantled at that time. After its dedication on November 11, 1931, the memorial remained at Clarendon Circle until 1940, when concerns about the structure being a possible traffic hazard resulted in its relocation to the Court House that same year. Eventually, in 1986, the memorial was returned to a spot very near its original location.

What About You?

What do remember about Clarendon Circle? Shops? Businesses? Trolleys?

September 3, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

Playing Ball at Jennie Dean Park

Post Published: July 30, 2010

The photograph above has the following caption: “Play Ball! The game is about to start on Jennie Dean Field. Left to right are: Dernard [sic] Johnson (Arl. Rec. Dept.), captain of the Arl. Rec. Dept., Mr. Pryor (counselor of 153), and Warren Jackson (Mgr. of the Daper Jeans).”

Ernest Johnson was the Supervisor of the Department of Parks’ Negro Recreation Section while the county had a segregated recreation system. In 1964, after a reorganization of the department, he became Supervisor for the county’s recreation centers. Johnson was very involved in the development of the programs under his charge, and during the early 1950s, oversaw photographic documentation of the Negro Recreation Department’s programs. Researchers can now see photographs of dances, plays, sporting teams, parades and other activities for both African-American children and adults; Johnson’s widow generously donated these photographs to the Virginia Room.

Jennie Dean Park, located at 3630 27th Street South, was part of the first group of parks developed by the Department of Recreation when it was formed in 1948. During development, it was referred to as “the county’s presently sole recreation area for colored citizens.” Serving south Arlington and located in the African-American neighborhood Nauck, Jennie Dean Park, with its baseball fields, tennis courts and open areas, gave south Arlingtonians a new place to enjoy outdoor activities, either on their own or through a county-sponsored program. Today, the park has a lighted basketball court and picnic facilities, and is a centerpiece of the area in the warmer months.

What About You?

What do you remember about Jennie Dean Park? How about the programs in the Negro Recreation Department? Did your path cross with Ernest Johnson? We want to know!

July 30, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

George McQuinn: Arlington’s All-Star

Post Published: May 27, 2010

He has no plaque in Cooperstown and you won’t find a hometown field with his name. But back in the day, George Hartley McQuinn of Arlington, Va. could pick it with the best of them.

In 1938, just his first full season in the big leagues, he hit safely in 34 straight games for the lowly St. Louis Browns. Later, he hit .304 while playing for the New York Yankees.

Born in 1910, George McQuinn was a seven-time All-Star and a major leaguer for 12 years.  He helped win two American League pennants and a world championship ring as the unlikely spark for the 1947 Yankees. And at the end of each season, he came home to Arlington, where as a boy living near modern-day Ballston, George played ball with his five brothers. He was even named the first captain of the Washington-Lee baseball team.

Just before his final season in the big leagues, George bought himself a sporting goods store back home at 1041 N. Highland St. in Clarendon, gave it the winning brand “McQuinn’s,” and took an active role in running the place. He returned to the store for a year after his retirement following the 1948 season, but baseball wasn't finished with him yet. George managed various minor league teams, winning four championships with the Braves in Quebec. As time went on, he accepted part-time scouting positions for the Braves and then the Washington Senators while spending more time at his store and writing a concise but thorough “Guide to Better Baseball.”

Clarendon's downturn in the 1960s forced McQuinn to close his store, and he finally left baseball in 1972. He moved to Alexandria and became an apartment manager, spending more time with his family. George McQuinn died following a stroke on Christmas Eve 1978. He was 68 years old.

McQuinn was never voted into Cooperstown. But in the last spring of his life, he was inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame in Portsmouth. His official photograph shows him wearing the Yankees uniform.

To learn more about George McQuinn, read the full original article by Peter Golkin (from which the above local history blog post was adapted):

Arlington’s All-Star--George McQuinn

He has no plaque in Cooperstown and you won’t find a hometown field with his name. But back in the day, George Hartley McQuinn of Arlington, Va. could pick it with the best of them. Kids bought first basemen’s mitts bearing his name. And his bat also made an impression. In 1938, just his first full season in the big leagues, he hit safely in 34 straight games for the lowly St. Louis Browns.

George McQuinn was a seven-time All-Star and a major leaguer for 12 years.  He helped win two American League pennants and a world championship ring as the unlikely spark for the 1947 Yankees. And at the end of each season, he came home to Northern Virginia.

Born on May 29, 1910, McQuinn grew up learning the game on various fields around then-“Alexandria County.” One makeshift diamond required shooing cows from the Lacey pasture north of Washington Boulevard and west of Buchanan Street. More ball could be found on the future site of the Parkington Shopping Center, later Ballston Common.

“Baseball became my life very quickly,” McQuinn told the Washington Post’s Bob Levey in 1976. “We never had nine guys, only about seven or eight, but that didn’t make any difference. I used to play all spring and summer and go hunting and fishing all fall and winter. The other kids used to say, ‘You’re going to be a big leaguer.’ And I knew it in my heart.”

While George and his five brothers played in and around their Ballston neighborhood, their father was always somewhere nearby, driving the Fairfax-to-D.C. line for the Washington & Dominion rail line. Football and basketball also filled out the days but by high school, McQuinn’s grace in the field and at the plate stood out. He was named the first captain of the Washington-Lee baseball team.

Topping out at 5 foot 11 inches and about 165 pounds, McQuinn made up for average size with an impressive physical discipline and natural ease. Soon after graduation, he hit the semi-pro leagues and caught the eyes of Yankees scouts as a potential heir to another leftie, Henry Louis Gehrig.

“The Yankees were so much richer and better run than the rest of the teams,” McQuinn remembered. “I wouldn’t have minded playing in Washington before the home folks, but New York was kind of the ultimate. And everybody knew about Gehrig, oh, my yes.”

His contract with New York meant sharpening his game in farm towns like Wheeling, Albany, Binghamton and Scranton. But despite consistently hitting above .300, McQuinn couldn’t gain much traction toward reaching the Bronx. He was never even invited for a look at Yankees spring training. Why bother since the “Ironhorse” Gehrig would no doubt play day-after-day, season-after-season?

“I should have said sell me or trade me. There was no future in playing minor league ball behind Gehrig. But I didn’t,” McQuinn recalled. “Maybe that’s why when I finally did make the big leagues, it didn’t seem like so much of a thrill.”

Even without a request, the Yankees eventually cut McQuinn loose—twice in fact. Instead of apprenticing in the Bronx, his 1936 major league debut came on a conditional contract with Cincinnati, followed by one more year of promise with the Newark Bears back in the Yankees’ system.

Lacking a first basemen among many things, the St. Louis Browns grabbed McQuinn for 1938. The Yankees hadn’t bothered to protect him on their roster. In that first full rookie year, he rewarded the Browns’ faith hitting .324 along with 42 doubles, second in the American League. He was also second among first basemen in fielding.

By painful coincidence, McQuinn’s 34-game summer hitting streak ended during a trio of back-to-back-to-back doubleheaders in Philadelphia, just before the Browns visited the Bronx. A building cache of publicity for McQuinn was wiped out. At the same time no one, especially the Yankees, could have known that Gehrig had only a few more months left in baseball.

Despite some horrendous Browns season records (55 wins-97 losses in 1938, 43-111 in 1939), McQuinn generally thrived during his St. Louis years. But looking back, he couldn’t shake the trajectory of his career. “We’d finish last every year. I began to think God didn’t intend for me to become a Yankee.”

World War II took many ballplayers overseas, leveling pro fields across the United States. For the Browns in ’44, it meant their one claim to an American League pennant. McQuinn helped lead the way. Known to wear a brace for recurring back pain, he had failed two Selective Service System physicals. And by '44, he was considered too old for military induction. The Cardinals, who also shared Sportsman Park, would win the “Trolley Series” four games to two but McQuinn’s .438 average topped both teams and his would be the only Browns’ homer in Series history. The team became the Baltimore Orioles in 1954.

While George McQuinn spent the war playing ball among what was known as an "all 4-F infield," his younger brother Kenneth served in the Naval Reserves. A ship’s cook, he died  during the June 6, 1944 invasion of Normandy, leaving behind his wife and toddler son back in Arlington. Kenneth Warner McQuinn is among the names on the Clarendon memorial to Arlington’s war dead. Another brother, Army Staff Sgt. Charles McQuinn, was decorated for gallantry in France and Belgium.

At the end of the ’45 season, McQuinn found himself traded to the cellar-dwelling Philadelphia A’s. He later acknowledged being troubled by the Browns playing that year with a one-armed man, Pete Gray, in their outfield. With the A’s, McQuinn was plagued by chronic back pain and an anemic .225 batting average. Upon his release in the fall, A’s manager Connie Mack reportedly suggested: “George, you played one year too long.”

McQuinn was 36 years old, almost a senior citizen in pro ball. That January at their Virginia home, his wife Kathleen asked about spring training just weeks away. “Honey, what are you going to do? Baseball or work?”

McQuinn was jolted. “That word work. It hit me between the eyes,” he remembered.

Cold calls to several clubs failed to generate much interest. Then, saved for last, McQuinn reached out to new Yankees manager Bucky Harris. The aging first baseman would try to close the loop on his old dream of pinstriped glory. With the Bronx Bombers still haunted by the sudden end of the Gehrig era and hobbled by the war years, McQuinn said he knew how to get the Yankees back to the Series for the first time in four years.

As Harris later recalled, “Naturally I asked how and he said, ‘Sign me.’ Now I know McQuinn, and have known him for several years. I figured if he had enough confidence in himself to come to me like that I couldn’t lose trying him.”

McQuinn wouldn’t take the opportunity for granted. “How many times do you get to live a dream?” he asked in 1976. “I prepared for that season like I’d never prepared for anything else.”

Tenacity and dedication paid off in ‘47. McQuinn beat out four others for the starting job at first and hit .304 that year—second-best on the team. He drove in 80 runs and homered 13 times. At one point during the season, the Yankees notched a 19-game win streak. In October, they took a dramatic seven-game Series from the Dodgers. McQuinn made the cover of Sport magazine and writers declared him the “baseball Cinderella story of the year.” Joe DiMaggio said McQuinn was the key to the team.

“I made them forget Gehrig for a while, anyway,” McQuinn reflected later.

His career had almost ended before its remarkable comeback. But McQuinn was now also ready to  prepare for “work”—life after the game. He bought himself a sporting goods store back home at 1041 N. Highland St. in Clarendon, gave it the winning brand “McQuinn’s,” and took an active role in running the place. And he was still a Yankee—a world champion.

The 1948 season came quickly and despite all best hopes, there would be no second straight magical year in New York. McQuinn spent much of the season watching from the dugout. He hit .248 and he drove in just over half the runs of the previous year. His season ended with a failed pinch-hit appearance in Fenway Park. The defending world champions finished third, Harris lost his job and McQuinn was released in October. But it would be a different off-season from the one before.

Satisfied that he had nothing left to prove, McQuinn readily accepted retirement. He had appeared in 1,550 games, had 1,588 hits, a lifetime average of .276 and 135 homers. On the field, there were 13,414 put-outs, 1,074 assists and just 113 errors. Very solid numbers.

He returned to Arlington and the store on Highland full-time—for a year.

With the 1950s came the familiar baseball pangs. Now he would try managing in the minors, returning to familiar towns up into Canada and west to Idaho. In Quebec, where he also manned first on occasion, his Braves won four championships. But as a new decade approached, more time at home became his goal.

McQuinn eased into the part-time life of a scout for the Braves and later the Browns-like Washington Senators. “I knew I would never be a big league manager. I was just too easygoing,” he later told the Post.  With his lifetime of know-how and love for the game, McQuinn reached out to the next generation of coaches and players, writing a concise but thorough “Guide to Better Baseball.”

Northern Virginia kids and their parents still sought out the local celebrity-retailer. Phil Wood, then in grade school and now Washington’s noted baseball historian-broadcaster, recalls his own visit in the early ‘60s:

“George’s sporting goods store in Clarendon was a very short walk from my grandmother’s house. My dad took me in there once and introduced me to him. Now, my dad didn’t really know George McQuinn but George acted like they’d been friends for years. I was still in the single digits, but tall for my age and was actually switching to first base in Little League because of some knee issues. And George talked about how to choose the right mitt, and how much bigger they were than when he played (although they would get still bigger as the years went by). He was obviously a good businessman [and] knew how to charm the customers.”

By the mid-60s, Arlington’s once-vibrant shopping districts like Clarendon faced serious challenges from the new outlying malls. Parking issues, limited space and upkeep took their toll. McQuinn closed his store. A few years later he formally left baseball, retiring in 1972 from a scouting post with the Montreal Expos, Washington’s future Nationals.

McQuinn was living in Alexandria where his business and management skills went to use overseeing an apartment building just on Martha Custis Drive, just south of I-395.  He had time to watch his grandson play Little League and welcomed the occasional chance to talk about his own days on the ballfield.

George McQuinn died following a stroke on Christmas Eve 1978. He was 68 years old.

“I always regretted not looking him up again after the business closed,” Phil Wood says. “Especially when he passed away at a fairly young age. Good player, great glove man, and more of a power hitter than you might expect—lots of extra base hits.”

McQuinn was never voted into Cooperstown. But he was the first inductee of the Arlington Sports Hall of Fame when it was created in 1958 by the county's Better Sports Club. And in the last spring of his life, McQuinn was inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame in Portsmouth. His official photograph shows him wearing the Yankees uniform.

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May 27, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

Infamous Arlingtonian Mary Ann Hall

Post Published: April 30, 2010

Rixey Mansion, now part of Marymount University, stands on the site of Mary Ann Hall’s country house.

 

Mary Ann Hall, sister of Bazil Hall, the farmer and slave owner for which Hall’s Hill (now Highview Park) was named, also owned property in Arlington which she used as a summer home and country house. The main building of Marymount University, Rixey Mansion, now occupies the site of Mary Ann’s farmhouse.

Mary Ann was a high-class madam in Washington where she ran a brothel (located at the foot of Capitol Hill) for over 40 years. She bought the lot and had the brothel built to her specifications, a substantial house with four stories containing 25 rooms and a basement.

When the construction for the National Museum of the American Indian began, professional archeologists were called in to interpret the site where her house stood. The results of the excavation showed that the quality of materials at the site was better than that of the surrounding neighborhood. Tableware was expensive and seeds and bones found showed a nutritional diet that included substantial amounts of beef, poultry and fish as well as turtle, and fruits such as coconuts and berries. Also found were dozens of corks and bottles which seemed to indicate Mary Ann’s fondness for champagne.

A successful business woman, in 1853 she was able to purchase a farm in Alexandria County (now Arlington) to which she gradually added through 1869. As she grew older she spent more time at the farm and turned over business matters to her younger sister Elizabeth.

District of Columbia court records show that when she died, Mary Ann Hall was worth $87,000 (about $2,000,000 today) with no debts. A list of her belongings included Belgian carpets, oil paintings, plush red furniture and an ice box as well as a large number of sheets, mattresses, blankets, feather pillows and comforters.

Mary Ann never married, had children or kept a diary. She left no collection of personal letters or business ledgers, so there is little known about her as an individual. However, her obituary in the Evening Star described her as a person of unquestioned integrity and a heart open to “appeals of distress and a charity that was boundless.”

After her death in 1886, she was buried in Congressional Cemetery. The inscription on her grave monument reads:

Truth was her motto
Her creed charity for all
Dawn is coming.

April 30, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages, Unboxed Tagged With: local history news

A Family’s Final Resting Place

Post Published: January 28, 2010

Shreve family gravestoneOf the two Shreve family cemeteries in Arlington, the Southern-Shreve cemetery could possibly lay claim to having a more unique history. Located on the north side of Fairfax Drive, between North Frederick and North Harrison streets, the cemetery sat near the property of Richard and Frances (Redin) Southern. Richard Southern was a landscape architect and horticulturist, who became known for pioneering the use of the tomato as a food. It may seem hard to believe in these modern times, but prior to Southern’s efforts, the tomato was widely regarded as being poisonous and was only used for decorative purposes.

The land was given as a dowry by Frances Redin’s brother, a prominent Georgetown attorney, and was the burial place of John Redin, father of Frances and her brother. This generous act may have been precipitated by the fact that the Southerns cared for John Redin during his final years. He was buried in the garden of the Southern’s home in 1832, his gravestone being the first in what was to become the family cemetery.

Being neighbors of the Shreves, Birches, and Balls, the families intermarried and the house and property remained in the Shreve family until 1904.

There are approximately 20 marked stones in the cemetery, which is still in fairly good condition today, with the most notable being that of Richard and Francis Shreve, who were both killed by lightning on June 25th, 1874. The inscription reads: “Struck by a thunderbolt from Heaven, they both lay down and died, they left three lambs whom God had given them, may he for them provide.”

What About You?

Do you have any stories involving local family history? Let us know!

January 28, 2010 by Web Editor Filed Under: Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

ARLINGTON ROCKS – PT. 3: "The Seventh Dawn"

Post Published: November 16, 2009

Progressive rock…I’m sure that some of you still have a few King Crimson, Yes, Moody Blues, or Emerson, Lake, & Palmer albums lurking in your collections somewhere. While never approaching the popularity of the aforementioned groups, Arlington’s very own entry into the progressive rock sound of the 70’s, The Seventh Dawn, had a story arguably as unique as any, and a sound that avoided the pitfall of many of their superstar contemporaries, which has led to a modest, but well deserved reappraisal of the band that few could have predicted.
Listen to The Seventh Dawn

Essentially a songwriting project of three brothers, Heff, Bil, and Eric Munson, along with Heff’s girlfriend and wife-to-be Ann, The Seventh Dawn was formally launched in 1973. In early 1975, a college friend at Virginia Commonwealth University suggested the band record a vinyl record to accompany a “mock-up album cover” he was doing as an art assignment. Using the recording equipment available at the school’s electronic music laboratory, the resulting album, “Sunrise”, was completed in 1976. 200 copies of the disc were pressed. Though the recording was primitive by the standards of the day, there was no denying the quiet power and charm of the performances, and the songwriting was strong throughout. “Sunrise” reflected the tastes of the members, with strains of The Beatles, King Crimson, and progressive British folk acts such as Steeleye Span and Renaissance being evident.

A follow-up album, “Dreams” was recorded, but not released due to financial constraints. Weathering numerous lineup changes, the band soldiered on until breaking up 1981.

Years later, fate intervened when their seemingly forgotten album found its way into the hands of serious record buffs in the 1990’s, fetching a very expensive price on the collectors market. This resulted in the album’s reissue on vinyl, and eventually, a 2007 reissue on CD with bonus tracks, and, the release of the long deferred second album, “Dreams” as well.

What About You? Do you remember The Seventh Dawn? Let us know!

 

 

November 16, 2009 by Web Editor Filed Under: News Archive, Our Back Pages Tagged With: local history news

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