Change comes calling to Georgia Avenue

Fifteen years later, with the increasing commercialization of property fronting Georgia Avenue, Dolan decided to move his house several hundred feet around the corner onto an empty lot that would be given the address of 918 Thayer Avenue.  

The December 14, 1924 Washington Post article "Program of Construction Extends into Maryland" reported that Dolan, "...expects to erect three stores on his original home site. All of these stores on the east side of Georgia Avenue are expected to be of more valuable construction than some of the presents improvements on that side of the street." 

 

By 1926 Dolan had completed work on three adjoining, two-story brick buildings, still extant at 8223-25-27 Georgia Avenue.  With the opening of several subdivisions surrounding Silver Spring's commercial center, Dolan's buildings were quickly sold to three "service industry" businessmen.

Purchasing 8223 was Richard J. "Pop" Dietle who ran the Silver Spring Home Bakery.  Dietle's commute to work was really short as he lived above the store with his wife Matilda and their children Richard, Erwin, Henry, and Herbert. 

Next door at 8225 was Marcel Zimmerman's Silver Spring Electric Co.  Like the Dietles, Zimmerman lived above his shop with his wife Louise and daughter Mary Jane. At 8227 was the Silver Spring Hardware & Painting Co. owned by Frederic Di Vecchia, who likewise lived above his store with his wife Ann.  All of the upper facades of these three buildings have retained their original architectural design.

Also constructed in 1926 and adjoining Dolan's project to the south was Moses Sclar's Grand Leader Store at 8221 Georgia Avenue, which opened the same year.  Amazingly, despite the passage of over eighty years, this structure has retained the original "fabric" of its entire façade.  Occupied today by Tijuanas Mexican Café, whenever I enter the building's center door flanked by the original projecting shop windows I can't help but wonder what merchandise those cases have displayed over the years.

When occupied by the Grand Leader, Silver Spring's first department store, those display windows were most likely stocked with displays offering the latest shoes, clothes, and assorted "dry goods."  This popular Jewish-owned business was run by Sclar until his death in 1939, after which time its operations were carried on by his wife Catherine and their children Ada, Reuben, Fannie, and Jacob.  For nearly a quarter of a century the Sclar‚s Grand Leader was a Silver Spring landmark.Shopping was not the only attraction that the Grand Leader offered.  Because there were no synagogues at the time in Silver Spring, many Jewish couples were married in the Sclar's residence which, like their neighbors, was located above the store.  Rabbis from Washington, DC would officiate at these ceremonies.  It would be interesting to learn of any couples who were wed above the Grand Leader!

The Dolan's Georgia Avenue residence wasn't the only household to be relocated.  In the next block north were two mirror-image, American four-square houses at 8301 and 8303 Georgia Avenue.  These substantial two-story wood-frame homes, like the Dolan residence, featured wrap-around front porches and bay windows.

The home at 8303 Georgia, on the corner at Bonifant Street, occupied a lot that was nearly twice as large as the lot that 8301 sat on, bordered by Thayer Avenue.  Occupied in 1930 by Thomas Hunter, his wife Alice, and their children Ruth, Thomas Jr., and Marion, 8303 was listed in the census conducted that year with an appraisal of $30,000 ($384K today).  Thomas was the brother of John H. and together they had founded in 1912 Hunter Bros. Hardware, located at 8126 Georgia Avenue. 

The days for 8301 and 8303 were numbered occupying as they did these valuable corner lots.  In fact the former's owner, William H. Thompson, had already relocated his house.  

Thompson, a building contractor, had by 1930 moved it, his wife Mamie, and their children Virginia, Ray, Thelma, and William Jr. around the corner onto Bonifant Street.  There at the end of the block the house had been placed on another corner lot at Fenton Street and given the address of 900 Bonifant.

At some point in time, probably by the early 1950s, 900 Bonifant became a rental property.  In 2004 redevelopment finally caught up with the house when its new owners announced plans to raze it, along with two other houses, to construct a condominium project.  An agreement brokered between the Silver Spring Historical Society and the owners to give 900 Bonifant free to anyone who would haul it away resulted in no takers...it was simply too expensive to move.  Today the Lofts 24 condominium occupies the site. 

The fate of the Hunter's home at 8303 Georgia was similar to the Thompson's residence.  Appearing in the December 24, 1933 Washington Post was an article announcing that a People's Drug Store (today's CVS) and a Piggly Wiggly grocery store were slated to be constructed on the two lots where the homes had sat.  At some point between 1930 and the publication of this article, 8303 was lifted off its foundation and similarly rolled around the corner onto Bonifant where it was placed on an empty lot just up the street from the Thompson home.

Assigned an address of 912 Bonifant, the Hunters lived in the house until 1953 when Mr. Hunter passed away.  The property was quickly sold, razed, and by the following year three separate businesses with the addresses of 934-936-938 Bonifant Street occupied the site of the homestead.  A photograph of this house has yet to surface.

Lastly, one Georgia Avenue home that DID manage to stand its ground can still be seen today.  Plaza Artist Materials at 8209 Georgia Avenue was in 1920 the private residence of Bernard R. Gannon, a grocer merchant in Silver Spring.  By 1925 the house was occupied by Dr. James Howell Forsyth's drug store.  

Originally a two-story, wood frame American four-square house with front porch, the structure has been all but engulfed by add-on construction.  If you walk into Plaza today make sure you look up at the pressed tin ceiling, probably installed when the house was converted from residential to commercial use.  Also make sure that you walk across Georgia Avenue and view the building from a distance.  From there you can see the house's two top-floor dormer windows peeking out from the roofline.

Every time I walk by the former sites of these homes I conjure up mental images of the spectacle that must have ensued in relocating them over three-quarters of a century ago. Certainly someone must have taken a photograph of at least one of these three moves.  Maybe these photographs will someday surface too.

In today's society when most structures are built to last a generation...only to be knocked down and replaced by construction just as ephemeral...it is inspiring to know that there was a time when we were less wasteful and more concerned about preserving our heritage.  If only we can emulate that mindset today.