Anniversary of the Avenue of Progress

October 2008

by Jerry McCoy

I have always liked numbered anniversaries of historic events that end in a zero. With awareness of a tenth, twentieth, or thirtieth anniversary of an event I quickly know what year it took place and usually where I was and what I was doing on the Road of Life. As I get older, tenth anniversaries feel like they happened yesterday and with fortieth anniversary events my recollections get a little hazy as I was only ten-years old.

But for historians, who study and research historic events that took place fifty, one hundred, or even five hundred years ago, it can feel like s(he) was actually in attendance at the event. That is how I felt about the sixtieth anniversary of an event that took place here in downtown Silver Spring last month.

Looking north on the Washington and Brookeville Turnpike (today's Georgia Avenue) where it intersected at grade level with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad tracks (today's Metro/CSX). A Washington, Woodside and Forest Glen Railway streetcar heads south to the end of the line at Eastern Avenue. Photographed June 21, 1917 by Willard R. Ross.

For those who were in Silver Spring on September 11, 1948, subsequent memories of that anniversary were probably ones of pleasant recollections and confidence in the future - unlike the memories that this date brings to those of us who were here in 2001. On that date sixty years ago an estimated 70,000 people turned out to watch Silver Spring's "Avenue of Progress" parade, an event that celebrated the dedication of the Georgia Avenue underpass. Yes, that underpass!

If you drive or take public (vehicular) transportation, you've certainly been on Georgia Avenue where it dips below the underpass with the CSX/Metro tracks looming overhead. Commuters on this route during morning and/or evening rush hours have most likely sat for a few minutes under the underpass' dark and somewhat intimidating overhead structural supports waiting for the traffic signals at Sligo Ave. to the north or East-West Hwy./Burlington Ave./13th St. to the south to turn from red to green. But for anyone who traveled this section of Georgia Avenue prior to 1925, intimidation of a different sort was on their minds - trying not to get hit by a passing Baltimore and Ohio Railroad train!

This photograph appeared in the July 21, 1942 Washington Evening Star showing flooded automobiles in the middle of Georgia Avenue on the south side of the original underpass, constructed in 1925. (Courtesy of the Washingtoniana Division, DC Public Library)

Commencing in 1873 the B & O Railroad's "Metropolitan Branch," extending from Washington, DC to Point of Rocks, MD, crossed the Seventh Street Pike (today's Georgia Ave.) at grade level. Those on foot or carriage had to make sure that there were no oncoming trains. In 1897 the establishment of the Washington, Woodside, and Forest Glen Railway streetcar line, which traversed the by-then renamed Washington & Brookeville Turnpike, added more opportunity for accidental collisions. Something had to be done.

In 1924 construction began on the original three lane underpass constructed at this location, popularly known as the "Viaduct." One lane on the east side was designed solely to accommodate the streetcar route and the other two lanes were for north and south bound traffic. When streetcar service was eliminated in 1924 its very narrow lane was opened to north bound traffic and the other two lanes were dedicated to south bound use. With this change began a series of hundreds of accidents that would take place over the next 23 years. The safety issue was that unless a north bound motorist hit the former streetcar lane "dead" center they could wind up, well, dead.

Maryland Governor W. Preston Lane, Jr. cuts the "Avenue of Progress" ribbon to open the new Georgia Avenue underpass, September 11, 1948. A portion of the new railroad bridge's fluted concrete piers are visible in the background. (Photo by Jay Braun. Collection of SSHS)

And that was exactly what happened. Accidents, severe injuries, and deaths became so pervasive at the site that with the killing of Mrs. Elna Gerlac Allen, age 55, who crashed her car into one of the viaduct's steel girders on September 24, 1940, Silver Spring Business Men's Association Chairman Fred L. Lutes sent telegrams immediately to Maryland's elected officials to renew its 10-year effort to replace the underpass. Lutes concluded his association's protest telegram with, "For the sake of humanity, will you do something now to stop this slaughter?"

If motorists didn't run into one of the girders, they had a good chance of driving into standing water, especially after a hard ran when the underpass filled up due to its poor drainage design. I have spoken to several men in their seventies who grew up in Silver Spring and who recall - always with a smile on their face - the stranded cars that got submerged in the underpass when their drivers failed to "forge" the water that usually measured two to three feet deep. Standing above Georgia Avenue and taking in the scene below, or getting "in" on the action by swimming in the gasoline/oil/sewage-filled water, these men fondly recall the excitement of a heavy summer downpour from decades past.

This political cartoon appeared in the May 9, 1947 Maryland News making fun of the confusion caused by the rerouting of traffic on Georgia Avenue during construction of the underpass.(Collection of SSHS)

All of this trauma/drama came to an end when the State of Maryland and the B & O Railroad appropriated a combined $1.5 million ($14.7 million in 2008 dollars) to construct a new state-of-the-art six lane underpass and a uniformly paved and divided Georgia Avenue (U.S. Highway 29) from East-West Hwy. to Colesville Rd. An additional $100,000 was expended by the state to construct a five-foot diameter sewer pipe that extended from the underpass to 16th Street at the District line through which collected storm water would be discharged into the Potomac River.

Maryland Governor William Preston Lane, Jr. was given the honor of cutting the ribbon stretched across the south side of the underpass and of being the first to drive a vehicle under it. (Although the Washington Post reported in the next day's edition that the unnamed owner of a Silver Spring photographic studio had driven under it a week earlier to become the "first.") Following Gov. Lane was a 60-float parade consisting of industrial, civic, commercial and fraternal groups that took (only?) two hours to make its way up Georgia Ave. where it turned right on Colesville Rd. and right again on Dale Dr. where the parade ended at the new Montgomery Blair High School Stadium, also officially dedicated that day.

Inaugural issue of The Underpass Magazine of Silver Spring, Maryland published in September 1949. The cover photograph of Silver Spring's 1927 Maryland National Guard Armory was taken by the magazine's managing director, W. L. Cook. (Collection of SSHS)

The new underpass became such a well-known landmark identified with downtown Silver Spring that a year after its dedication a new periodical was launched in September of 1949 titled The Underpass: Magazine of Silver Spring, Maryland. Filled with articles about local businesses and personages accompanied by wonderful photographs and advertisements, the magazine published one other issue the following month and, oddly, no more after that.

Housed in the Silver Spring Historical Society's archives are an incomplete reproduction of that first issue and a complete original of the second printing. No evidence has ever surfaced that the magazine continued publication after October of 1949. If there are other extant issues of The Underpass the Society would certainly like to know about it!

Gracing the cover of that first issue was another Silver Spring landmark that unfortunately is no longer around for anyone to celebrate, our 1927 Maryland National Guard Armory that stood on Wayne Ave. between Georgia Ave. and Fenton St. In October of 1998, ten years ago this month, this designated Montgomery County Master Plan for Historic Preservation site was demolished as part of the "revitalization" of downtown Silver Spring. Today the Wayne Avenue Parking Garage occupies the Armory's footprint.

Yes indeed, not all anniversaries are happy.

(Next month the story of the 50th anniversary of the burning of Falkland Mansion!)

If you can share with the Silver Spring Historical Society any photographs, memorabilia, or memories of the Georgia Avenue underpass or of The Underpass magazine, please contact SSHS at P.O. Box 1160, Silver Spring, MD 20910-1160, email sshistory@yahoo.com, or call 301-537-1253. The society's Web site is www.sshistory.org. Current and future residents and historians will thank you!