April 2009
Silver Spring Park
by Jerry McCoy
One hundred years ago this month the Washington Post ran a news story on p. A3 of its April 4th issue with a four-tiered headline proclaiming "SUBURB GROWING FAST / Silver Spring Park Is Making Rapid Improvement / MANY LOTS ARE BEING SOLD / Home Builders Find Numerous Attractive Features in Popular Maryland Subdivision - Sidewalks and Graded Streets Add to Conveniences - Single Fare Promised by Railway."
"Where's Silver Spring Park?" you are probably thinking.
Silver Spring Park
by Jerry McCoy
SLIGO AVENUE 1909 (top left clockwise): Jouvenal (811) and Glover (809) houses; Drayton (737) and Hewitt (735) houses; Burns house (805); Waters house, south side mid 900 block.
One hundred years ago this month the Washington Post ran a news story on p. A3 of its April 4th issue with a four-tiered headline proclaiming "SUBURB GROWING FAST / Silver Spring Park Is Making Rapid Improvement / MANY LOTS ARE BEING SOLD / Home Builders Find Numerous Attractive Features in Popular Maryland Subdivision - Sidewalks and Graded Streets Add to Conveniences - Single Fare Promised by Railway."
"Where's Silver Spring Park?" you are probably thinking.
Just five years earlier in 1904, developer R. Holt Easley hired surveyor Charles J. Maddox to survey a new subdivision named Silver Spring Park. The borders of this development "thick with trees" were Bonifant Street on the north, today's Cedar Street on the east, Thayer Avenue on the south, and the Washington and Brookeville Turnpike (today's Georgia Avenue) on the west. The subdivision eventually expanded south to Sligo Avenue with Carroll Lane as the eastern boundary.
This subdivision was part of a 106-acre parcel that Easley had purchased in 1902 from Julia M. Thayer, widow of wealthy Washington, DC merchant William Thayer. By 1907 Easley was advertising, in both the Washington Post and the Evening Star, lots for sale in his new subdivision. Business was slow in the beginning but by the early 1910s, spurred by a variety of newspaper articles, Silver Spring experienced its first building boom and the demand for lots started to increase.
Some of the earliest houses constructed in Silver Spring Park were located on Sligo Avenue and were illustrated in the 1909 article. Sligo Avenue, originally named Blair Road, predated the development Silver Spring Park, connecting Georgia Avenue to University Boulevard/Route 193 (the later then named Bladensburg Road). For a short time Sligo was also called Bluestone Road due to the color of the crushed stone paving used on its surface.
Photographs of six houses located on Sligo Avenue accompanied the 1909 article. These were taken by well-known Washington "artistic" photographer George V. Buck, whose shop was located at 1113 F Street, NW. My first thought upon seeing the microfilmed images of these large houses, all two-stories with wrap-around porches, was that they looked more at home in Takoma Park than East Silver Spring. The fact of the matter is that many of East Silver Spring's houses constructed in the early 20th century within a block or two east of Georgia Avenue were of this size and architectural style. Most of these homes, indeed similar to ones that are readily found in Takoma Park today, were demolished and their lots rezoned for commercial usage. Thus was the case for all of illustrated 1909 houses except one, which miraculously still stands.
The first of the houses featured in the Washington Post that a visitor to Silver Spring in 1909 would have encountered was the home of Samuel D. Waters and his wife Ida. Located at the middle of the south side of the 900 block of Sligo, a 1913 Post article described the large house as being one of the finest residences in Montgomery County. Waters was a hardware merchant whose shop, Samuel D. Walters & Son, was located a short distance away on Georgia Ave. Mr. & Mrs. Waters had moved in just in time to be enumerated as residing there in the 1910 U.S. Census.
The house was large enough to also accommodate Mrs. Waters' son by her first marriage, one domestic, and two boarders. By 1911 the Waters had moved to Washington, where he had a carriage shop at 310 Pennsylvania Ave., NW. On March 10, 1913, the Sligo house while occupied by thirteen renters went up in flames and was completely destroyed within 30 minutes. The fire was abetted by not only the 100 gallons of oil stored in the furnace room but by the fact that there was no local fire department! Only after the Silver Spring Post Office burned down on May 5, 1915, would the Silver Spring Volunteer Fire Dept. be established.
Crossing Fenton Street (which I'm trying to document whom it was named for), a visitor would have passed on the north side of Sligo three more recently constructed homes. The first house at 811 Sligo was named "Four Maples" and it was the home of stonemason William Jouvenal and his wife Hannah. Next door at 809 Sligo was mail carrier Joseph B. Glover and his wife Roberta. Two doors down was Baltimore & Ohio freight station agent Jonathan E. Burns and his wife Mae at 805 Sligo, the only brick house of the three. Burns had worked for the B&O since 1887 and served as agent at the B&O Station on Georgia Avenue since 1894.
A person walking the north side of this same block today would encounter one of the blandest streetscapes in downtown Silver Spring. Passing the blank south wall of the 7-Eleven store and its small parking lot on the corner (built 1981), one next encounters the bunker-like Ambassador Animal Hospital (built 2004), and lastly the almost-as-bad Montgomery County Police Silver Spring District substation (built 1961). Together these three sterile boxes replaced six eclectic turn-of-the-century American foursquare homes and one bungalow, all with tree-covered yards.
Crossing Grove Street (another street that I've yet to discover the identity of its namesake), the 1909 visitor would have walked halfway down the same side of Sligo and arrived at 737 Sligo, the home of government clerk William H. Drayton and his wife Gertrude. Featuring an unusual protruding lunette shaped attic window, this home remarkably still stands and is undoubtedly one of the few surviving century-old homes in East Silver Spring. The owner of this fine home should be proud.
Next door at 735 Sligo was the home of Silver Spring Postmaster Frank L. Hewitt. Hewitt served as Silver Spring's second postmaster from 1906 to 1914. This impressive home was razed in 1957, one year short of its 50th anniversary, for construction of the still operational Barbizon Apartments.
Over the decades, Silver Spring Park became consumed by the expanding and all-encompassing moniker "East Silver Spring." Extending in a northeast direction from the east side of Silver Spring's Central Business District all the way to the Capital Beltway and the Montgomery/Prince George's County border, the name East Silver Spring fails to acknowledge the historic origins of our 105 year-old neighborhood. This needs to be rectified.
With commercial pressures of Silver Spring's CBD continuing to threaten the neighborhood with encroaching expansion to the east, the time for historic district designation of the neighborhood is evident. Designation would not only limit this expansion but would protect the exterior fabric of original homes from being altered as well as halt demolition of original homes for replacement by "McMansions." An added bonus to preserving the unique character of our neighborhood would be the additional bonus of tax benefits.
Why, we might even be able to incorporate our neighborhood's original name into the historic designation, Silver Spring Park Historic District. I like it.
If you know of any houses in the Silver Spring Park neighborhood that are at least 100 years-old or know of any descendants of the individuals mentioned in this article, please call me at (301) 537-1253, write PO Box 1160 , Silver Spring , MD 20910-1160 , or email sshistory@yahoo.com. The Silver Spring Historical Society's web site is www.sshistory.org. Only with your help can the history of Silver Spring be preserved.
The next Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Station open house will be held on Saturday, April 4, 2009, from 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. This restored 1945 station is located at 8100 Georgia Avenue (at Sligo Avenue) in downtown Silver Spring, MD. Limited free parking is available in front of the station (please do not park next door at the fire station!) with ample street parking and a parking garage available nearby. The railroad station is also an easy four block walk from the Silver Spring Metro station on the Red Line. The station is the only building in downtown Silver Spring listed in the National Register of Historic Places (although others ARE eligible!). For additional information call (301) 495-4915.
This subdivision was part of a 106-acre parcel that Easley had purchased in 1902 from Julia M. Thayer, widow of wealthy Washington, DC merchant William Thayer. By 1907 Easley was advertising, in both the Washington Post and the Evening Star, lots for sale in his new subdivision. Business was slow in the beginning but by the early 1910s, spurred by a variety of newspaper articles, Silver Spring experienced its first building boom and the demand for lots started to increase.
Some of the earliest houses constructed in Silver Spring Park were located on Sligo Avenue and were illustrated in the 1909 article. Sligo Avenue, originally named Blair Road, predated the development Silver Spring Park, connecting Georgia Avenue to University Boulevard/Route 193 (the later then named Bladensburg Road). For a short time Sligo was also called Bluestone Road due to the color of the crushed stone paving used on its surface.
Photographs of six houses located on Sligo Avenue accompanied the 1909 article. These were taken by well-known Washington "artistic" photographer George V. Buck, whose shop was located at 1113 F Street, NW. My first thought upon seeing the microfilmed images of these large houses, all two-stories with wrap-around porches, was that they looked more at home in Takoma Park than East Silver Spring. The fact of the matter is that many of East Silver Spring's houses constructed in the early 20th century within a block or two east of Georgia Avenue were of this size and architectural style. Most of these homes, indeed similar to ones that are readily found in Takoma Park today, were demolished and their lots rezoned for commercial usage. Thus was the case for all of illustrated 1909 houses except one, which miraculously still stands.
The first of the houses featured in the Washington Post that a visitor to Silver Spring in 1909 would have encountered was the home of Samuel D. Waters and his wife Ida. Located at the middle of the south side of the 900 block of Sligo, a 1913 Post article described the large house as being one of the finest residences in Montgomery County. Waters was a hardware merchant whose shop, Samuel D. Walters & Son, was located a short distance away on Georgia Ave. Mr. & Mrs. Waters had moved in just in time to be enumerated as residing there in the 1910 U.S. Census.
The house was large enough to also accommodate Mrs. Waters' son by her first marriage, one domestic, and two boarders. By 1911 the Waters had moved to Washington, where he had a carriage shop at 310 Pennsylvania Ave., NW. On March 10, 1913, the Sligo house while occupied by thirteen renters went up in flames and was completely destroyed within 30 minutes. The fire was abetted by not only the 100 gallons of oil stored in the furnace room but by the fact that there was no local fire department! Only after the Silver Spring Post Office burned down on May 5, 1915, would the Silver Spring Volunteer Fire Dept. be established.
Crossing Fenton Street (which I'm trying to document whom it was named for), a visitor would have passed on the north side of Sligo three more recently constructed homes. The first house at 811 Sligo was named "Four Maples" and it was the home of stonemason William Jouvenal and his wife Hannah. Next door at 809 Sligo was mail carrier Joseph B. Glover and his wife Roberta. Two doors down was Baltimore & Ohio freight station agent Jonathan E. Burns and his wife Mae at 805 Sligo, the only brick house of the three. Burns had worked for the B&O since 1887 and served as agent at the B&O Station on Georgia Avenue since 1894.
A person walking the north side of this same block today would encounter one of the blandest streetscapes in downtown Silver Spring. Passing the blank south wall of the 7-Eleven store and its small parking lot on the corner (built 1981), one next encounters the bunker-like Ambassador Animal Hospital (built 2004), and lastly the almost-as-bad Montgomery County Police Silver Spring District substation (built 1961). Together these three sterile boxes replaced six eclectic turn-of-the-century American foursquare homes and one bungalow, all with tree-covered yards.
Crossing Grove Street (another street that I've yet to discover the identity of its namesake), the 1909 visitor would have walked halfway down the same side of Sligo and arrived at 737 Sligo, the home of government clerk William H. Drayton and his wife Gertrude. Featuring an unusual protruding lunette shaped attic window, this home remarkably still stands and is undoubtedly one of the few surviving century-old homes in East Silver Spring. The owner of this fine home should be proud.
Next door at 735 Sligo was the home of Silver Spring Postmaster Frank L. Hewitt. Hewitt served as Silver Spring's second postmaster from 1906 to 1914. This impressive home was razed in 1957, one year short of its 50th anniversary, for construction of the still operational Barbizon Apartments.
Over the decades, Silver Spring Park became consumed by the expanding and all-encompassing moniker "East Silver Spring." Extending in a northeast direction from the east side of Silver Spring's Central Business District all the way to the Capital Beltway and the Montgomery/Prince George's County border, the name East Silver Spring fails to acknowledge the historic origins of our 105 year-old neighborhood. This needs to be rectified.
With commercial pressures of Silver Spring's CBD continuing to threaten the neighborhood with encroaching expansion to the east, the time for historic district designation of the neighborhood is evident. Designation would not only limit this expansion but would protect the exterior fabric of original homes from being altered as well as halt demolition of original homes for replacement by "McMansions." An added bonus to preserving the unique character of our neighborhood would be the additional bonus of tax benefits.
Why, we might even be able to incorporate our neighborhood's original name into the historic designation, Silver Spring Park Historic District. I like it.
If you know of any houses in the Silver Spring Park neighborhood that are at least 100 years-old or know of any descendants of the individuals mentioned in this article, please call me at (301) 537-1253, write PO Box 1160 , Silver Spring , MD 20910-1160 , or email sshistory@yahoo.com. The Silver Spring Historical Society's web site is www.sshistory.org. Only with your help can the history of Silver Spring be preserved.
The next Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Station open house will be held on Saturday, April 4, 2009, from 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. This restored 1945 station is located at 8100 Georgia Avenue (at Sligo Avenue) in downtown Silver Spring, MD. Limited free parking is available in front of the station (please do not park next door at the fire station!) with ample street parking and a parking garage available nearby. The railroad station is also an easy four block walk from the Silver Spring Metro station on the Red Line. The station is the only building in downtown Silver Spring listed in the National Register of Historic Places (although others ARE eligible!). For additional information call (301) 495-4915.
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