Category Archives: Uncategorized

GM wrote about how freight trains use to run down K and Water Streets yesterday and called for readers to submit what it was like patronizing bars like Chadwick’s at the time. And he received this fantastic story from Michael Judge:

Yes, I do indeed have memories of the old railway that ran through lower Georgetown.  Back in the mid-80’s, my friend Jack Gwaltney and I were aspiring actors working at Houston’s restaurant.  We would head down to Chadwicks after our shift to catch last call and commiserate about whether we would ever make it in show business.  One night, Jack looked out the bar’s front window and commanded me to “Make a wish!”  He then ran outside.  I followed him and saw the big locomotive chugging by.  Up we jumped onto a freight car like a couple of Woody Guthrie hobos.  We rode it until just beyond the Whitehurst overpass, jumped off, and raced back to Chadwick’s to pay our bar tab.

Jack went on to become a wonderful actor—he played John Marshall in the HBO series “John Adams.”—and I won the Helen Hayes award for best actor in 1987.  The good old days.

Anyone else ride the rails down K St.?

Photo by Hillel Steinberg.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• The case for the gondola.
• This sort of event rental was just what the neighbors around Duke Ellington High School were afraid of.

Montrose Park

GM is reviving an old series today, Now and a Long Time Ago. He is doing so because a reader pointed to a fantastic collection of photos from the days when the Capital Crescent Trail was the Georgetown Branch of the B & O Railroad, and freight trains rumbled all the way in to the West Heating Plant. Continue reading →

Photo by Ji Soo Song.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• The search for the missing enslaved people sold by Georgetown University.
• M St. in front of the Four Seasons was completely blocked in the middle of rush hour last night. GM has now idea why, but assumes some foreign dignitary is probably involved.

Potomac Boat Club

This week on Know Your Trees, GM is branching out (ha) to talk about a tree you traditionally didn’t see very much in the tree boxes of Georgetown, but which you’re going to see more of in the future: the cypress. Specifically the bald cypress.

When GM first saw a cypress planted in a tree box, he was surprised that a tree famous for growing in deep southern bayous would do well in an urban environment. But apparently they can adapt well and are being planted more around places like Georgetown. The one above is on P just west of 31st. There were about five other relatively young cypresses planted around the neighborhood before this year. This year brought a handful more, including one on Volta just west of Wisconsin.

So what does a cypress look like? Continue reading →

Photo by Bill Starrels.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Sad news, Betsy Cooley, long time executive director of CAG and genuinely all-around fantastic person, passed away. She will be greatly missed.
• Update from yesterday’s article: Dumbarton Oaks thinks the oak they just took down was at least 200 years old.

Dumbarton Oaks

Dumbarton Oaks recently cut down a massive white oak. As a sign near the carnage explained, the tree was too sick to remain and posed a danger if it were left up.

The photo above doesn’t quite do this tree justice. Here’s GM’s daughter next to another of the slices, for some perspective:

From GM’s rough counting of the rings, the tree appears to have been between 100 and 130 years old. This is actually not particularly old for a white oak, which can in some circumstances live over 400 years. But it’s still a sizable loss for an estate named after it (and others of its kin). Continue reading →