These are a couple great photos of Chevy Chase Country Club in the 1920s, thanks to the Library of Congress.

Chevy Chase Club in the 1920s

Chevy Chase Club in the 1920s

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If you lived in D.C. in the 1980s, seeing a police chase screaming down K St., or any other major thoroughfare, was not a rare occurrence.

So, out of the thousands of chases mentioned in the newspaper archives, we have selected three to share in our next “Three Things …” post.

1. Rum runners crash into Library of Congress

Bootleggers and rum runners. Washington had its fair share in the Roaring Twenties. Below is an article we came across from March 11, 1928 about a wild police chase of rum runners, through the streets of D.C.

Speeding at 70 miles an hour through Southeast Washington streets early yesterday morning, an alleged rum runner, closely pursued by police, lost control of his machine, which crashed into the stone wall surrounding the Library of Congress. Unhurt, the driver of the car and his companion jumped and fled, but were captured. Two hundred and forty half-gallon jars of corn whisky were confiscated, police said.

Those held are Robert Thomas Burgess, 32 years old, charged with reckless driving, illegal possession and transportation of liquor, and Patrick E. Foley, transporting and possessing.

They were captured by Sergt. George M. Little, member of the police flying squadron, and Robert F. Cornett, Federal dry agent, who was recently exonerated by a Baltimore Federal court in the killing of Gundlach, St. Marys County, Md., farmer.

The chase began when the “dry” squad stationed themselves at the District line, on the Marlboro pike, to await the arrival of the suspected liquor car. In a previous skirmish, the machine had escaped, Sergt. Little had said.

Their quarry flashed past at a high rate of speed, and the police car swung into pursuit, which led through Alabama avenue to Good Hope road, and Naylor road to Pennsylvania avenue southeast.

Swerving to avoid wrecking a milk wagon at Second and B streets, the driver of the fleeing car lost control and it plunged into the wall, from which it glanced to an electric light pole, about 200 feet distant. Mowing down the pole the automobile again collided with the wall, and bounded back into the street, where it came to a stop against the curbing.

run runners wreck at the Library of Congress (Washington Post)

2. An 80-mile-an-hour chase from Chevy Chase Circle

Six months before D-Day, a wild police chase through from Chevy Chase to Georgia Ave., NW, ended in a massive crash and fireball. Behind the wheel was a young man in the navy from Bainbridge, Maryland. Below is the report in the Washington Post on January 7th, 1944.

An 80-mile-an-hour chase involving police scout cars and an automobile stolen from an undertaking firm, ended early yesterday when the auto, driven by a young sailor, crashed into the brick columns of a bus barn at Georgia ave. and V St. nw., and caught fire.

The sailor, Charles Steven Thornburg, attached to the Naval Training Center at Bainbridge, Md., suffered a broken leg, possible skull fracture and internal injuries. His condition as described as critical at Garfield Hospital.

The chase began when police observed the car at Chevy Chase Circle. They started pursuit and reported via two-way radio to Charles Clay, jr., police radio dispatcher. Clay assigned other scout cars to the chase, and the speeding car was later seen at Georgia ave. and Peabody st. nw.

The chase continued south to Park rd. as reports were flashed to Clay, who dispatched other scout cars to the vicinity with instructions to block the street. Finally reaching V st., the auto piled up against the brick columns. Segments of the radiator flew off and broke a plate glass window across the street at 2113 Georgia ave. Fire apparatus and an ambulance were dispatched there.

The wrecked sedan was stolen from Joseph Gawler’s Sons, Inc., 1756 Pennsylvania ave. nw, police said.

police chase wreck – January 7th, 1944 (Washington Post)

3. Officer Rainey chases ‘em down on his Harley

Officer Maurice A. Rainey, Park Policeman, gives you two chases here for the price of one. The first was a report we found in the Washington Post from October 2nd, 1921.

Park Policeman M.A. Rainey, who was reprimanded by Judge Mattingly in the Police court early in the week for alleged “wild west tactics” in bringing a speeding motorist to a halt, was yesterday commended for his work by Col. C.O. Sherrill, superintendent of public buildings and grounds.

Col. Sherrill conducted an investigation into the incident, and after a hearing in his office yesterday stated that Rainey’s “actions were beyond criticism and were most admirable.” He expressed his appreciation of the aid given Rainey in making the arrest by Serg. F. Wilson, Gen. Pershing’s chauffeur, and Park Policemen C.D. Fortner and O.E. Morgan.

Rainey’s second major chase, as reported by the papers was on Sunday, February 26th, 1922.

An exciting chase between Park Policeman Maurice A. Rainey, stationed on the speedway, and an alleged bootleg automobile through the streets of the northwestern section, early Sunday, resulted in the machine crashing into a tree at Twenty-sixth street and New York avenue northwest, wrecking it. The alleged bootleggers escaped. The bootleggers threw a quantity of Scotch whisky, Rainey declared, from the the speeding machine. The wrecked car was confiscated by the police and revenue agents. When the bootleggers jumped from the machine Rainey abandoned his motorcycle and gave chase on foot, but was outdistanced by the negroes.

Officer Rainey is pictured in the photograph below, posing on his sweet Harley, in front of the White House. He’s no Officer Sprinkle, but still … pretty cool.

At the White House gates. “M.A. Rainey, October 5, 1922.” National Photo Company Collection glass negative.

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Here’s a great photo from November 1942. It’s from the Chevy Chase Ice Palace.

Chevy Chase Ice Palace, Washington. D.C. Couple doing fancy ice skating (Library of Congress)

The post Chevy Chase Ice Palace appeared first on Ghosts of DC.

Here’s a page from the real estate section of the Sunday Washington Times on June 7th, 1908.

Washington Times – June 7th, 1908

The post June 7th, 1908: Plant Your Dollars in Chevy Chase appeared first on Ghosts of DC.

Do you attend The Chevy Chase Presbyterian Church? If you do, maybe you recognize the interior of the church. This photo from Shorpy dates back to 1924. Click on it for greater detail.

Washington, D.C., circa 1924. “Sanctuary, Chevy Chase Presbyterian Church.” National Photo Company Collection glass negative.

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This is a map of Chevy Chase, Section 2, near the District. It dates from 1890 and we dug this up at the Library of Congress.

Cadastral map of planned residential subdivisions in what is now the inc. town of Chevy Chase Village (Montgomery County, Md.).

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Do you live in Chevy Chase? Was your down payment $500? I think it’s safe to say that’s off by a factor of around 200. Either you find this extremely amusing or slightly depressing. That amount of money in 1911 is probably worth $20,000 today. That also probably makes you a little depressed. Chevy Chase ain’t cheap.

Thomas J. Fisher & Co., Inc. advertisement – April 9th, 1911 (Washington Herald)

Related articles

• Cops Bust Up “Whoopee” Party in Chevy Chase (1929) (ghostsofdc.org)
• Connecticut Avenue, the Shopping Focus of Quality and Economy (ghostsofdc.org)
• Thirty-Five Acres in the Heart of Beautiful Chevy Chase (ghostsofdc.org)
• Three Things That Happened At Chevy Chase Circle (ghostsofdc.org)

The post A Chevy Chase Home for $500 Down appeared first on Ghosts of DC.

Washington’s Joe Judge sliding at home

To close out our week of baseball posts, we are going to highlight an old local baseball hero … one who you might not know.

Joe Judge was Washington’s first baseman for almost 18 seasons, starting in 1915 up until 1932 (he played his final seasons with the Brooklyn Dodgers and Boston Red Sox). He was a fine ball player, batting .300 or higher in nine seasons and set a number of American League records, including 2,056 career games and a .993 fielding percentage at first base. Joe was a tremendous fielder and strong hitter, but his soft-spoken style and dead-ball era depressed power numbers really hurt his chances to get into the Hall of Fame.

His talent on the field speaks for itself, but something that makes Joe Judge really special to Washington is the fact that he really embraced the city and adopted it as his home. Originally from New York, he was one of the few Nationals/Senators that stayed in the area after the end of each season. A 1927 article in the Washington Post lists Judge, Bucky Harris, Walter Johnson, Sam Rice and Ossie Bluege as the only players that would winter in D.C. following the baseball season.

Joe Judge posing on the field in 1924 (Library of Congress)

Another story about Joe pegs him as being responsible for one of the scariest moments in 1920s Washington baseball, when he was directly responsible for injuring our star, Walter Johnson (unintentionally of course). The Washington Post reported on the spring training accident the day after the freak accident, March 12, 1927.

SARASOTA, Fla., March 11.–The injury of Walter Johnson was the main topic of conversation among the nationals here this morning. Joe Judge being particularly shocked at the news that the old master suffered a broken bone of his left ankle, for it was a blow from Joe’s bat which did the damage. Incidentally, this was the second offense for the first baseman for only a few days previously, he had shot one back at Johnson which landed on his other ankle, but with no bad effects except a swelling. the latest accident to the veteran pitcher has cast gloom over the entire camp.

I’m sure poor Joe was absolutely mortified to hear the news that he had broken the ankle of his teammate, friend and roommate. Johnson was already 39 years old and probably didn’t have much left in him, but this accident might have accelerated his exit from the game. He eventually returned, but had his worst season ever, finishing with a 5-6 record and an ERA of 5.10. That was the Big Train’s last season.

Judge played several more years with Washington and, after the 1932 season, left to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers after being passed up for the Senators’ managerial position.

Joe Judge and The Hecht Company advertisement in the Washington Post – 1925

He lasted only a few more years in the twilight of his career, closing it out with the Red Sox in 1934. By 1936, the baseball itch was back and he took a position as the head coach at Georgetown, coaching until 1958 — except 1945-46, when he took an assistant position with the Senators.

Mark Gauvreau Judge wrote a great piece in November 2001 titled “Why Grandpa Should Be in the Hall of Fame,” arguing for the inclusion of his grandfather in Cooperstown.

As for stamina, iron man Cal Ripken has nothing on Judge. Who’s Who in Baseball put it this way, “as a member of the Senators Judge became one of the most popular players that ever wore a Washington uniform. He covered first base through the administrations of Presidents Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.” Until 1990, when tied by George Brett, Louis Wilson and Frank White, he and Sam Rice topped the list of Most Seasons as Teammates -18. Up to his death at 68 in 1963, a year before I was born, he was known and recognized by virtually everyone in Washington. At a 1953 Old Timers Game, Mel Allen introduced him as “that other Washington Monument.”

…

Grandpa spent most of the rest of his life in Washington; 18 years with the Senators, two with the Red Sox in the twilight of his career, and 19 coaching at Georgetown University. Until recently, his daughter, my aunt Anita, still lived in the house he bought in Chevy Chase, Maryland. She is now in an assisted-living home, but she remembers the Senators’ victory in the 1924 World Series, when she was five years old. “I remember that parade down Pennsylvania Avenue. They went to the White House. Old Calvin Coolidge had his picture taken with them and somebody, I think it was the Hecht Company, gave them all clothes. They went in and got a suit for free. And they’d go into a restaurant and try to pay the bill, and forget it. It was free. I mean, they were treated like royalty. We went to the theater — in those days they had vaudeville. They stopped the vaudeville, stopped everything, put the spotlight on where we were sitting and introduced him.”

He deserved it: he hit .385 in the Series.

…

Joe Judge died in 1963, when he suffered a heart attack while shoveling snow. Sportswriters mourned the loss of what one called “the Senators’ all-time great first sacker.” But by then he was largely forgotten. The Senators were about to be moved, JFK was in the White House, and the Beatles invasion was just a year away. The age of celebrity was beginning, and there wouldn’t be any time for a player like Joe Judge. It’s too bad he didn’t get drunk more or maybe get arrested. His reticence, and his one flash of anger captured in print, buried his name. To the shame of the Hall of Fame, it might stay that way forever.

Joe Judge lived at 3333 Tennyson St. NW (Zillow) in Chevy Chase, right on the Maryland border, with his wife Alma and children. I suspect that Joe and Alma made the decision to move up to the relatively new suburb of Chevy Chase after reading a few articles in the newspaper similar to this one and maybe given his prominence, he even met with Fulton R. Gordon, one of the big local developers (i.e., guy that did a lot of Chevy Chase and Columbia Heights).

Joe Judge household in the 1940 U.S. Census (Ancestry.com)

Related articles

• Thirty-Five Acres in the Heart of Beautiful Chevy Chase (ghostsofdc.org)
• Three Things That Happened At Chevy Chase Circle (ghostsofdc.org)
• Babe Ruth Runs Into Wall; Knocked Unconscious (ghostsofdc.org)
• 19-Year-Old Phenom Debuts For Washington: Walter Johnson (ghostsofdc.org)
• The Senators Are In the World Series! (1924) (ghostsofdc.org)
• Smallest Crowd Ever at Griffith Stadium for Senators Game (ghostsofdc.org)
• Baseball Leaves The District (Again) (ghostsofdc.org)

The post Joe Judge: Washington’s First Baseman and “That Other Washington Monument” appeared first on Ghosts of DC.

New Chevy Chase addition - December 14th, 1918 (Washington Times)

The Chevy Chase post last week was quite popular, so I’ll add another one for the neighborhood.

I came across an article in the Washington Times from December 14th, 1918, only a month after Armistice Day was celebrated in the District. Fulton R. Gordon — we focused on his Columbia Heights development a while back — had acquired a large tract of land in upper northwest, with plans to develop the area in the spring of 1919.

The work of grading the land and the cutting through of streets is now under way. A construction force began work on the property a few days ago. It is believed that work will be commenced on some of the contemplated homes in the spring.

The work of construction is all being done in conformance with the permanent street highway plans of the District. Government engineers have been at work for some time making a survey of the property, establishing the grades and preparing the maps. This work is now practically completed.

…

The land embraced in the new subdivision constitutes the only large piece of undeveloped property in the District part of Chevy Chase. Improved property surrounds the tract on all sides. With the completion of the present project the District part of Chevy Chase will be completely improved and will extend continuously from Belt road on the west to Thirty-second street on the east.

It is estimated that two years will be required for the complete development of the addition, in accordance with the present plans. However, it is expected that the property will be cleared and graded within the next several months, and it is the intention of the owner to commence the erection of houses as soon as the grades are established and building material is more readily obtainable.

The new addition presages considerable activity in Chevy Chase real estate during the coming year. Chevy Chase has built and maintained an enviable reputation as one of the city’s ideal home sites. It has shown phenomenal growth since the first lots in the suburb were placed on the market. Ten years ago there was not a home in the District part of Chevy Chase.

Today there are approximately 600 attractive homes and bungalows there. The suburb was enjoying a substantial and rapid growth just before the war. Many new homes were in the process of construction when the war boke out. Real estate men are confident of a resumption of interest on an increasing scale in this suburb as quickly as building can be commenced on a normal basis.

Fulton R. Gordon is enthusiastic about the future of the suburb. “Chevy Chase was making rapid strides just before the war,” said Mr. Gordon, “and we are now beginning where we were forced to leave off. I expect the Government to employ fully 35,000 more people permanently in the future. The unscrambling of the war will take ten years. Many new residents are daily looking around for homes here, and Chevy Chase is making its appeal to them.”

Chevy Chase was growing quickly at the time and the homes were quite nice. Both middle and upper-middle class Washingtonians were moving further out to the edges of the District, buying up the new homes for around $10,000 each.

Chevy Chase today (Google Maps)

Related articles

• Three Things That Happened At Chevy Chase Circle (ghostsofdc.org)

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We haven’t done a “Three Things…” post in a while, so let’s go to the far reaches of the District, up to the Maryland line, and talk about some things you didn’t know happened there long ago.

Chevy Chase Circle (Wikipedia)

1. The tragic suicide of a local tailor

There’s always a macabre story when doing one of these posts … and this is sad and graphic story published by the Post on August 30th, 1905.

William G. Zimmerman, a tailor, of 912 Eight street southeast, shot himself through the head yesterday morning, near Chevy Chase circle, and died a short time afterward. About 11:45 o’clock Policemen Maher and Sullivan, of the Tennallytown substation, heard the sound of a pistol shot from the direction of the pavilion at the circle, and hastened to the sport. There they found Zimmerman unconscious, and rapidly bleeding to death from a bullet wound above his right temple. They summoned the Emergency Hospital ambulance, but the man was dead before he reached the hospital, of hemorrhage of the brain. The body was viewed by the coroner, who issues a certificate of suicide.

…

His money is to go to his widow, according to a note which he left behind. The note read:

“In the pocket of my chinchilla coat my wife will find something; I hope that she will forgive me, as I pray God will; I leave all for the benefit of my wife and children, without bond or authority. I am beyond where there is care and reset. It is better that I rest forever.”

2. Washington Cricket Club takes on the Baltimore club

The Washington Post reported on June 16th, 1907, that a cricket match was to be held within the circle … something you’re not terribly likely to see these days.

The first of a series of eight games between the Washington Cricket Club and the St. George Club of Baltimore will take place at Chevy Chase Circle to-morrow at 1 o’clock. The local club has been practicing hard of late and expects to the the Monumental City team a hard game.

Capt. Bob Barr will use Dick Roberts and Harry Holmes, as bowlers, while William Warren will be wicket keeper.

Bob Barr in 1889 (Wikipedia)

You might not know this, by Bob Barr was an excellent Major League pitcher two decades prior to this. Way back in 1885, he single-handedly pitched the Washington Nationals (then affiliated with the Eastern Association) into the league championship. He pitched in 15 of the teams’ final 24 games, winning 14 of them, a remarkable feat. Bob Barr, Walter Johnson, Stephen Strasburg … the line of dominant Washington pitchers lives on.

Also, back then, being a baseball player was a regular job, and when you hung up your spikes, you had to find other employment since you have an Albert Pujols-like contract. After bouncing around to a number of the teams, the native Washingtonian returned to the city and was employed in the Engineering Department of the District government. Bob and his wife Fannie lived at 1816 Kalorama Rd. NW in today’s Adams Morgan.

Bob & Fannie Bar in the 1900 U.S. Census lived at 907 Q St. NW

3. Tornado his Chevy Chase

The thunderous sound of an approaching tornado, normally reserved for Kansas or Oklahoma, were heard in the vicinity of Chevy Chase Circle in September 1896. In the blink of an eye, the storm caused tremendous damage, as reported by the Post on September 20th, 1896.

The vicinity of Chevy Chase Circle was visited by a miniature cyclone yesterday afternoon at 5:30 o’clock which did more damage in the five minutes than can be repaired in as many days. The storm was about a quarter of a mile in width and passed between the post office and the Inn. It was heralded by clouds which entirely obscured the su and for some time complete darkness prevailed. Then came a funnel-shaped cloud moving at great speed. Big trees were uprooted and broken off, bushes and hedges were ruined, and a score of poles on the Capital Traction Company’s line between the Chevy Chase Club and Chevy Chase Inn were blown down. The wires were badly tangled, and for four hours traffic was at a standstill. Superintendent Claude had 150 men at work as soon as the rain, which followed the windstorm, had blown over, but little could be done. At 9 o’clock two cars were run as far as the circle, where they were met by horse cars connecting the Inn with the lake. Up to the time of stopping the cars little had been done, but it is announced that the cars will be running on schedule time this morning.

The storm did considerable damage to corn fields over which it passed. Outhouses were torn up and blown away, but no damage was done to the larger buildings. The country outside of the strip where the poles were blown down did not suffer at all. No one was injured.

Given the magnitude of the damage, it’s a miracle nobody was hurt. On a side note … cornfields and outhouses? Different times for sure.

Image of tornado (Wikipedia)

Related articles

• Opium Den Holdup at Moy’s on Pennsylvania Avenue (ghostsofdc.org)
• Three Things That Happened at the Washington Monument (ghostsofdc.org)
• Babe Ruth Runs Into Wall; Knocked Unconscious (ghostsofdc.org)

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