The National Archives and Records Administration’s (NARA) Archives Assembly will host a presentation by M Marie Maxwell on African American filmmaker and Truxton Circle Home Owner, Eloyce Gist. It will be on the 3rd, a Thursday, in October at 1PM.
This post is just to put it on your radar.
It will be in College Park though at the Archives II location. No problem, there is a shuttle from the Washington, DC National Archives I location, but it is on a limited schedule. I’ll tell you which shuttle to hop on as we get closer.
This is to correct some of the data on a previous version of this post. Mainly regarding George Basiliko. I had written, “November 1967, the property was included in a larger package that was sold/transferred to Sophia and George Basiliko.” Since I did not quote the document number, I cannot find the document now. Also it didn’t make sense.
There are loan documents for this lot 130 on Sq 552 for Basiliko. I suspect there were so many properties that people got sloppy, or careless, not checking to see if Basiliko owned each and every one of the properties listed.
The Washington Sanitary Improvement Company (WSIC) was a late 19th century charitable capitalism experiment that ended in the 1950s. This blog started looking at the homes that were supposed to be sold to African American home buyers, after decades of mainly renting to white tenants.
Looking at WSIC properties they tend to have a pattern where the properties were sold to a three business partners, Nathaniel J. Taube, Nathan Levin and James B. Evans as the Colonial Investment Co. for $3 million dollars. Those partners sold to African American buyers. There was usually a foreclosure. Then the property wound up in the hands of George Basiliko and or the DC Redevelopment Land Agency (RLA). Then there were the odd lucky ones who managed to avoid that fate.
The house was foreclosed January 1924 from Mayo and Sarah Scott. Because the first mention of the Scotts is a foreclosure, it does not state the relationship between Mayo and Sarah.
Looking up Mayo J. Scott, because his name is so unusual, I found there were two Mayo Scotts, Sr. and Jr. Neither of them married to a Sarah.
A Mayo Scott appears in the DC Recorder of Deeds for a lease from July 1923 for 1707 New Jersey Avenue. It was between just Mayo J. Scott and William Taylor. There was no William Taylor listed as an owner for that block. The closest I can find was a Grace Taylor who was on the deed with Amelia Green at 1703 New Jersey Avenue.
Looking at the City Directory, I found the link between Mayo and Ida Dorsey Scott. They were apparently married. Ida was married to a man named Arthur C. Dorsey. Arthur died in 1936 and the Rev. Ida Dorsey Scott is mentioned as his divorced survivor.
Going back to Mayo J. Scott, I will assume the elder. He was previously married to Annaca Alberta Jackson, but divorced her in 1923 citing ‘desertion’. They were married in 1901 and had three children, one I will guess was Mayo James Scott Jr, who sometimes switched it up to James M. Scott. I gather he didn’t want to be a sandwich condiment.
Marie. Dad was born 1903, Mom was born 1900. Her maiden name was Jackson .
Susan. Your dad, his middle name was “Mayo.”
Marie. Yes, James Mayo Scott.
Susan. Mom and Dad—what were they like? What did they do?
Marie. Well, Dad worked for the railroad up here in Bluemont. He had a job there. I guess cleaning and washing, I don’t know. I know he worked at the railroad station. My grandfather worked at the Bluemont hotel, and then later drove Miss Ruth’s car for her. The hotel was a big house up on the side of the road, on Railroad Street. Ruth’s Home bought it from the Beatty’s.
Susan. And Mom, what did she do?
Marie. Mom, she just stayed home and raised the children. But she worked for the Beatty’s also. And she worked for 30 years at Ruth’s Home.
Marie Scott goes on and briefly mentioned her grandparents along with their photos.
Mayo James Scott the elder
Ida D. Scott was the mother of Raymond Dorsey who died in 1952. She was listed as his next of kin. She was also the mother of Mildred Proctor who died at 1717 NJ Ave NW in 1928. But from Mildred’s death certificate we learn Ida’s maiden name was Ida R. Tyler.
Ida Scott had also the title of Reverend. It was mentioned in her own obituary when she passed away in 1956 and in her ex-husband’s obit. However, an Ancestry Family tree has her death in 1971 in Kent, MD. But the 1956 obit mentions brother Jerry Tyler. In the 1934 city directory, she was listed as a ‘Spiritualist’ under the heading of clergymen. So there is the possibility that an ad in the October 1944 Sacramento Daily Union advertising “Psychic readings by appointment,” could have been her. However, I have found a lot of Rev. Ida Scotts all over the US and one who still exists to this day.
The Washington Sanitary Improvement Company houses sold by the Colonial Investment Company, made up of Nathaniel J. Taube, Nathan Levin and James B. Evans used trustees Abraham H. Levin and Robert G. Weightman. Early on, I was not aware of a connection between Nathan and Abraham H. Levin. Currently, I am aware that Nathan and Abraham were brothers.
When Nathan Levin died in 1956, he was replaced by Harry A. Badt in the paperwork for further foreclosures and sales of WSIC Truxton Circle houses. In researching Badt, I found the brotherly connection.
According to a 1946 ad, Colonial Investment Co. was established in 1925. So starting there, I looked for him in the papers. In 1933 Abraham Levin passed the bar. The next year he married Naomi Lillian Bersh. He worked for the Census Bureau. In the 1940s he went into real estate, obtaining his license in 1945.
According to Abraham’s obituary he returned to federal service in the 1960s, working for HUD. He died in 1998.
Abraham H. Levin was one of two trustees who issued mortgages to African Americans purchasing Truxton Circle homes from the Colonial Investment Company. His name was on countless foreclosures.
I got a warning months ago but didn’t really understand it. Citizen Atlas is gone. Sort of.
For years I have been using https://propertyquest.dc.gov/ to find information about houses in Truxton Circle and sometimes other parts of DC. I have used photos from Property Quest, which leaned on Citizen Atlas for photos for churches and other places.
But now that’s gone.
It makes sense in some ways. These photos are old enough to buy themselves a strong drink. So I hope they are with an archive or something. That is something I’ll have to look up later because this summer is personally busy for me.
Most places use Google Street View. Real estate websites use it along with the government. Those are the most up-to-date images of a property….. unless the owner or former owner has blocked it.
The photos aren’t completely gone. Not knowing when the photos will disappear, I copied all the ones used for the blog and the URLs (for now) work. Unfortunately, I THOUGHT, I had copied all the photos for Truxton Circle. But alas, no. I only did it for one block.
So I will eventually update the URLs on the blog to a page in the InShaw universe where I am hosting the images I have used. Yes, they are over 20 years old, but as far as I’m concerned they are government created and free to use.
One of the things I miss about my Truxton Circle home* is my patio garden. I loved being able to pop out of the kitchen backdoor and grab a few herbs for cooking. I did grow other things, like alpine strawberries.
You will never find alpine strawberries in your local store or farmers market. These things are too fragile to survive transport. But they are supertasty.
They grow in not so sunny yards such as my backyard patio.
Now some of these plants made it to the Maryland abode and with a larger yard with sun, these things flourished. In DC I was able to get a few tasty fruits and was happy. Now with a few more plants because they like the sun (who knew?), I can snack on them when putting around in the garden. I can get a decent handful in one outing, depending on if anything has gotten to them.
What do they taste like? Strawberries. A mushier strawberry.
They do not have runners. They grow in clumps. They have survived several harsh DC/MD winters. The squirrels (and deer) don’t seem to be too interested in them. Slugs like them.
They do grow from seed, but it can be challenging. If you have room or just want the greenery, I recommend them.
Everyso often people argue about the boundaries of the Shaw neighborhood. Here’s a map from 1971 from the National Capital Planning Commission. It also shows the 14th St Urban Renewal Area, but little matter.
I do not miss the old guys who sold heroin on the corner of 4th & Q. I do not miss calling 911 or 311 depending on the ever changing policy and not getting great results.
But they weren’t all that bad. One winter, Jimmy and the crew joined in with the snow shoveling.
They were better than the young men who sold drugs on my or other nearby corners. Young men attract more violence. With the old guys, I didn’t worry as much about drive bys and stray bullets. Slow moving men can’t fight turf battles.
I did worry when younger men started hanging out there.
Before the old men. It used to be the spot where screamy teenagers would hang out and….. scream.
The National Archives and Records Administration’s (NARA) Archives Assembly will host a presentation by M Marie Maxwell on African American filmmaker and Truxton Circle Home Owner, Eloyce Gist. It will be on the 3rd, a Thursday, in October at 1PM.
