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. In 1956 Nathan Levin died and Colonial Inv. Co. vice president Harry A. Badt took his place in the foreclosure paperwork. 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.
Let’s see what happens with 17 Bates St NW:
- December 1950 (recorded Jan 26, 1951) Evans, Levin and Taube sold the whole of 17 Bates St NW to Lydia C. Rhyme.
- December 1950 (recorded Jan 26, 1951) Lydia C. Rhyme borrowed $3,800 from Colonial Investment Co.’s mortgage arm with trustees Abraham H. Levin and Robert G. Weightman.
- December 1950 Ms. Rhyme sold half of 17 Bates St NW to Ann C. Stukes.
- December 1950 Rhyme sold the other half to Otis Wise.
- December 1950 Stukes borrowed $1,663.75 from trustees Abraham H. Levin and Robert G. Weightman.
- November 1952 Wise borrowed $1,663.74 from Levin and Weightman.
- March 1953 (doc# 1953011195) Rhymes was released from her mortgage with the benefit going to Wise and Stukes.
- November 1961 Wise was released from his mortgage.
- December 1965 Stukes was released from her mortgage.
- December 1968 Emma and Nathaniel Vaughan, Emma being Stukes’ heir, sold their half to George Basiliko.
- May 1977, Otis Wise had died and Jennie Walker, his sister sold/transferred his half to his widow Idella Wise.
- August 1978 Idella Wise sold her half to George Basiliko, Inc.
- August 1978 George Basiliko Inc sold the property to the Bates Street Ventures Partnership.
Well this worked out for Stukes and Wise. Basiliko seemed to be an instrument to get the property to Bates Street Ventures Partnership, who would eventually transfer the property back to Basiliko. Bates Street Ventures appears to be totally different from Bates Street Associates as the signatories for loans are Gerald Diaz and Edward A. Kassoff.
I cannot locate anything about Ms. Rhyme and nothing definitive about Ann Stukes.
Otis/Odis Wise, in the 1950 census was living as a lodger at 515 L St NW. He was working as a machine operator for the Department of Justice and separated from his wife. In an earlier 1940 census, he lived at 1135 5th St NW with his wife “Adella” where he worked as a messenger at the Department of Justice and she worked as a seamstress at home. For some reason he did not list her as the person who would know where he was on his WW2 draft card. Otis Wise and Dollie Wolf were married in 1919 in South Carolina. However, this was not reflected in the 1920 census, as he was living with parents Annie & John Wise in SC. In the 1930 census his wife was “Idel” and according to it, they had been married for 5 years. Then he worked as a laborer for the Navy Yard.