This is a redo of a previous post to add a little bit of more info.
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 Investment Company 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.
First, the lot number 822 doesn’t work. Looking at maps 129 Bates fits on lots 819 & 820, formerly of lot 25. So this examination will look at sales for lots 819/820 combined.
The last time I tried this, titles were too messy for me to do a decent tracking for this address and I gave up. I’ll make another stab at it.
Let’s see what happens with 129 Bates St NW:
- March 1951 Evans, Levin and Taube sold 1/4 of the unit to Harold J. and Margaret A. Price.
- March 1951 the Prices borrowed $3,700 from Colonial Investment Co. favorite trustees Abraham H. Levin and Robert G. Weightman.
- May 1951 Evans, Levin and Taube sold 1/4 of 129 Bates to Elsie M. and James W. Horton.
- May 1951 the Hortons borrowed $3,650 from trustees Levin and Taube.
- May 1951 Evans, Levin and Taube sold 1/4 of the property to Doris E. and Thomas H. Brown Jr.
- May 1951 the Browns borrowed $3,650 from Levin and Weightman.
- June 1951 Evans, Levin and Taube sold the remaining 1/4 to Marian and Thomas P. Gale.
- June 1951 the Gales borrowed $3,700 from Levin and Weightman.
- July 1951 the Prices sold 1/4 of their property to Charles M. and Mabel C. Bowser.
- June 1953 the Browns lost their quarter to foreclosure, and Evans, Levin and Taube repossessed the property via an auction.
- August 1954, in a large property package Evans, Levin and Taube transferred several foreclosed properties to themselves via an intermediary Lillian M. McGowan. I don’t know why.
- December 1954 the Hortons lost their quarter to foreclosure, and Evans, Levin and Taube repossessed the property via an auction.
- December 1957, the Gales lost their quarter to foreclosure, and Evans, Badt and Taube repossessed the property via an auction.
- December 1957, as part of a larger property package ( doc # 1958019347) Harry and wife Jennie Badt transferred their interests in this and other properties to the survivors of Nathan Levin.
- October 1963, the Prices, and by extension the Bowsers, were released from their mortgage.
- December 1972 James B. and wife Carmen Evans, in a very large property package (doc#1972027675 ) sold their interest to R & R Investments Inc.
- November 1972, James A. Mitchell’s* survivors, Sidney H. and wife Olivia Matthews, along with Harry C. and Gloria Matthews, Nathaniel Taube, and Nathan Levin’s survivors sold their interest in the property to the District of Columbia Redevelopment Land Agency.
- January 1973, R & R Investments sold their interest to the DC Redevelopment Land Agency.
- May 1974 the Board for the Condemnation of Insanitary Buildings decided that 129 Bates Street NW was condemned (doc# 7400013192) and informed the owner, DC RLA.
- June 1975 129 Bates was considered sanitary.
- About 1978 DC RLA transferred/ sold this and other properties to the Bates Street Associates, Inc.
129 Bates does not strike me as a 4 unit property. I’m not sure what happened with the Bowsers. Their quarter was not foreclosed, like the other 3/4th of 129 Bates. Eventually, 129 Bates was owned by the DC RLA and then Bates Street Associates. The slum landlord who usually shows up, did not.
Looking for the deed history of 127 Bates St NW, it is pretty much the same as 129, except it also has lot 782, which only appears once.
*I have not idea who James Mitchell is.