Images

Carter G. Woodson FBI FOIA request – #1

So I put in a FOIA request to the FBI looking for Carter G. Woodson. Not my first. That was George Basiliko. That led to bupkis. But I decided to give it another try with Carter G. Woodson. I got a response to go bug the National Archives with a couple of file numbers and the document below.

I was going to sit on this but the FBI’s eFOIA system got some crazy bug and sent me about 18 emails in the past 3 days. I have another non-Shaw related request (I’m curious about stuff) and was hoping it was about that. But nope. It took me a while but I discovered it was the same stuff I got before. It’s just one crazy duplicate email after another. And the FBI gives you 48 hours to click on the link if you want your document. I clicked the link and I got an error.

Instead of suffering in silence, I decided to blog about it. May as well write a post.

The above disappointing article is a very brief mention of Dr. Carter G. Woodson. I’m guessing it is FBI file 25-LA-330971 and this appears to be some African American paper where Nation of Islam (NOI) leader Elijah Muhammad had a column. EM mentions Woodson’s book Negro Orators and Their Orations, published in 1925.

When I get something from the National Archives, I might share it. If it is semi-useless as the newspaper clipping from the FBI, I probably won’t.

Memory Lane: 400 Block of Q St NW 2007

Taken December 12, 2007. 400 blk of Q St NW looking west towards NJ Ave NW.

Even as far back as 2007, there were bike lanes.

 

Memory Lane: Snowy City Scenes February 12, 2006

I’m looking into my collection of photographs and going down memory lane.

Taken Feb 12, 2006

I took these photos eighteen years ago. The snow just fell and it was pretty. Pretty until you have to go to work and it gets packed into ice on the sidewalk.

Taken 2/12/2006
Taken 2/12/2006. 1500 blk of New Jersey Ave NW,

 

Memory Lane: 1500 Block of 1st St NW January 5, 2008

When I took this photo back in 2008 I did not know that the corner house had history. That it was the home of the notable Pocahontas Pope.

Taken Jan. 5, 2008. 1500 block of 1st St NW.

So much has changed since then. It’s been renovated and now I am more familiar with it’s notable former resident.

It was on the market last year, but I see the listing was removed. Well, better luck in 2024!

This Was Once A Functional School- Langston School

Among the Library of Congress photographs were photographs of the John Mercer Langston School, which sits on the unit block of P St NW in Truxton Circle. I discovered photographs of the Langston School among the several photographs that photojournalist Marjory Collins took in March 1942. However, like the Slater School, it was not labeled. Thank goodness these schools are located so close to each other that this slice of Truxton Circle history has been captured.

Langston School taken March 1942

Collins, it seems was aiming to focus on the woman in the hat, not so much the school building.

[Untitled photo, possibly related to: Washington, D.C. Schoolteacher] Library of Congress
It was part of a series of photos of a school teacher. As the teacher seemed to live in a whole other part of town a goes unnamed, just like the school, I’m not particularly interested in following her story.

Langston Elementary was a functional school. It had students and teachers and staff. But now it is just an empty historic building:

Abandoned Langston School on P St NW.

The images below are from 2007. The building has been better secured in the past 16 years.

Western side of the Langston School on P St NW.
Langston School taken May 30, 2007
Rear of Langston? May 30, 2007
Broken Windows, Langston School. Taken May 30, 2007

Slater School 1942

I happened to have found this photograph in the Library of Congress’ collection. It was listed as a Negro elementary school. When I took a closer look I saw the name of the school on the building.

Slater-Negro-School
Slater School. Kids playing on P St NW. 1942.

I am amazed seeing children playing on P Street as if it was an extension of the playground. P Street actually doesn’t look that wide in this photo. Things were different in 1942, when this was taken by Marjory Collins the Farm Security Administration – Office of War Information photographer who took the photograph.

I found a similar view from 2008.

Unit block of P Street NW taken January 8, 2008

The school was in poor shape then.

Slater School on the unit block of P St NW ca. 2008

Fifteenth Street Presbyterian 1899

Old-Church
Fifteenth St Presbyterian, ca 1899? Library of Congress

This is the old building, probably the same one that was in the 1957 Church Survey.

Piecing Together Lost Truxton Circle or What the what am I looking at? Pt 2

Continuing on from Part 1….

Look at this photo taken in 1942.

Military unit in Armstrong Technical High School being trained by an U.S. Army lieutenant. Library of Congress.

Now same day in March 1942, same event.

Washington, D.C. Military unit in Armstrong Technical High School being trained by a U.S. Army lieutenant. LOC

Behind them appears to be the National Homeopathic Hospital. Below is a photo of the hospital from 1910.

National Homeopathic Hospital, ca. 1910

You can see the front of the hospital in the top photograph. In the second photo you can see part of the old Dunbar High School building. Despite it being an event for Armstrong High School boys, it appears they are on Dunbar’s campus.

Below is an aerial photo from 1951 or 1952 taken by the US Geological Survey. Keeping in mind where the two tallish buildings of the hospital sat, and the corner of old Dunbar, you can see where the boys were parading.