Rumors of War, 1938-1940

The Letters and Abodes of Leon and Mary Grayson

In June 1935 our lawyer grandfather Leon Harman Grayson (1906-1993) moved to Washington D.C. from his native Savannah, Georgia. He exchanged letters with his hometown sweetheart Mary Julia Bell (1909-2001), with whom he had secretly eloped in December 1933. They made their union public when she joined Leon in October 1935. During their first 18 months in the city the couple moved often, apparently out of thriftiness. When taking a trip back to their hometown they would decamp and move into a new place upon their return. Another way of economizing was living in a series of boardinghouses, in which they traded privacy for having meals included in their rent. We were able to accompany them in those early months by means of the letters written to and by them, and the photos they left of their experiences.

Mary and Leon left the boardinghouse life behind in April 1938. A letter postmarked the following month from Mary’s mother Julia Barnard Bell (1889-1969) is addressed to a new residence: 6313 16th Street NW.

Brightwood

The Graysons’ then-newly constructed apartment house is located on the western edge of the Brightwood neighborhood, three miles up 16th St. from their former Kenyon St. boardinghouse in Mt. Pleasant and two miles south of the growing Maryland suburb of Silver Spring. Like many of their former residences, their apartment house abutted the beautiful Rock Creek valley. The neighborhood was and is roughly bordered by 16th St./Rock Creek Park (W), Walter Reed Army Hospital (N), 5th Street (E), and Kennedy Street (S), and is bisected by Georgia Avenue, a major north-south artery. Included in its boundaries were the brand-new 1000-seat Art Deco Sheridan Theater and its park-and-shop commercial appendage (1937); Coolidge High School (under construction); Brightwood Elementary (new building 1926) and Military Road school (1912), each segregated until 1954; Nativity Catholic Church (founded 1900), and the Civil War-era Fort Stevens, at which President Abraham Lincoln came under Confederate fire. Fort Stevens has been preserved as a park. Each structure named survives as well including the park-and-shop though, like so many movie houses, the once-proud theater is defunct.

“Bennett Hall” 6313 16th St. NW, May 1938-Apr 1940

6313 16th St. was the first domicile built in a superblock of planned garden-style apartments, a then-recent movement of similarly built low-rise walk-ups unified by shared community green space. These garden apartments would be their home for next twenty years.

1938 Letters

We have only two further letters from 1938, both from Leon’s widowed father Col. William L. Grayson (1870-1941). Though William would turn 68 in August, he still worked full-time as a county court clerk and was involved in at least three fraternal organizations and local and state politics. He had six adult children and seven grandchildren in 1938. His letter writing (actually dictating, as most were typewritten) must have been prolific. Sept. 26, “My Dear Boy, Yesterday we made our usual pilgrimage to [Bonaventure] Cemetery…. I am pleased that Mary got the 40 hour week. I know she enjoys having an afternoon off each week.” Mary is a downtown department store clerk in 1939, so this may be the job her father-in-law is referencing. A streetcar boarded on Georgia Ave. would drop Leon at the door of his Justice Department office, and Mary near the downtown department stores.

Nov. 23. “Glad to know that everything is running smoothly with you and Mary and that you are apparently having such a good time…. I remember Addie Barnard, Mary’s Aunt, when she taught school in Savannah and I agree with you that she is a very fine lady.” Adelaide “Addie” Barnard (1873-1954) was a clerk in the Treasury Department who had lived in Washington since at least 1920 and, significantly, at the ca. 1923 South Cathedral Mansions apartments at 2900 Connecticut Ave. NW since at least 1928.

1939 Letters – “Notes,” Family Ties, and Rumors of War

The 1939 Washington City Directory listed “1450 Somerset Pl. NW” as Leon and Mary’s address. It is the same building, though a separate entrance. The 16th Street address appears unused today, though the entry door remains in use and is still so marked.

We have fifteen letters from 1939, all from Col. Grayson. While Leon and Mary economized in some ways, Leon was by nature openhanded. Living within their income was an ongoing challenge. Jan. 5. “I received your check [and] I will pay same. I am so glad that you have finally cleared up this note business. It will give you and Mary just a little more money to live on and for goodness sake, my boy, let me admonish you to keep out of debt. The most exacting and cruel master in this world is debt.”

Aug. 28. “Sooner or later Hitler will have to be called to account. The longer he puts it off it gives France and England more time to complete their preparations. I hope we will not become involved. The life of one American boy is more precious than the whole of Germany.” How prescient, though William would not live long enough to know it. His very own precious boy Bill, age 23 at this writing, was later MIA and feared dead on Bataan for more than a year, and a POW for two more beyond. “P.S. My dear friend Col. Walter Coney is sick in Walter Reed Hospital. If you get a chance drop put and see him.” Sept. 2. “I will attend to the note for you…. If I were you, should our country get involved, I would make an application to get in the Judge Advocate Department. It is an important branch of the service.” William didn’t have to add that an Army lawyer probably wouldn’t see combat.

Oct. 2. “I was pleased that you and Mary visited Colonel Coney…. I received the check and attended to the note.” Throughout October and November William also mentioned hosting visiting political dignitaries and attending the Georgia-Carolina Fair. October 19. “I am sorry to tell you that Rip is no more. The Veterinary doctor told me the merciful thing to do would be to put Rip to sleep. I had to wish it off on [27 year-old daughter] Edith. Bounce is fine.”

Nov. 2. “I don’t think Spence or W.L. [Leon’s-older brother and 13 year-old nephew] think much of the mustache you were wearing. “Dub” said it made your face look dirty.” Nov. 6. “I’m enclosing your note marked paid. It won’t be long now before this note business will be history…. I’m certainly glad we now have a neutrality bill that ought to keep us out of war.” Nov. 13. “I was delighted to hear from you. It is fine that “Everything is fine and running smoothly” and that you are “Looking forward to a quiet week-end” but when I read your letter, it is anything but quiet. Dances, dinners, etc. would indicate the week-ends are not as quiet as you state.” Nov. 22. “I am leaving tonight for Norfolk, and Edith and Bill expect to drive up on Friday” to visit Leon’s oldest sister Lynne Mueller and her family. “I was hoping you and Mary could run down at that time and we could all be together.”

Dec. 12. “The addresses of Lynne and [older sister] Dorothye [Comly] are as follows… Evidently you have not been writing to them very much or you would know where they were.“ Both were married to military men. Younger sister Edith would soon marry a Navy man herself. Dec. 18. “I am sorry that there is no possibility of your coming home during the holidays. You know best and I guess I will just have to wait until you can come home next Summer…. I am glad to know you removed your whiskers, for my information was that you were bending over on account of their weight. Everyone that saw you told me you looked like a Bolshevik, and you want to avoid an appearance of that kind when there is so much agitation in this country against communists.” Dec. 27. “I had a talk on the ‘phone Christmas morning with Lynne. I also heard from Dorothye. It was the most unhappy Christmas I have ever experienced. This is the fourth Christmas without Mother and the longer the time the worse it seems.”

January-March, 1940

Col. Grayson’s health was deteriorating, which he mentioned in his letters. He also sent along family news and weather reports, always calling Leon, “My dear boy” and signing off “Your loving and devoted Daddy.” “Love to Mary and hugs and kisses for my dear boy” were invariably included. His last letter addressed to 16th Street was dated March 25, 1940, “anticipating a mighty pleasant visit from both of you at Isle of Hope this Summer.”