Bethesda Actually

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Uncle Tom’s Cabin on Old Georgetown Road will open to visitors for the first time over the weekend of June 24-25 (limited hours).

The cabin in Bethesda, which is the former home of slave Josiah Henson, whose autobiography was the model for Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin”, was recently purchased by Montgomery County Planning Board.  It will be opened to provide the public with a rare view of the cabin during the county’s Heritage Days event.

Historian CR Gibbs told 9 News: “We have a chance to bring together the strands of farming, of slavery, to tell the interconnected and complex story that has long since been desired to be told.”

Should be a fascinating event!  More here from the Washington Post.

Ventured into Washington, DC yesterday after deciding to walk the Capital Crescent Trail and take advantage of the fantastic weather.  Admittedly the starting point wound up being the metro station rather than the trail, but while we’re on the subject of abandoned railroads, I thought I’d post these items that might be of interest to the local history fanatics out there!

While walking through Georgetown, we stumbled across this old railroad trestle just west of the university towards Foxhall Road:

Clearly an old railroad bridge, some post-walk research told me this was the remains of the Washington and Great Falls Electric Railroad.  Not strictly a Bethesda issue, although the railroad, also known as the “Cabin John Trolley” (where it eventually terminated, never actually being extended to Great Falls!), ferried passengers through Glenn Echo, where they could board a Bethesda-bound streetcar.  We covered this previously in relation to the Bethesda North Trail (read more here).

Further exploration in the woods along Foxhall turned up further remains, while the old track bed was still clearly visible across the road.  The old track bed today is a pleasant right of way that is well preserved in certain sections along the route.  This is also not the only trestle that remains intact, with others further down the line in Maryland.

The Washington and Great Falls Electric Railroad was incorporated in 1892 and opened in 1895, beginning in Georgetown at the junction of 36th and Prospect Streets.  It was bought by the Washington Railway and Electric Company in 1902 and finally dismantled during the 1960s.  Running along a private right of way, the journey must have been extremely pretty on its vantage point along the hillside above the Capital Crescent Trail.  Original photos here.

I’ve been out of town for the last week and can’t believe I missed this… Still, better late than never as they say!

March 25th is Maryland Day, commemorating that day in 1634 when settlers first disembarked from two small sailing vessels – the Ark and the Dove – only Maryland soil.

On June 20, 1632, Charles I of England granted a charter authorizing the Maryland settlement to Cecilius Calvert, Baron of Baltimore.  Lord Baltimore’s brother, Leonard Calvert, lad the settlers on the journey to find their new world.  140 souls departed Cowes on the Isle of Wight on November 22, 1633.  Three days into the voyage a severe storm almost put pay to the expedition, and no trace could be found of the smaller Dove.

But remarkably, while Calvert’s ship, the Ark, was refitting on the island of Barbadoes, the Dove reappeared, having managed to weather the storm.  The travelers continued on and reached Virginia by February 27th.  They reached Maryland shores the following month and after reaching a peaceable accord with the Conoy Indian chief, they continued down the Potomac and disembarked on March 25, henceforth commemorated as Maryland Day.

Find out more about Maryland Day here.

Bethesda Meeting House

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Like many hamlets since swallowed up in an burgeoning metropolitan area, Bethesda’s roots are rather humble.  A typical outlying settlement, Bethesda began life as a small collection of buildings alongside a busy road that had once been a Native American trail.

The town’s viabiliy was cemented in the early nineteenth century when the thoroughfare was converted into a toll road called the Washington and Rockville Turnpike, transporting tobacco and other commodities between Georgetown and Rockville, and up to Frederick.  Around the toll and a solitary store, a small settlement grew up that would one day become Bethesda.

Originally named “Darcy’s Store” after local business owner William E. Darcy, the growing town acquired its definitive name in 1871 when postmaster Robert Franck named it after the Bethesda Meeting House, a Presbyterian church built in 1820.  The church burned down in 1849 but was rebuilt the same year on an adjacent site, where it stands to this day.

The church in turn took its name from the biblical Pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem, a place associated with healing.  In ancient Greek manuscripts, the name of the Pool is often mistaken for that of the New Testament town Bethsaida, described as a “desert place” and believed by scholars to be the possible location where Jesus fed the five thousand.  The origin of the church’s name has led to a common misconception that the town took its name directly from the Pool of Bethesda.

Many villages grew up around crossroads – mini hubs where travelers congregated before continuing in their various directions – and Bethesda was no different.  Straddling a crossroads for most of the nineteenth century, the town was little more than a blacksmith, post office, church, school, some houses and a few stores.  But that was set to change after the turn of the twentieth century, when the newly installed streetcar line connected Bethesda to the nearby District of Columbia.

This enabled suburbanization to take a hold, with the neighborhoods of Battery Park, Woodmont, Drummond and Edgemoor springing up on farmland adjacent to the turnpike.  Well-to-do men like Merle Thorpe built mansions in fine grounds and help found the Woodmont Country Club – now on land occupied by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).  Thorpe’s home, Pook’s Hill, accomodated the exiled Norwegian Royal Family during World War Two.

Pook’s Hill was inspired by Rudyard Kipling’s 1906 story, Puck of Pook’s Hill.  Puck was the mischievous sprite of English folklore also known as Robin Goodfellow, who is thought to have lent his name to the popular outlaw Robin Hood – or Robin of the Greenwood.  Nevertheless, it is a fun pagan injection into Bethesda’s otherwise biblical heritage.

The rapid expansion of government during World War Two correlated to a rapid expansion of Bethesda, with the National Naval Medical Center (1939) and NIH (1953) built north of the downtown.  As a result, medical professionals, government contractors and business people have flocked to the area.

Bethesda has since become the core employment hub of southwestern Montgomery County, with many of its workers traveling from Washington, DC and vice versa.  Major companies headquartered here today include defense giant Lockheed Martin, Mariott International, Honest Tea and Ritz Carlton.

Darcy’s Store is a weekly feature article about the history of Bethesda

Okay so I enjoy films – sometimes old ones – but I’ve always been a fan of old movie theaters like this.  So armed with my camera while out on a stroll around town, I decided to snap a few pictures!  Most locals will be familiar with the Bethesda Theatre, but for anyone new to the area, here’s the deal…

Opened as the Boro Theatre (name changed only a year later) on May 19, 1938 to a screening of Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife, starring Gary Cooper and Claudette Colbert, it soon became a local landmark/community hub and remains one of the few remaining Art Deco cinemas in the Greater DC Metro area.  At the time it was built, it represented the cutting edge of technology and comfort.

Remaining in that role for more than four decades, in 1983 it was converted to a film and food venue known as the Bethesda Cinema ‘N Drafthouse, then later the Bethesda Theatre Cafe in 1990.

Placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999 and restored to its former glory, thanks to the Bethesda Cultural Alliance, the old cinema is now a theater showing intimate Off Broadway productions and cabaret-style shows.  Great building!  For more info on shows, history and old pictures, check out the theaters official website.

And despite being pretty small, its fashionable Deco lines help it hold its own against the towering building behind!