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“Bite-Size Bits of Local, National, and Global History”
Tenleytown in Northwest Washington in Washington, District of Columbia — The American Northeast (Mid-Atlantic)
 

A Country Road

Top of the Town

— Tenleytown Heritage Trail —

 
 
A Country Road Marker image. Click for full size.
Photographed By J. J. Prats, March 19, 2011
1. A Country Road Marker
Click on the image to examine it closely.
Inscription.
Step back into the 19th century with a walk down Grant Road, ahead and to your left. This winding byway recalls Tenleytown’s farming past. In fact Grant Road’s undisturbed quality earned it National Historic District and DC Historic District designations.

By the late 1800s, huge linden trees shaded modest, one-room-wide houses here. Cows, mules, horses, and chickens roamed the surrounding fields. Most families were working class, but two generations of Tenleytown physicians, John and Sidney Chappell, lived among the storekeepers, stonemasons, and policemen. General Sidney Chappell, who served as the head of psychiatry for the U.S. Army, was a friendly man whose large, elegant house was run by a white-coated butler.

As one of the few roads through the farmlands, Grant Road attracted outsiders. Burrows family members still recount the regular visits to their part of Grant Road (behind you) by President Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909). Roosevelt had a hunting lodge nearby and enjoyed riding through the woods. The president even treated little Edna Burrows of number 4426 to horseback rides.

In earlier days, Grant Road was the southern edge of the Civil War-era Fort Reno, and became part of the “military road” linking the city’s ring of forts. (Today’s Military Road takes a different
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route.) Perhaps this was the quiet, meandering path poet (and Civil War-era Washingtonian) Walt Whitman took when he walked “on fine moonlit nights over the perfect military roads, hard and smooth.”
 
Erected by Cultural Tourism DC. (Marker Number 2.)
 
Topics and series. This historical marker is listed in this topic list: Roads & Vehicles. In addition, it is included in the Former U.S. Presidents: #26 Theodore Roosevelt, and the Tenleytown Heritage Trail series lists.
 
Location. 38° 56.877′ N, 77° 4.626′ W. Marker is in Northwest Washington in Washington, District of Columbia. It is in Tenleytown. Marker is at the intersection of 39th Street Northwest and Albemarle Street Northwest, on the right when traveling north on 39th Street Northwest. Touch for map. Marker is at or near this postal address: 3837 Albemarle Street Northwest, Washington DC 20016, United States of America. Touch for directions.
 
Other nearby markers. At least 8 other markers are within walking distance of this marker. The Rest (about 600 feet away, measured in a direct line); Tennally's Town: My, How You've Grown (about 600 feet away); Beer, Popcorn, and Penny Candy (approx. 0.2 miles away); On the Circle (approx. 0.2 miles away); Suburban Style (approx. 0.2 miles away); Fort Reno (approx.
Marker Reverse image. Click for full size.
Photographed By J. J. Prats, March 19, 2011
2. Marker Reverse
0.2 miles away); Birth of Tennallytown (approx. 0.2 miles away); Reservoir / Reno City (approx. 0.2 miles away). Touch for a list and map of all markers in Northwest Washington.
 
More about this marker.
There are a number of photographs on the marker.
♦ Caption of large photograph above the text, “Dr. John W. Chappell, his family, and a neighbor pose in front of the house he built on Grant Rd. (later 3901 Albemarle St.). The house was razed in 1999.”
♦ Upper left, portrait of Edna Burrows who “grew up on Grant Rd. and, as a child, rode with President Theodore Roosevelt.”
♦ There is photograph of the president on a horse to the right of the previous caption.
♦ Next photograph shows “Benjamin Pyles, gardner at Evalyn Walsh McLean’s ‘Friendship’ estate, posed in front of his home at 4561 Grant Road around 1925.”
♦ On the lower left is “Florence Burrows, seen in this 1918 portrait, worked for women’s suffrage.”
♦ To the right is a portrait of “poet Walt Whitman, who may have walked Grant Road during the Civil War.”
♦ On the lower right is a
A Country Road Marker image. Click for full size.
Photographed By J. J. Prats, March 19, 2011
3. A Country Road Marker
Grant Road is behind the photographer.
photograph captioned, “this 1938 view of the rear of 4561 Grant Rd. (house with porch) reveals a glimpse of the new Wilson High School. The household still relied on an outhouse, at the right of the porch.”
The large illustration on the reverse is “Lilly Spandorf’s watercolor of this block of Grant Road includes, near the lower right corner, the red gate to number 3525, whre Spandorf often stayed.”
 
View of Grant Road from the Marker image. Click for full size.
Photographed By J. J. Prats, March 19, 2011
4. View of Grant Road from the Marker
4426 Grant Road image. Click for full size.
Photographed By Allen C. Browne, May 3, 2015
5. 4426 Grant Road
The Burrows family lived here.
4561 Grant Road image. Click for full size.
Photographed By Allen C. Browne, May 3, 2015
6. 4561 Grant Road
Benjamin Pyles lived here.
 
 
Credits. This page was last revised on January 30, 2023. It was originally submitted on March 20, 2011, by J. J. Prats of Powell, Ohio. This page has been viewed 1,025 times since then and 10 times this year. Last updated on March 8, 2019, by Devry Becker Jones of Washington, District of Columbia. Photos:   1, 2, 3, 4. submitted on March 20, 2011, by J. J. Prats of Powell, Ohio.   5, 6. submitted on May 5, 2015, by Allen C. Browne of Silver Spring, Maryland. • Bill Pfingsten was the editor who published this page.

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Mar. 19, 2024