Found: Old Photo of Wilson Normal School Students, 1923

Perhaps somewhere out, a reader might recognize one of the young ladies in this photo, which QW found while indulging in one of her favorite pastimes, flea marketing.

The Wilson Normal School, first named the Washington Normal School, was established in 1873 to train young white high school graduates to become elementary school teachers.  One of the school’s chief missions—as with “normal schools” all over the country—was to established standards of teaching or “norms”—thus, the term “Normal."

Predating the Wilson School, the Normal School for Colored Girls had been established in 1851; its name was thankfully changed to Miner Normal School in 1879.

The Washington Normal School changed its name to the James Ormond Wilson Normal School in 1913 to honor the then-superintendent of D.C. schools.  

The School was originally housed in the Franklin School Building at 660 K Street, NW (left).  It's first graduating class of 18 young white women began classes in September, 1873.   

In 1911, Congress granted the white school money to erect a new building at Eleventh and Harvard Streets, NW (right).  This was completed a year later and first occupied in 1913.  Today, this delightful building houses the Carlos Rosario International Career Center.   

The Miner College then occupied Franklin School.

 

In 1929, the US Congress turned both the Wilson and Miner Schools into four-year teaching colleges--they were renamed the Wilson Teachers College and Miner Teachers College respectfully.

In 1955, the segregated Wilson and Miner Teachers Colleges  were merged to become the District of Columbia Teachers College--the precursor to the University of the District of Columbia.

© Cecily Hilleary, 2010

Photo credits:
Students, Wilson Normal School, from QW's private collection.
Buildings, courtesy University of the District of Columbia, Learning Resources Division, University Archives Collection.

Update on Lena Gray (Quondam Washington,Jan. 17, 2009)

Lena Gray, three of whose photos appear on QW's 1/17/2009 posting, may have been Josephine L. Gray, daughter of John A Gray, a prominent African American restaurateur in Washington during the second half of the 19th Century.  

Gray was nominated by President Ullyses S. Grant, April 13, 1871, to serve as a member of territorial Washington's council of the legislative assembly, along with Frederick Douglass and others.  

Gray's restaurant was said to have been one of the "first" restaurants in the city, and the African American newspaper, the Washington Bee, listed him as one of the "moneyed" members of DC's black society.

Gray was born in Washington, DC in 1835 to Jane and Basil Gray, a laborer.  The family appears in the 1850 census as living in Ward 4.

By the 1850s, John had established himself as a caterer in Washington.  For awhile, he had a restaurant which, according to the Bee and other sources, was popular among a predominantly white clientele. 

The Gray family found itself the subject of some unwanted attention in February of 1859.   John rented out a house he owned--at 383 15th Street, N.W., just two blocks away from Lafayette Square.  His tenant?  The dashing rake, Phillip Barton Key, the son of Francis Scott Key.  Phillip was a US District Attorney who fell in love with the beautiful Theresa Bagioli, the wife of N.Y. Congressman Daniel Sickles. 

For two years, the couple carried on, using the Gray house as their "love nest," according to George Rothwell Brown in his 1930 book,  Washington:  A Not too Serious History.  Whenever Key wanted to meet his lover, he would stand in Lafayette Park within view of her windows and flap his handkerchief as a signal.

On Saturday night, February 26, Mrs. Sickles broke down and confessed everything in writing to her husband  (published in Harper's Magazine, below, right).

 

The next evening, an unsuspecting Key waved his handkerchief as usual.  It was Mr. Sickles who met Key, not Mrs. S.  

Key, you scoundrel!" Sickles allegedly cried. "You have dishonored my bed–you must die!"  

With that, he pulled out his two-dollar and fired at Key.  He missed the first shot and as Key begged for mercy, he calmly walked up closer and shot him twice again.

As readers likely know, Keys died, Sickles was tried and acquitted of the murder by reason of temporary insanity.  This was the first time such a defense had been admitted in US jurisprudence.

This is not so terribly surprising, as according to the thinking of the times, a man had a right to exact revenge on his wife's seducer--even if she had been a consenting party.

Sickles reunited--at least publicly--with his wife, but was shunned by Washington society forever after.  

He retired in 1861.

Theresa died of TB in 1867.

And Quondam Washington supposes that John A. Gray found another tenant soon thereafter. 

However, none of this answers the fundamental question--what really did become of the lovely Lena Gray?

© Cecily Hilleary, 2010

Photo credits:

Lena Gray, courtesy of the Photography Collections, University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

Washington Bee, courtesy the Library of Congress and National Endowment for the Humanities.  Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress as part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).

Coming Soon: Black Man's Beat--On Being a Black Cop in DC's Gilded Age

March 17th, 1892:  

An excited Noah E. Sedgwick dipped his pen in ink and began a letter to John W. Ross, Commissioner of the District of Columbia:  

Dr. Sir, I have the honor to make application for a patrol driver or the like under your branch of the District Government.  I will faithfully discharge [sic] the duties assigned me. Your obedient Servnt, Noah Sedwick.

A month later, Sedgwick once again took up the pen and filled out an application for appointment to the Metropolitan Police Department:

13.    Have you ever been indicted and convicted of any crime?  Have not.

14.    Are you addicted to the use of intoxicating liquors, morphine or opium?  Not.

15.    Have you ever been addicted to the use of any of these articles?  No.

16.    When did you last drink intoxicating liquors?  March 11^th, 92.

The application even asked whether Sedgwick suffered from piles or rheumatism.   

It did not, however, ask him his race.   As if this did not matter...