Evening star., 1934-02-04

enough to pick up all the Information he
wanted, settled his bill and left A few days
after this Gen. Ross troops entered the cry
and fine-lookng naval officer full uni
form called on Mrs Suter and. addressing her
by name, said: I am glad to meet you again.
madame She, of course did not recognize
him and was offended by his familiar manner.
Why. sir. I do not know you, said she oh,
yes, madame, you certainly remember the old
Quaker gentleman who STOPPED with you a few
days ago Why, you not that man she
replied with great surprise. The same !
sure you, and 1 am happy to see you again
and hope you are we'll madame. l am Ad-
miral Cockburn of the English Navy.
BY 1889 the National Metropolitan Bank had
moved to its present location and w. w Cor
coran the banker, occupying this corner,
having moved there from a small room
Pennsylvania avenue near Fifteenth street.
The following year after moving to this corner,
Mr. CorcOran took as partner George W. Riggs
son of Elisha Riggs, and thus founded the
great financial institution of Corcoran Il Riggs
now represented by the Riggs National Bank.
At the southeast corner of and Fifteenth
streets, at a very early date, stood q large
frame building occupied by John Kennedy
grocery store. Later Mr.. Kennedy sold out
to Selden Carey who later conducted book
store on the south side of F street, in the
block to the east The frame building which
occupied this corner gave way in 1847 to the
fSe-StOry brick building erected there by w. w.
CorcoTan. At first it contained 40 rooms, one
intended to accommodate some of the Offices
attached to the Treasury. 1t was always known
the CorcoGan Building. and here the
corner was for years the Western Union Tele-
graph office, where many a Washington lad
served messenger boy before bicycles came
into use. and kilograms were delivered on foot
unless the street wei able n helm IN
h IOT far west of the Corcoran Building
stood for many years an OLD Presbyterian
church. presided over for SO years by the Rev.
James Laurie. 1t was of brick and was erected
about 1907, though frame church is said TO
have stood here as early rs 1888 In 1859 it
became the property of the willard brothers,
prOprietors of the Willard Hctcl and was n
verted into a hall for amusement purposes.
The transaction is recorded in Sessford's An
mails for the years mentioned. which states:
The F street church, between Fourteenth
and Fifteenth, has been sold TO the MesSrS.
Willard, who are now fitting it up for ball
room. The congregation OF that church has
united with that New York avenue, whose
church has been taken down TO make room for
an enlarged one, which has been erected ON its
site, taking in the whole front on street
Many will recall this early church structure
Willard Hall, where all kinds of meetings
were held. One of the first attractions adver-
tised there was Blind Tom,' the colored piano
player, who always participated in applauding
his own efforts and few years later the mo-
mentous Peace Congress met here in an effort
to prevent the Civil War. Many years later,
in 1892, it burned out but soon restored
for entertainment, for it was on January ].
1897, that Dumiere's famous cinematographe-
the first motion picture in Westinghouse