Lora Stirling Birch

Interview with Lora Stirling Birch
Interview Dates: May 29 and July 12, 2024
Interviewer: Molly Collins Offner
Transcriber: Betsy Barnett
Editor: Ellen Hirzy
Additional Materials:  
Family photographs provided by the interviewee are at the end of the  transcript.

Photograph by Molly Offner

This interview transcript is the property of the Ruth Ann Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project.
Not to be reproduced without permission.

START OF INTERVIEW
OFFNER: This is Molly Collins Offner. I am interviewing Lora Stirling Birch for the Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project. Today’s date is Wednesday, May 29, 2024. It’s the early afternoon and we’re conducting this interview in Laytonsville, Maryland, about 35 miles north of Capitol Hill. Joining us this afternoon is Lora’s daughter Pam Heaston. I had the pleasure of meeting Lora when she sent me a letter about her life at 110 Fourth Street NE, which is my home since 1996. We arranged a meeting and spent a lovely November afternoon in 2023 with her family learning about her early life on Capitol Hill and at 110 Fourth Street NE. I suggested to Lora that it would be wonderful to capture her memories for the Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project. So we are here today.
I am going to begin, Lora, with some of your background information. Could you provide your current age, the date of birth, and place of birth?
BIRCH: I’m 90 years old. I was born on December 25, 1933, and, I think, either East Chicago, Indiana, or Hammond, Indiana[EH1].
OFFNER: Right. Can you talk a little bit about your parents and siblings and what brought you to Washington, DC?
BIRCH: My father Robert Stirling, well, in 1933 it was still hard to find work. And he worked in the oil fields, and steel mills, all that type of thing, which, because of the Depression, he couldn’t find work. My mother Lora was mainly just a homemaker, but at one point during the Depression she could find work as a janitor in schools. And so she did that job. My brother Dean was born in 1922. My sister Mary was born in 1924. So I was definitely the baby, the Depression baby. So, yeah, Dean joined the Navy in 1942 and spent his war years in the Navy. Dean was a very intelligent young man, and the Navy kept sending him to college, and he kept complaining he didn’t join to go to school. So finally he got put out in the field, but he never went overseas. My sister Mary was a very beautiful young woman. I was always jealous being the nine-year-old with an 18-year-old sister who, during the war, had more boyfriends [Laughs] because there was so much military around. So, yeah, that’s my …
OFFNER: A quick background.
BIRCH: Yes.
OFFNER: So what brought your family to Washington?
BIRCH: My dad got a job at the Naval Gun Factory. He worked as a machinist. He worked in Shop 21 making parts for torpedoes during the war. World War II.
OFFNER: In the Navy Yard [Washington Navy Yard].
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. At the Navy Yard. I always thought he made torpedoes, but he didn’t. He made the parts, and the Torpedo Factory, I guess, was in Alexandria [Virginia].
OFFNER: In Old Town, right?
BIRCH: Yeah.
OFFNER: Right. So when you arrived in Washington, DC, Capitol Hill, the height of the Depression, your family sought housing and secured housing at 110 Fourth Street NE, which we assume was a boarding house at that time?
BIRCH: Well, it was people renting. And boarding, I don’t know that that …
OFFNER: The right term. They rented out different apartments.
BIRCH: Yes. But the first place was on East Capitol Street.
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: Which wasn’t very far away. So they, I guess Mom started looking for—I think they were in one room because they were wherever my dad was ...
OFFNER: On East Capitol Street. Okay.
BIRCH: … when he came here to work before the rest of the family. So then, when everybody came, we were in that one room for a while, and then Mom found this apartment at 110 [Fourth Street NE].
OFFNER: So I’d be interested in having you sort of describe this apartment, because currently it is the third floor of 110 Fourth Street, which now serves as two bedrooms with an adjoining walk-through bath. And that’s sort of the space ...
BIRCH: Yeah.
OFFNER: … as it’s currently configured. But if you could sort of walk through what that space looks like in [the] 1930s.
BIRCH: There’s a stairway up to the third floor. You had a landing when you got there. If you went left, you went into a living room, which I think Dean and Mary probably had as a bedroom. You could go from there into the kitchen. When you come out of the kitchen, at the other end of the stairs was a walkway with the kitchen sink in it. And you could go from there into the bathroom. From the bathroom into the bedroom and from the bedroom out to the landing. [Laughs]
OFFNER: Back out to the landing.
BIRCH: And I was just learning to walk, and my mom didn’t want me on the floors because she was afraid of splinters. So they put a diaper under my arms, and they’d all take turns walking me. [Laughs] They had me—you could do a circle.
OFFNER: [Both laugh] So your brother and sister stayed in one room as their living room–sleeping arrangement.
BIRCH: Yes.
OFFNER: And then you were with your parents in the other room.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: And then you had the kitchen and a small eating space.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: And then the adjoining bathroom. So it was five people.
BIRCH: Five people.
OFFNER: And you would have lived in that space for how many years, do you think?
BIRCH: I don’t remember exactly when Mom and Dad took over renting the whole house. But I think we moved from the third floor down and took some of the second floor. We kept moving until we got to the first floor. [Both laugh] And then they rented out the apartment on the third floor.
OFFNER: So they kept the apartment.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: And then just lived in the remaining space.
BIRCH: Yeah. They rented the house, but the rent from the apartment came to them.
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: Because they rented the whole house. So.
OFFNER: At some point, they rented the whole house.
BIRCH: Yes.
OFFNER: When you were a toddler. At that point.
BIRCH: Yeah, there were years in there that I don’t remember …
OFFNER: Sure.
BIRCH: … what they were doing.
OFFNER: Sure.
BIRCH: Oddly, not until I was a little older. That meant probably five or six.
OFFNER: Mm-hmm. So as you moved from the third-floor apartment to the second floor, were there other people renting rooms?
BIRCH: Yeah.
OFFNER: There were other people.
BIRCH: I don’t remember any of those. I do remember my mother’s brother and his wife rented that third-floor apartment at one point.
OFFNER: Okay.
BIRCH: Other people rented it. And the only one I remember is a woman, an older woman, that rented a bedroom with the porch off of it.
OFFNER: The back room?
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. The last couple that rented the apartment were from out of town and came here to work. Really, really very quiet, nice couple. My mom really bonded with the wife. And I think when those people decided to move, Mom didn’t want to deal with the apartment any more. So…
OFFNER: So we’ve looked through some records, and it looked like ownership may have conveyed somewhere around the mid-1940s.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: Would you have had had renters in the apartment as it was or just used the space for yourself?
BIRCH: Yeah. They would have kept the apartment until just before they sold it ...
OFFNER: Okay. So it sold.
BIRCH: … actually. But I think it was when that couple moved, Mom— and neighbors on one side were terrible, making a lot of noise all night long. We just—Mom—and my dad had cancer then.
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: So it was too much. So they moved to a small house on Ridge Road SE.
OFFNER: So they moved off Capitol Hill by then.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm, yes.
OFFNER: So that was about the early ’50s?
BIRCH: Uh-huh. Fifty, fifty-one. It was my senior year in high school.
OFFNER: And you were at Eastern High [1700 East Capitol Street NE] …
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: … at the time?
BIRCH: And I had to take a couple of buses to get there then. Capital Transit. [Both laugh] So, yeah, I wasn’t thrilled that they were moving when it was my last year. But I wasn’t going to …
OFFNER: Switch schools.
BIRCH: … leave the school then.
OFFNER: So what other schools did you attend on Capitol Hill?
BIRCH: I went to Peabody Elementary [425 C Street NE].
OFFNER: Oh, just down the street.
BIRCH: Yeah. And [Charles E.] Hilton Elementary School was a block or two away [Constitution Avenue and Sixth Street NE, now the site of Hilton Community Garden]. And I went to Stuart Junior High School [Stuart-Hobson Middle School, 410 E Street NE].
OFFNER: Okay.
BIRCH: And then Eastern.
OFFNER: Okay. All neighborhood schools.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: And did your family attend a church? There are a lot of churches on Capitol Hill.
BIRCH: No. Hmm-mm.
OFFNER: Wasn’t part of your family life.
BIRCH: Yeah.
OFFNER: So when we met in November of last year, you shared with us a lot of memories.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: So, if it’s okay, I’ll prompt some of those to see …
BIRCH: Okay.
OFFNER: … what stories we learn from that. You had mentioned that your sister got married at some point and then ran a boarding house across the street.
BIRCH: Rooming house.
OFFNER: Rooming house.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: I guess that’s the more proper term. Rooming house.
BIRCH: She thought she was going to be like our mom, but she wasn’t made for that. So they didn’t live there too long. But they had their two sons while they were there and rented out four rooms.
OFFNER: Okay.
BIRCH: On the second floor at 119 Fourth Street. So they were right across the street.
OFFNER: And what was your sister’s married name?
BIRCH: Mary Moser.
OFFNER: Moser.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: One story that impressed me was the memory of rats scampering up the pipes …
BIRCH: Yes.
OFFNER: … through the walls.
BIRCH: I could lie there at night and hear the plaster crumbling in the wall right beside my headboard. [Both laugh] Some nights they were so loud I couldn’t sleep. I was afraid they were going to gnaw their way through the wall. So I didn’t like that. Well, my mom was very strong. She didn’t want anything like that in her house, and I don’t remember ever having a rat in the house.
OFFNER: Just …
BIRCH: Just in the walls
OFFNER: Just in the walls. Right.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm, yeah.
OFFNER: Impressive.
BIRCH: They were traveling. [Both laugh]
OFFNER: Finding some other more opportunistic spot. So another story you told is your older brother was brought out, maybe even through the front window?
BIRCH: No, the front door.
OFFNER: The front door. Oh, okay. The front door to a waiting ambulance.
BIRCH: He had scarlet fever.
OFFNER: Scarlet fever.
BIRCH: And, in those days, you went to the hospital and your house was quarantined for anybody with scarlet fever. So, yeah, I was watching from the upstairs window as they took him out..
OFFNER: [From the] window, right.
BIRCH: And he had grown to where his feet were off the end of the [laughs] gurney.
OFFNER: He was too tall for the gurney. Another story I think you shared with us was maybe playing a prank on the woman that rented the room that was in the back of the house that had a balcony.
BIRCH: Yes. As I mentioned, it was an older woman. And she was a hoarder. And she had stacks of newspapers all over that room, and I don’t know why. Dean and Mary would talk about her, about how they’d like to get rid of her. Not kill her [Interviewer laughs] but just get her out of the house. And I, as an eight- or nine-year-old, decided to impress my older sister and brother, and I got a rope and I tied it around the doorknob over to the railing on the stairs. And she couldn’t open the door. And after I did that, I kind of disappeared in the neighborhood and somebody, one of the other kids, told me my mother was looking for me. [Interviewer laughs] And I thought, oh well. I know why. So I went home and I tried climbing in a window, the one that is now a patio door.
OFFNER: Patio door.
BIRCH: Over the basement.
OFFNER: Right. There was an outside door. They put a roof over it. Would you have had a roof over that?
BIRCH: No, we had—it was like a little room that you could go from the house …
OFFNER: Right.
BIRCH: … out and down the basement.
OFFNER: Right.
BIRCH: And this was where I think you have a door, a glass door, now.
OFFNER: Right, yes.
BIRCH: And it was a window. As I was climbing in the window, my mother caught me. I got in a little bit of trouble for that one. [Laughs]
OFFNER: Sounds like that. Did the renter stay much longer?
BIRCH: I think she did. She didn’t leave because of that. [Both laugh] That much I know. But, yeah, I was—I don’t know. It was surprising, you know, what you do when you’re young like that. And, then, I became a very quiet teenager and never got in trouble. [Both laugh]
OFFNER: So the house has a backyard, sort of, that’s now bricked over and has a patio with fences that are on either side. Your memory was that there were no fences between the yards in the back.
BIRCH: I can’t swear to that. I know we had—when you went out the back door from the kitchen, there was the covering from the porch overhead and it was grass …
OFFNER: Grass. Okay.
BIRCH: … along the left side and the right side was kind of just a bed down there and long gardens. And then you went to the garage off of there. And we never used the garage with a car because for quite a few years we didn’t have a car. So, yeah.
OFFNER: Sort of a storage …
BIRCH: But I couldn’t believe that when you replaced it, it [the garage] was still standing.
OFFNER: Yes. [Both laugh]
BIRCH: That just amazed me. That it hadn’t fallen down.
OFFNER: It was very close to that. So for the record, I replaced the garage that was there, probably from the ’30s, maybe even older, that was just corrugated iron and wood frame.
BIRCH: Yes [Laughter].
OFFNER: So it’s now a rebuilt garage in that space. One of the other memories that you shared was the neighbors in 112, the LoBianco family.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. Yeah. The family was very close to them. Mr. LoBianco owned a barber shop, I think. And did quite well. There were rumors his money didn’t come necessarily from the barber shop alone. But, you know. And I don’t know when his wife died. I only remember …
OFFNER: That she died.
BIRCH: … she wasn’t there. And there was an older daughter, Theresa, and four or five younger brothers. And Theresa became the mom and took care of that family. So, and she’s a very pretty Italian girl. So, you know, I felt bad for her but she was restricted a lot just because that was what was expected.
OFFNER: So that was her fate.
BIRCH: Yeah, yeah, mm-hmm. And they were very Italian. They made wine in their basement, and they’d get the tubs, put the grapes in, and stomp on them down there. Yeah, we got some of the wine.
OFFNER: So were the boys around your age or maybe younger?
BIRCH: Yeah, mm-hmm.
OFFNER: So they may have been playmates in the neighborhood.
BIRCH: No. I don’t remember them that much. I think most of them were older than me.
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: Maybe the youngest one was maybe my age. But, you know, it was a very nice family and I always liked Theresa. She had a hard time with being the only female, the oldest in that family. And one time she gave me a note and asked me to go to the store for her. And she gave me money. And I went to the store and was to buy some feminine products, which she wasn’t in a position to go and get when—wouldn’t ask her brothers. Then my sister had a fit. She said I’d never ask her to do something like that. So who does she think she is? But I felt bad for her. And I understood, even if I didn’t know what I was buying. [Both laugh]
OFFNER: That’s very thoughtful. So do you have memories of the neighborhood, like Stanton Park or Eastern Market?
BIRCH: Eastern Market I kind of remember, but it was strictly the market and vegetables day, that type of thing. And people didn’t stay there the way they do now.
OFFNER: They just bought their groceries and were on their way.
BIRCH: Yes uh-huh. On the weekend.
OFFNER: And, you know, you were there. You moved to Washington during the Great Depression. World War II was declared, at least for the United States, in the early ’40s. And do you have memories of what that was like and …
BIRCH: No, I really don’t. I was nine?
OFFNER: Eight or nine, yeah.
BIRCH: 1941? Yeah. I was kind of young. My memory of that was I was listening to my favorite radio show on Sunday. I don’t know with …
OFFNER: December [1941].

BIRCH: Yeah. They took the show off and had Roosevelt announce the beginning of the war. But I was furious. [Interviewer laughs] How dare he take my radio show off that I’d waited for all week!. [Laughs] And then, yeah. It was not good. Everybody had the star flags in their windows [indicating that a family member was in the service] and rationing what you could buy, dark windows.
OFFNER: At night?
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. And, yeah, but I—And my brother was …
OFFNER: In the Navy.
BIRCH: …in the war, in the Navy, yeah. My dad was in World War I in the Navy. So Mom and Dad are buried at Arlington [National Cemetery] and, yeah, right down from [President John F.] Kennedy’s grave. So.
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: My dad always loved DC. And can you put this where it belongs? [Laughs]
OFFNER: Sure. [Interviewee laughs]
BIRCH: My dad always loved DC, so when he died and he was going to be buried at Arlington, we were so excited because the site overlooks DC. And we thought, oh, Dad would be …
OFFNER: Happy with that.
BIRCH: He’d be happy with that site. And then, when they came along and put Kennedy up there, we thought, well, this really was a prime spot. [Both laugh] So, yeah. But I really don’t remember much about the war except the end of it, and Mom took me to the Capitol where people were celebrating and all that sort of thing. So I got to see that. But I don’t know how much of what I saw I understood. But I did know the war was over. So that was a very important thing.
OFFNER: So one of the areas that you were interested in when we met was the alleyway—it’s now called Frederick Douglass Court—that alleyway bordered by Third and Fourth Streets NE and then A and what would have been B Street probably.
BIRCH: It would have been B.
OFFNER: B. But now is called Constitution Avenue. What do you remember of the alley? Was it a place …
BIRCH: I don’t remember a whole lot because I probably wasn’t allowed back there.
OFFNER: Too young?
BIRCH: But I do remember being back there and was astonished at these people who were living there sitting out in front of their home with a washtub and doing their washing in that tub. And I guess they must have had a well or something, because they didn’t have running water, electricity either, or anything. I was just blown away that somebody was living there like that.
OFFNER: Mm-hmm. And were there children that you interacted with in the alleyway as a child?
BIRCH: No, not really. And I wish I had.
OFFNER: You may have been limited in where you could wander.
BIRCH: Yeah, yes I was.
OFFNER: And do you remember sort of the racial makeup at that time?
BIRCH: No. Our block was all white. On Fourth and B [Constitution Avenue NE], you turned left, there were black families there and not great housing there, either. But Mom became friendly with one of the women there, and the lady liked to cook with bacon grease. So Mom saved all of the bacon grease and took it down and gave it to that lady. So, yeah. And at the grocery store, I guess somebody was running a numbers game down there, which my mom, to my amazement, played the numbers. [Interviewer laughs] And she won a little bit now and then, but … And, in those days, you didn’t have a credit card at the Deckelbaum’s [grocery store], but they kept a running tab of what you bought. And so Mom had a tab where she owed money all the time. One of the first things she did when they sold the house was pay that tab off.
OFFNER: So where would the Deckelbaum’s have been located? Were they at the corner of Fourth and B?
BIRCH: And B, mm-hmm.
OFFNER: Okay.
BIRCH: Yes, right there. They faced B Street. So, and they’d come up and play penny ante with my parents from time to time. Mr. and Mrs. Deckelbaum And we didn’t have a car, so sometimes they took Mom and me—well, we went to Sears way out on Wisconsin Avenue [near Tenley Circle].
OFFNER: Wow.
BIRCH: Yes. It was quite a trip. But, yeah, they were just very, very nice people.
OFFNER: So the Deckelbaum’s store, was it a general grocery, a butcher shop, or a …?
BIRCH: General grocery.
OFFNER: General grocery.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm, yes. Mom went down every day to buy the food for dinner because we didn’t have—We had a refrigerator, icebox, I guess, but not big enough to keep a lot of food. So she went down. And it was the highlight of her day, I think, to go down there and socialize. So, yeah.
OFFNER: So as you walk out the front door at 110 Fourth Street and you go right, you shared a memory that two doors down was an oyster shack.
BIRCH: Right next door to 108.
OFFNER: Right.
BIRCH: And I think it’s now a garage.
OFFNER: And it’s now a garage, yes.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and it was a shack, and they sold oysters and different seafood there. And my dad was thrilled because he loved oysters. So. It was interesting.
OFFNER: So then, you keep going down the block and right at the corner was maybe another grocery store or butcher shop.
BIRCH: Yeah, and it was facing A Street, Fourth and A. And you had to go down some steps to go into that one. And it wasn’t quite as successful as Deckelbaum’s. It wasn’t that big. But they had good penny candy. [Both laugh]
OFFNER: So on either end of the block, you had a good penny candy source.
BIRCH: Yeah, mm-hmm.
OFFNER: And, then, if we keep just crossing the street, I think you shared a memory that there was a Chinese laundry on that corner.
BIRCH: Yeah, yeah. And, at one point, the upstairs, there was a long porch …
OFFNER: Yes.
BIRCH: … and there were people there who would make, like, ice cones. Maybe now it would be a slushie, only these weren’t slushie. But they were flavored ice. So, yeah, it was kind of an interesting little area there.
OFFNER: So you could pretty much live within that block.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: Many of your needs met just up and down the street.
BIRCH: . Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: So your family, at some point your father became ill and you had rambunctious neighbors at 108?
BIRCH: Ah, yes. [Both laugh] They were awful. They stayed up all night long, making noise. There were two Irish ladies that lived there that were never married, and they ran the boarding house or the …
OFFNER: Rooming house?
BIRCH: Rooming house. And rented an apartment. I don’t know whether there were two apartments or just one, but they got too old, and they moved in with their nephew for a while. But the house was rented out, and that’s the whole house. Then these people took—the ladies had left a piano and one night they took the piano outside and hacked it up for firewood.
OFFNER: Oh, my.
BIRCH: Yeah. At that point, it was just not good for Mom and Dad to be there.
OFFNER: Right.
BIRCH: Or me, either. But the Irish ladies had some terrible roomers, too. So. That was not a good house.
OFFNER: It wasn’t a good house.
BIRCH: But, now, I’m sure it’s been redone [and it’s] beautiful.
OFFNER: Yes. And I have lovely neighbors, So, very lucky. But if you looked just out at the street, probably most of those houses would have been some form of either a family dwelling or a rooming house or a family and rooming. Rented rooms.
BIRCH: More just family. Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: As time went on.
BIRCH: But mainly it was just families, except for my sister renting out. But when they sold it, I don’t know who they sold it to.

It was a great place to live. The streetcars going down East Capitol Street, and in bad weather I could take a streetcar to high school. You could buy student tickets. When I was a teenager another friend and I would take the streetcar to Griffith Stadium [in Northwest Washington between Georgia Avenue and Fifth Street and W Street and Florida Avenue] to see the Washington Senators play baseball. And it was enjoyable to be able to go there. I remember passing the Wonder Bread Bakery [641 Street NW] and how great the fragrance was. And I think Eastern was in a playoff football game one year. I went for that. But it was great. It was a wonderful time to be a teenager and have no fear. And I never had any fear of being out and going where I wanted to. So. Sad the way times have changed.
OFFNER: So, it’s 1951. You move to Ridge Road, ...
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: … finish your high school year, and then what was your next adventure?
BIRCH: Well, my dad died probably within a —I graduated in June ’52, he died in September. So it was just Mom and me. We lived there until 1957, probably 1956. I had gotten married (in 1954) and was expecting my first child. It was a very small house. So we moved to Silver Spring [Maryland]. Ralph and I had two daughters and decided to move. We then had two sons. We bought a house in Bethesda [Maryland].
OFFNER: And how did you meet your husband?
BIRCH: On a blind date. [Both laugh] Yeah. My best friend in high school met my Ralph’s best friend, She just wanted to go out with Paul so badly, and Paul wanted to go on a double date. And she had to find a date for Ralph. So she pleaded and begged because I had said no more. I would never do a blind date. Then, she beat me down and I did it.
OFFNER: So was Ralph from Washington, DC?
BIRCH: He was from Fairfax [Virginia].
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: Yes. That was quite a drive in those days. [Laughs] Yeah, it was well over an hour from Fairfax to Southeast. And that’s how we wound up in Maryland. We moved to a house in Silver Spring that we shared with my mom. Eventually we moved to Bethesda.
OFFNER: So your husband actually worked on Capitol Hill.
BIRCH: He did. He was a printer, and he wanted so much to be a printer. And he applied to the union, [International] Typographical Union. He never heard from them. My sister called the Typographical Union and said she was his mother and what was wrong with them that he never heard from them, and she demanded that they find a position for her son. So they said, oh, we’re so sorry, and he went for an interview and got the job as an apprentice. He called me at work. I was working at the Navy Department, and he called me at work and said, well, he thought everything went okay, but he thought maybe he spelled apprentice incorrectly. And I said how did you spell it? He said A-P-P-R-E-N-T-I-S. [Laughs] But he wound up handling the printing for the [House] Ways and Means Committee on Capitol Hill in Congress. So he had quite an adventure there.
OFFNER: Yes. And it was the Ways and Means Committee with, at the time, Chairman Dan Rostenkowski [D-Illinois]?
BIRCH: Yeah. He was very involved in, I think it was the 200th-anniversary publication they did [The Committee on Ways and Means: A Bicentennial History, 1789–1989]. And he handled the printing and everything to do with that. And we have pictures of him with [President George] H. W. Bush.
OFFNER: Mmm. Great.
BIRCH: Yeah. So.
OFFNER: So when you were working for the Department of the Navy, was it on the Mall or …?
BIRCH: Constitution Avenue.
OFFNER: Constitution Avenue.
BIRCH: It was in the temporary buildings [along Constitution Avenue NW between 17th and 21st Streets]. They moved from there to Crystal City [Virginia] eventually, I guess. But that was too far for me. [Laughs] So I worked at— We lived in Bethesda, so I worked at NIH [National Institutes of Health].
OFFNER: Ah, okay.
BIRCH: Yeah. Then, I worked for NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration]. That was me. [Laughs]
OFFNER: So I think we’re at the end if we wish it to be. Are there any last things that come to mind as you …
VOICE: I will interject here
OFFNER: So this is Lora’s daughter Pam [Heaston].
HEASTON: Mom talked about riding her bicycle all over DC as a kid. You got a bicycle from whom?
BIRCH: From my sister and my uncle.
HEASTON: And your mom didn’t want you to have it, right?
BIRCH: No. She didn’t want me riding a bicycle on the streets of DC. It was too busy.
HEASTON: And where did you go? On the bike?
BIRCH: All over. I went to the zoo [National Zoo, Connecticut Avenue NW].
OFFNER: Oh, my gosh.
BIRCH: [Laughs] I rode all the way out where the DC Armory is [2001 East Capitol Street SE]. I guess it’s still there, past Eastern [High School]. Out that way. Yeah. And all around the neighborhood. But Mom never knew I went to the zoo. [Both laugh] I went there a couple of times. But Mary and Uncle Bill would probably have gotten in big trouble. [Both laugh] So, yeah. But, yeah, she was just worried about the traffic.
OFFNER: Sure.
BIRCH: No bicycle lanes in those days. And, you know, you can park on both sides of the street, so there’s not a whole lot of room for bicycles. Now my grandson rides a bicycle all over DC. He had a car. So he had a car that caught on fire and he never replaced it. [Interviewer laughs] So he rides his bike. And he’ll be thrilled to hear this, that I mentioned him, because he’s been really interested in my history, the house’s history. So there you go, James. [Both laugh]
OFFNER: Well, thank you, James.
BIRCH: Yeah. And in those days, the—oh, I can’t think of what you call it. Where you have a creek that went across the road and you’d have to go through it, at the zoo.
OFFNER: Mm-hmm. Rock Creek?
BIRCH: Yeah, but it went across it. Hmm?
HEASTON: It was fording across it. They didn’t build a bridge. You just had to drive through the stream.
BIRCH: Mm-hmm. And I went through on my bicycle and that was kind of … [Laughs] Yeah.
HEASTON: You got wet.
BIRCH: Yeah, it was kind of exciting though. It was fun. [Interviewer and interviewee laugh] Yeah, I had a lot of freedom. So. Good and bad, but I guess Mom trusted me not to get in trouble. [Interviewer laughs] Thank goodness I didn’t.
OFFNER: So it was mother’s trust well placed.
BIRCH: [Laughs] Oh, yeah. My father’s father came to visit and he redid the staircase at 110. My sister told me that. I’m looking at the …
OFFNER: The notes (for the interview).
BIRCH: Yeah. Yeah, we’ve covered most of it there.
OFFNER: Right.
BIRCH: Mmm. I think we got it all. But, yeah, it was a very good time to be there. So.
OFFNER: Happy memories of …
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: … life there.
BIRCH: Yeah. And Mom—When they bought the house, it had a stucco front, which was crumbling, falling down. The first thing she did was have that replaced, and I think it’s still the same ...
OFFNER: It is, yes .
BIRCH: … that Mom had put on. And she had the thing in front, the coal chute. And we would have coal delivered. They’d put it down that chute near the furnace, and Mom would take care of the furnace and the heat. And the next thing she did was replace it with oil heat. So she got out of the coal business.
So we used to have ice, big chunks of ice, delivered for our icebox. The delivery man had big tongs and would put the ice in the icebox.
BIRCH: The milk container outside, not completely outside, right inside the front door.
OFFNER: The little …
BIRCH: The container where the milk would—you’d put the used bottles in there and the milkman would come and deliver the milk and butter.
OFFNER: He would just open the front door and …?
BIRCH: Mm-hmm.
OFFNER: Wow.
BIRCH: Had a standing order. I remember horse and wagons going down the street and then somebody—calling watermelons, watermelons. Someone would come by and sharpen knives and go down the street and announce that. I remember paperboys yelling “Extra! Extra!” during the war when something would happen.
Yeah. And these things were special to happen, to have memories of.
OFFNER: Mm-hmm.
BIRCH: So.
OFFNER: Well, Lora, thank you for taking the time to share with us your memories of Capitol Hill and 110 Fourth Street NE. It means a lot to me as the current owner to have that history.
BIRCH: It’s wonderful for me and I appreciate the opportunity to dig into my memories while they’re still there.
OFFNER: While they’re still there. Well, at 90, you’re very impressive. [Both laugh]

END OF INTERVIEW (MAY 29, 2024)

START OF INTERVIEW (JULY 12, 2024)

OFFNER: This is Molly Collins Offner. I am here with Lora Stirling Birch for the Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project. This is our second interview. Today’s date is July 12, 2024. And we are here in Lora Birch’s home in Laytonsville, Maryland. We are going to add to Lora’s childhood memories. And I am going to begin with asking Lora about memories of her father and his love of music and a little bit about the Polish drinking songs. So Lora.

BIRCH: My dad grew up around Chicago and was really big in the bar scene. He loved to sing and sang bass in quartets in bars. They were Polish bars, most of them with Polish patrons. And he just loved music always. He would sing at home.

We had a big floor-model Philco radio, and he put a tweeter on it and enhanced the bass, and he would just play it full volume. He would listen to E. Power Biggs [classical pipe organist, 1930s to 1970s] play the organ. And if he turned the music up on that, I could turn a corner on to the street and hear that radio. (Laugh)

It was a good memory of him. And he loved all kinds of music from the ’30s, ’40’s…. And then my sister and brother were into music and I listened to the big bands. I just … it was all music. My mom sang around the house. I loved that.

OFFNER: A musical household.

BIRCH: (Laugh) Yes.

OFFNER: And then moving on. Washington, DC, has always been known for its July Fourth celebration, fireworks being a big part of that. What are your memories of July Fourth and the fireworks?

BIRCH: I loved the fireworks. And we went every year we could. The first time my parents took me, my dad was holding me right at the base of the monument [Washington Monument], right where the fireworks went off, and I screamed. It was really frightening to me. Hmm, later I got to where I liked the big booms [Laughter] even more than the fireworks.

But we did go. We walked to the [National] Mall. When I was married and we had four kids, we would frequently go to the fireworks and would sit on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. So that [the fireworks] remained always a big thing in my life.

OFFNER: You also had a memory of ice cream in the neighborhood.
BIRCH: My dad decided he wanted ice cream every night before he went to bed. Mom and I decided to take on the nightly walk to Grubb’s Pharmacy at Fourth and East Capitol Streets to get it for him and us. I loved that store. It had a soda fountain and items not related to drugs. Fun things. My daughter, grandkids, and I checked it out a few years ago. I was so disappointed. No soda fountain. Ice cream was in a freezer where you picked out what you wanted. Very crowded! So small. Since I’ve gotten older, why is everything I remember not as big as I remember?
When I was young, drugstores, 5-and-10-cent stores, had soda fountains. Ice cream cones, sodas, and sundaes were easily prepared for you. They also served food.

OFFNER: And another memory we want to probe a little bit is the funeral of FDR [President Franklin Delano Roosevelt] in 1945. What are your memories of that?

BIRCH: I remember how sad it was. I remember sitting in the room with my mother listening to reports of his death, Mom crying. As young as I was, they always spoke so highly of him and it impacted me, I guess. I remember lying on a sofa crying at his death. And Mom and I went to see the funeral cortege with horses, the caisson and all. We were right across from one of the old Senate office buildings right by the Capitol. We were right there when it turned a corner. So, it was— We were crying again.

OFFNER: A remarkable memory. And you would have been about 10, 10 and a half?

BIRCH: Yes maybe 12. Anyway I was very sad.

OFFNER: As the nation was.

BIRCH: Same as with Kennedy [President John F. Kennedy]. Hmm

OFFNER: So before we wrap up, are there any memories that have come to the forefront that you would like to add to this list?

BIRCH: I’ll think of them tomorrow.

OFFNER: (Laughter)

BIRCH: But not right now.

OFFNER: Okay, with that, we conclude our round two interview. Thank you.

Lora Stirling Birch Family Photographs
Addendum to Interview Transcript

Lora May Stirling as a toddler by the United States Capitol building.

Lora and her brother Dean and sister Mary.

Lora May Stirling in front of 110 Fourth Street NE with her dog.

Lora Birch, her daughter Chris Birch, and grandchildren in front of 110 Fourth Street NE.
November 4, 2023
[EH1]Don’t delete this question
Ruth Ann Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project
Lora Stirling Birch Interview, May 29 and July 12, 2024
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