John H smiled. He said, Who's to blame?" The parents. They are too soft with their children. I don't like this. Someone asked why he became interested in Stone Masonry. He said, "I'm the fourth generation in my family. I love it." My old folks were in the Guild. The Free Masons recalled the old ways, keep them alive. They were welcome anywhere, for they brought traditions, respect, the medicine bundle, they could translate several languages. They were involved in social reform and politics. They helped out families in need. The Sacred College of Masonry in England is not like the American version. I'm writing a book about stone masonry. There will never be another Cathedral built in the USA like the National Cathedral. All of the workers are dead (except John H, of course). The Indiana quarrymen are all dead or in their nineties. Of those who worked on the National Cathedral, 40% were Scots, 20% were Greeks or Italians, and the rest were Americans. The intellectuals don't appreciate us. There are not authentic iron workers, blacksmiths anymore. Most of this modern stuff is rubbish. He showed us his tools. Some were made by tempering in whale oil, made by real iron workers versus stuff made by industrial idiots. Notice my choice of tools. Here's a one pound chisel. It's much better made for my hand, for safety. Here's a Stanley [chisel], not so good. If you use a three pound hammer, you exert over 8 tons of pressure everyday and you are tired. In a craft school working with a Master, you learn to cut stone behind your back, while looking at the model. You don't look at what you're doing, but what the Master has done. Kit said some people look at their product without looking at their keyboard. John H said, "It's not the same." We found out that he'd written several articles for the NGS, so we'll look for them.

The sign on the red brick building across from our interview, Jefferson & K Sts., was "Jefferson Court MCMLXXXIV". We walked up Jefferson Street with Cathy Riggs-Salter, and our group then crossed the old C & O Canal, and I got pretty excited as I'd read about it, [and] seen old photos. The canal is now a tourist site here, has 90 minute rides, barges pulled by donkeys. We saw where they had been. Cathy gave us the second part of the field walk [handout], which included a scavenger hunt, see handout, map, which we are to bring to our debriefing, 2:15. We looked around the C & O. I want to return, then [we] walked up the hill to M Street.

We had mid-morning break with fruit juice and apple croissant at Au Croissant Chaud, 3222 N Street. [I] used Cirrus Atar [ATM] across the street. [We] walked over to the Old Stone House, (1765), 3051 M Street, and its beautiful garden in the rear. I passed an old fish shop with fresh seafood on display, past the Georgetown PO, 31 & N Street. We saw some beautiful old row houses, [set into] long narrow lots. One of the Qs was re real estate. We found out that real estate runs $135-215 [square] ft. with places running 900-3500 ft. in size. Fire marks in the old days indicated that the family had their fire insurance paid.

Sketch of Doorway detail, 3256 N St. NW

We talked about the role that landscape played in such a neighborhood. See also notes from May-June 91 trip to D.C. There is gentrification in [the] landscape. Mike Mulligan is in the basement of...

The Potomac Cafe, for example, serves Greek food. We saw the Strassi Gallery, former home of Marbury, owner of [the] home made famous by "Marbury verses Madison" Supreme Court Case. We were enticed into a below M St. Italian Restaurant for pasta and drink, away from the hot sunny pavement. Our group included: Bob A, Kathy S, Eric E, Susan B and myself. Deb R (TC from TX) and some of her friends wandered in later, and we gave them a tough time.

We had already been to the Georgetown Art Center, 1046 Potomac, and looked at old maps, lithographs, and postcards. Bob purchased over $100 of prints, while the rest of us were more restrained. We ended up under a shop covered porch for debriefing, but not before visiting Dream Dresser shop nearby. The D.D. is like some places in Kobenhavn.

We walked back to Washington Harbor, after our group talk. I did some reading while Angel took a nap. At 7:00, we were all nicely dressed, took the Metro to Farragut North, walked past NGS and Sumner School to the Governor's House, Holiday Inn, about 1 block north of Sumner/NGS on 17th St. We saw Bob S and Chuck G there, as well as other Alliance Coordinators. Some of us had a little bit of jealousy, having to share our wonderful SGI friends with people we didn't know. We got to meet a number of ACs and enjoyed our talk. We talked about our ASGI for next June, and I felt pretty confident in knowing what is involved. Our own SGI, TCs weren't there much. We had pizza & pop.

After our meeting, I worked on Mac project files at Sumner until about 11 PM, then ... later, back at the dorm, I spoke with some 'Glades Residents who were relaxing.