103-Year-Old Librarian Was Devoted to Family, Building Relationships

A bout the time that the Wright Brothers built their first successful glider, Edward Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance March" resonated as one of the year's most popular songs and President Theodore Roosevelt became the first chief executive to ride in a car, Anna Americus Boteler-Brown wriggled into what seems today was a far simpler world.

Born Sept. 14, 1902, of modest means and deep ancestral roots in the Washington area, Boteler-Brown lived through a century of increasingly complex and astounding changes. Times got more complicated, but Boteler-Brown did not. She never drove a car or used a computer. She continued to call the modern contraption known as a refrigerator an "ice box" and was amazed that she could talk on a telephone without a cord. She also held fast to the conviction that an oath, no matter how old, should not be broken.

When the retired National Security Agency librarian died of aortic stenosis Aug. 11, a little more than a month before her 104th birthday, she was content to be a grandmother helping another generation see that few things are more important than family and building strong relationships.

"She always reminded me of the Fairy Godmother in Cinderella, because she was kind of plump and blonde," recalled granddaughter Nancy Allen of Hagerstown. "For me, she was the real Fairy Godmother, protecting me and giving me what I needed when I was little."

Allen, one of Boteler-Brown's four granddaughters, still has fond memories of going to downtown Washington with her grandmother to a beauty parlor near F Street and Reeves Coffee Shop. "I don't remember the name of the salon -- I was only 5 or 6 years old -- but used to go with her every Saturday. After getting her hair done, we would go to either Woodies tearoom for lunch, or the Blue Room or the Neptune Room or Reeves."

Allen's grandparents also had a tradition of taking their older granddaughters, Lynda and Susan, to the Esther Shop in the District, where they would buy Easter dresses and shoes. "She didn't have a lot of money but was generous with what she had," said Allen, who was close to her grandmother.

Boteler-Brown was born in Georgetown in an integrated neighborhood where ice was delivered in chunks by Mr. Dorsey. "We were just ordinary people," said her brother, Lawrence H. Boteler, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, of McLean.

Their family has lived in the Washington area since the early 1700s, said Boteler. Their great-grandparents built a house on land adjacent to what became Fort Bayard, a Civil War fort located then on River Road and Western Avenue. When President Lincoln visited the fort, he had lunch with Boteler-Brown's family members.

Early on, no one expected Boteler-Brown to live as long as she did. She was told she wouldn't live past 16, because she had a "hole in her heart," said Allen. Instead, she outlived all her doctors and became a great-great-grandmother.

She was young when she began working in Washington department stores to help support her family. Boteler, 14 years his sister's junior and one of four boys, remembers his sister "always thinking of me" and bringing him something home from work. She once brought him a shirt and tie when he had a job interview. She also brought home coats and shoes for nieces during the 1930s when money was tight.

She eloped and married Emory F. Brown, a painter by trade, and they had one daughter. She didn't consider herself much of a cook, so her husband, who got home from work first, would make meals. They lived in the District and College Park. Her husband died in 1971.

Never adverse to hard work, Boteler-Brown spent 32 years as a librarian with the National Security Agency at Fort Meade. She was there in early days of the intelligence agency, and after retiring in 1972, she was called back for a highly classified special assignment.

"They loved her there and she loved her job," said Allen. "Having government security clearance was taken very seriously by Anna. She took an oath to protect and honor her country and would never disclose her work to anyone. We often asked her in a joking way to tell us the secrets and she would always reply, 'If I told you I'd have to kill you!' then followed by 'I took an oath for my country.' "

Boteler-Brown, who never lost her sense of humor, enjoyed bowling, romance novels and dancing. She loved the Charleston and taught her granddaughters how to dance by having them stand on her feet while they moved to Nat King Cole songs on her "hi-fi." She also enjoyed taking cruises with her daughter, Betty E. Swanson-Atkinson, who died in 1998.

And she was never afraid to say "I love you," Allen said.

Times changed, and people passed away. But Boteler-Brown's commitment to country and family were unwavering.