Answerman and Friends Uncover the Tale Behind a Greek Facade

A rather large facade of a Greek temple is built into the east wall of a rowhouse at 1618 Florida Ave. NW. It appears to be in disrepair but is still quite striking. Any idea of what this is and why it is there?

-- Mike Flack, Washington

Washington is a palimpsest: Its brick-and-stone stories are regularly scraped clean, reconfigured and told again featuring different characters. So it is with this odd little relic near the southwest corner of 16th Street and Florida Avenue NW. Visible through the chain-link fence are four crumbling Doric columns amid an ivy-choked garden. Answer Man half expected a nymph or faun to saunter past. It seemed a mystery.

But Answer Man was able to reconstruct this relic's story, a testament to Washington's historic-preservation community, tireless warriors in the fight to preserve not only buildings but also the tales that go with them.

We start with the marriage of Frances Oliver, daughter of a Pittsburgh steel magnate, and Loren B.T. Johnson, son of a Washington doctor and a doctor himself. Next comes a death. Poor Frances died in May 1907, leaving a young daughter, Aurelia.

In 1913, Dr. Johnson moved into 2108 16th St. NW, or, as the street was known then, the Avenue of the Presidents. About the same time, his former mother-in-law, Mrs. James B. Oliver, apparently bought the lot next door.

This is a bit curious, inasmuch as Dr. Johnson had remarried in 1910, to Miss Cecilia C. Kennedy, a "young and attractive" woman (so said The Post) who ran a "fashionable scalp treatment parlor."

Perhaps Mrs. Oliver wanted to build a house close to her granddaughter. Instead, a vast garden was planted, designed by landscape architect George Burnap. About the same time he was designing Dr. Johnson's garden, Burnap was designing something a bit bigger catty-corner across 16th Street: Meridian Hill Park. (Burnap eventually left that project and was replaced by Horace Peaslee.)

Burnap's 16th Street garden featured an open lawn bordered with shrubbery. A high wall faced Florida Avenue and turned the corner at 16th before stepping down to a low wall and ornamental iron fence. At the rear of the property, four Doric columns held up a hanging garden. Most striking was the intricate latticework that covered most of the interior walls.

The Johnsons lived in the house, and strolled the garden, until 1925. He was the superintendent of St. Elizabeths Hospital and served on the District's first parole board. Cecilia Kennedy was active in the Woman's National Democratic Club.

The garden eventually came to be called the Henderson Manor Garden, named after the castlelike mansion on the other side of Florida Avenue. By 1938, 2108 16th St. NW had been closed for a few seasons, although fetes were still held in its garden.

Dr. Johnson died in 1941, a year after the Washington House apartments were built where his garden had been. His house is now the embassy of Angola. All that remains of his garden are four crumbling columns. Why were they left untouched? That wall might be attached to the rowhouse at 1618 Florida Ave., making it more trouble than it's worth to remove.

Whatever the reason, they provide a touch of mystery to an otherwise ordinary stretch of city street.

Answer Men and Women

Answer Man is indebted to all the people who helped solve this riddle, including D.C. building permits-database guru Brian Kraft; Kim Williams and Brendan Meyer of the D.C. Historic Preservation Office; Colleen McKnight of the Historical Society of Washington, D.C., and historian James Goode, who, remarkably, had photos of the original garden.

Write answerman@washpost.com