Fabled Alsop House to Host Friends of Rose Park Gala, Oct. 1
By • September 16, 2026 0 344
The living room of the Alsop/Eisenberg House on Dumbarton Street. Photo by Robert Devaney.
A great Washington party, Susan Mary Alsop told a reporter, “is a question of electricity. It’s also luck. If you’re fortunate enough to get the secretary of state and the head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the night of an international crisis … it sounds ghoulish, but it’s something you want to have.”
The “Second Lady of Camelot” was married to influential Washington columnist Joe Alsop, who built the unique cinderblock house on Dumbarton Street in 1948, which scandalized the neighborhood.
It is at this fabled Georgetown residence — courtesy of current owners Ellen and Howard Eisenberg — that the Friends of Rose Park will rendezvous for the organization’s Annual Fundraiser Gala on Thursday, Oct. 1.
“The Eisenbergs have graciously opened their home to benefit the Friends of Rose Park,” said Gail Daubert, the group’s president. “We are grateful to the Eisenbergs for continuing a tradition of hospitality that Susan Mary Alsop made famous. To celebrate this fabulous house and Rose Park, we will be serving a new cocktail that we named the Rose Blossom!” The cocktail, she explained, is a spritz, made with Italian aperitif Sarti Rosa.
The dining room of the Alsop/Eisenberg House on Dumbarton Street, where the Alsops once hosted Cold War Washington. Photo by Robert Devaney.
Active in the community, the Eisenbergs — co-founders of United Sortation Solutions and Eurosort, Inc., companies in the materials handling industry — are both Entrepreneurs in Residence with Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business; Ellen is an adjunct professor at the business school.
Why all this hubbub for a public park? Well, neighbors know what an exceptional park they have at 26th and O Streets — the first of the District’s parks to be integrated — with its basketball and tennis courts (the latter named for the Peters sisters, doubles champs), rec center, children’s playgrounds, farmers market and dogs.
The need for maintenance of Rose Park, which runs parallel to Rock Creek Park from M Street to P Street, is continual, coordinated by the Friends group with the District and federal governments. Insect-damaged rose bushes are being moved and new ones are being added, along with high-tech trash cans that keep the rats out.
As for the Alsops, consider, for starters: “The Georgetown Set: Friends and Rivals in Cold War Washington” and “Taking on the World: Joseph and Stewart Alsop – Guardians of the American Century.”
The Alsops lived in Georgetown during the years — from the mid-’40s to the mid-’70s — when “The hand that mixes the Georgetown martini is time and again the hand that guides the destiny of the Western world,” as Henry Kissinger observed. Think Kennedys, Bradlees, Grahams, Harrimans, Achesons and Bruces.
It was also an era of “Elegant Deceptions,” to borrow a term from William Patten, who wrote the book “My Three Fathers: And the Elegant Deceptions of My Mother, Susan Mary Alsop.”
Jack Kennedy’s philandering was ignored. Joe Alsop’s capture in a man-baited KGB honey trap got the deep six. The married Susan Alsop’s affair with another man (upon the request of his wife) was utterly discreet, even as she bore a baby by him. All this while containing the Soviet Union and averting nuclear war.
So, bring your CIA remote viewing device to the Alsop/Eisenberg House and disrupt the timeline. “Oh, look, there’s Jack and Jackie and Ben and Tony!” “Dammit, Joe is so vociferous, but this martini is worthy of 007.”
We don’t know Marco Rubio’s or Jim Risch’s plans for the evening of Oct. 1, but we’re sure that Gail Daubert, Russell Bridges, Sarah Wade, Dave Dunning, Eric Dickman, Annabeth Foley, Jared Jones and Sarah Dean will be on hand.
To wit, the tip perfect hostess Alsop gave her daughter about parties: “Oh, just give them plenty of booze and hope it will go.”
Howard and Ellen Eisenberg at their Dumbarton Street home, once owned by Joe Alsop. Photo by Robert Devaney.
A portrait of Joe Alsop along the stairs with “Let’s create a lifetime of adventures” by Nelson De La Nuez. Georgetowner photo.
