Editorials and Opinions

Gary Tischler • September 12, 2013

The photograph that the Georgetowner caught that afternoon from Halcyon House, looking south, doesn’t seem like much if you don’t know the context.

Something way off on fire, plumes of smoke, a distant shot. It was our cover in our Sept. 14, 2001, issue after it happened. (Sept. 14, by the way, is the birthday of our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” written by Georgetowner Francis Scott Key in 1814. That flag seen waving in the foreground is a Star-Spangled Banner flag, a version of which still flaps today from Francis Scott Key Park on M Street.)

Knowing, of course, what it was and what happened, makes and made that photograph a powerful reminder of that day, you can hear it happening in your head looking at it, the noise, the utter confusion, and we know exactly where each and every one of us where that day and we can roll it back on command as if we lived in a story.

We still have a stack of publications from that day and right thereafter: the Georgetowner cover(s), the Time cover with President Bush waving a flag on top of the pile of rubble at the tip of Manhattan where the Twin Towers used to stand, a Vanity Fair special edition cover, “One Week in September,” “Faces of Tragedy, Faces of Heroism,” “Fanfare for the American Spirit,” a Newsweek cover with the faces of three sturdy firemen on the cover, “America a Year Later,” a Dec. 31 Newsweek cover with the Twin Towers on fire as the number 11, a commemorative issue based in Shanksville, Pa., where the last hijacked plane crashed in another ball of fire.

We remember all of those things vividly and only glancingly remember that Newsweek is gone. Yet 12 years after September 11, 2001, we are changed.

We live in the world in large part created and formed by that day and its aftermath. The terrorist attack on the United States led to two costly wars that had major impacts on our economy—wars that President Barak Obama is retreating from even as he and we and the rest of the world muddle through a response to chemical warfare in Syria, a muddle that has a lot to do with the wars of the 9/11 aftermath.

We live in a changed world because of 9/11—there is such a thing as the Homeland Security Department, there is the discomfiture of traveling anywhere, including the United States. There is a ratcheting of spying hiding under the flag of national security, the extent of which is now secret no longer, with a odd result: while people are afraid, aware and even angry, there is precious little passion or outrage that raises to the surface. We have gotten used to the world we live in, which is full of high-tech toys of the kind that bright 12-year olds can penetrate. So, why not the nation’s super-intelligence agencies?

In this world, everybody spies on everybody, for economic gain, for political advantage, for guessing the next terrorist attack, the latest scheming in some basement in America, Yemen or France. Our names are out there, and so are our bank accounts, any friend named Ali, or a contribution to a mosque, or knowing that a Sufi and a Sunni and a Shiite are different branches of the same Islamic tree.

In the Middle East, the Arab spring is misunderstood by most Westerners, except that perhaps free elections are overrated as a springboard to democracy. We know that what is going on has its dangers and that the grandchildren and children of Osama bin Laden are among the participants and soldiers of the civil wars and revolutions and demonstrations all over the region.

What happened on Sept. 11, 2001, raised a wall many of us would like to lower again. We are either at war or awaiting the next war, wondering who is friend or foe. The president may have been—in his agonizingly slow approach—acting on principle and seemed surprised that when he said, “Follow me,” there was no one behind him on Syria. The GOP stalwarts seem to have trouble imagining any sort of future except one that is absent Obama and his health care plan. They to would like to go back to before 9/11, somewhere when morals and movies were black and white.

We cannot go back. The smoke is still in our nostrils, as it was for everyone who experienced World War II. One of us remembers, as a five-year-old living in Munich, watching American tanks come into the fallen city. One of us also remembers standing next to the White House on 9/11 and being told by a policeman that two planes had struck the World Trade Center, and one had hit the Pentagon and another was coming right here, perhaps.

It didn’t. But that smoke from that picture, that was the Pentagon.

It was 9/11.

Georgetowner •

The obituary in the Washington Post for Clyde Everett ?Ev? Shorey, who died July 23 of congestive heart failure at his home in Georgetown, tells a story of a career and a passion for the March of Dimes, the charitable organization for which he had been a top lobbyist for a number of years.

The interview with him in the Citizens Association of Georgetown?s Oral History Project in April 2010 tells the story of Ev Shorey, resident of West Lane Keys in Georgetown, where he lived with his wife of 63 years, Joan Burgess Shorey. It?s the story of Shorey, the concerned citizen of Georgetown, who committed to active service and participation in CAG and became its president for a time.

Neither story gives you a sense of the kind of impression Shorey, who was 91, could make if you met him or watched him preside over CAG meetings.

His professional life of which a significant portion was his eight-year role as a lobbyist for the March of Dimes was surely sparked when his wife contracted Polio in 1953 at a time just before the breakthrough work of Jonas Salk bore practical results. A Yale graduate, Shorey had served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II and was a graduate of Columbia Law School. He had been an attorney in his father?s Chicago law firm and came to Washington where he was deputy general counsel of the U.S. Agency for International Development.

He helped in his role as lobbyist to widen the role of the March of Dimes to include a focus on comprehensive maternal and child health care and was on the organization?s board from 1962 to 1974. He was the first head of the organization?s government affairs office. He had lobbied for such programs as the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children.

In Georgetown, where he and his had moved after raising their children in Cleveland Park, Shorey soon became involved in the community life of the village, his neighbors and CAG. He helped with the creation of watch and guard programs and many other issues but his contributions were more subtly evidenced in his leadership style, which was to grow the organization, persuade other Georgetown residents to take part and lead on various issues.

Both his career on the national stage and his service on CAG were about substance and style, the cheerful and graceful embrace of principled duty. Talking about the people who participated in the block captain program, he called them ?great friends and great citizens.? Called a ?great motivator? during his interview, he said that ?you have to be convinced yourself that you can make a difference. And that it is important to get people to work together to make things happen. ?

It?s fair to say if you met Shorey, you were not likely to forget him. He had a certain cheerful dignity about him, a friendly curiosity. CAG meetings sometimes?not often?could get volatile or bogged down. Shorey was a great defuser, and persuader a champion of people joining and working together. He was one of those disappearing types of men?he was a gentleman. The description he made of others fits him: for Georgetown and Georgetowners, Everett ?Ev? Shorey, was ?a great friend, great citizen.”

Shorey is survived by his wife, Joan Burgess Shorey, four children, C. Everett Shorey III and Katherine Herold, David Shorey and Alden Lattu and seven grandchildren.

Nico Dodd • August 15, 2013

It’s no secret that Book Hill is an amazing spot for shopping, but what is the ingredient in the special sauce that sets it apart? The answer may be some of the stores’ best salespeople, the dogs who inhabit many of the stores in the neighborhood. We visited shops from Reservoir Road to P Street. Tom Vogt of Marston Luce may have put it best: “To be able to bring a dog to work every day brings a great deal of character to a store.”

And what better opportunity to meet all of these furry friends than the Georgetown French Market? The French Market is Book Hill’s signature European open air and sidewalk sale, which features up to 75 percent off at more than 35 shops and cafes. The event will take place April 19 and 20, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, visit GeorgetownDC.com. Remember to bring treats.

STELLA OF CATHERINE ROBERTS
Age: 9 years
?Breed: Yellow Labrador
?Stella has worked as a therapy dog at Georgetown University Hospital?for four years now. She previously worked in pediatric oncology and now works in the emergency room. Her favorite things include treats, going out in the garden behind the store and men. She is a huge flirt.

ASPEN OF PATISSERIE POUPON?
Age: 5 months?
Breed: Gold Retriever?
Aspen is perhaps the newest dog on Book Hill. At only 5 months old, he is still a puppy. Ruth, his owner, says his favorite things include food, toys, mud, playing and children. He is afraid of walking down stairs but is a great jumper. He is very cuddly.

KONA OF ELLA RUE?
Age: 4 years?
Breed: Mountain Mastiff (Burmese Mountain and English Mastiff mix)?
Kona is a lovely doggie. Her owner, Lauren Amons, says Kona’s favorite things are snuggles, belly rubs and babies. “She goes nuts
for the snow,” says Amons. Kona is very stylish, shown here wearing a necklace by Stella Dot.

HANNAH OF HEINER CONTEMPORARY?
Age: 10 years?
Breed: Mixed?
Hannah is very food-focused and loves balls, sticks and chicken soup. She is very much a window dog. People walking by often think she is a statue because she sits so still.

BRINCA OF THE PHOENIX
?Age: 11 years?
Breed: Boxer?
Brinca was born in Mexico City. She is a cancer survivor, who had a tumor removed from her shoulder. She loves shopping, dog biscuits, greeting and waiting on customers and jumping. Her name means “jump” in Spanish.

MOLLY AND PHOEBE OF COMER & CO.?
Ages: 6 years
?Molly and Phoebe belong to Fred Comer and Mark Manoff. They spend most of their time living in the countryside.

LATTE OF SUSAN CALLOWAY FINE ART?
Age: 12 years
?Breed: Maltese?
Latte is the very energetic Maltese who lives at the Susan Calloway Gallery. He was supposed to be named Cappuccino, but Susan Calloway thought Latte was more appropriate because of his white coat. His full name is Latte Bianca. Latte loves treats, and the mailman brings him one every day. Here he is seen with a portrait of himself.

PENNY OF MARSTON LUCE?
Age: 11 years
?Breed: Miniature Schnauzer
?Penny is the very cute Miniature Schnauzer at Marston Luce. Her owner, Tom Vogt, found her on the website for a Schnauzer Rescue League. Her favorite things include coming to work, riding in the car and cookies. Vogt says Penny has a “very sweet disposition” and that she “gets along with all other dogs and people.”

MISTY OF JUST PAPER & TEA
Age: 8 years
?Breed: German Shepherd?
Misty is a German Shepherd with a German bloodline. She loves visiting Volta Park and being with her owner Nick. According to him, she is a “ball-head” and loves chasing balls and Frisbees.

VALENTINE, PET OF JOY BLAIR?
Age: 13 years?
Valentine loves to play with Stella and Latte, who live at Catherine Roberts and Susan Calloway, respectively. Her favorite things are Gerber chicken sticks and riding in the car. “People love him,” said Blair. “I do, too.”

SHERMAN OF SHERMAN PICKEY (DECEASED)
Age: Lived to 16 years?
Breed: Mixed?
Sherman was adopted by Sherman Pickey own- er Ethan Drath from the Washington Humane Society. “He had an amazing run,” says Drath. His favorite thing was to sit in the doorway of the store in the sun. Sherman died in 2010, but other dogs are welcomed to the store, which gives complimentary treats to visitors.
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Georgetowner • August 7, 2013

If you read the cover story of the Downtowner on the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington—for which 250,000 showed up in our fair city to demonstrate for jobs, justice and freedom, among other things and to hear Martin Luther King, Jr., tell us, repeatedly and with passion, that “I have a dream”—you will see that 1963 is the year of anniversaries.

For those of us who were alive back then, we must have been also unaware and too young to notice we were living in history’s stream or as Bob Dylan sings “ Ah, but I was so much older then. I’m that much younger now”, or cryptic words to that effect.

Those of who can remember, commemorate—there will be lots to do, these being 50th anniversaries: images from history in beginning Vietnam, the death of four young girls in the bombing of a church in Birmingham, Ala., the Beatles’ first number-one hit in the United States.

I was in my second year of service in the U.S. Army then, far from harm in Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, but always aware of the tension of world affairs—officers being called out of movie theaters, units forming up. Some things there hardly touched us, but I remember this: one of my friends was a guy named Liam O’Keefe and he would be at my wedding a year or so later, but when I remember him most, he was crying, watching the news of the death of President John F. Kennedy, shot in Dallas.

The murder sent alarm bells through the army post, but unlike anything else—besides the chill of fears that went through all of us quasi-soldier—we were heart-broken in some sense or another because of all the images, the flickering stuff out of Dallas, Cronkite’s somber voice, Oswald shot in front of us on a Sunday morning when we should have been in church, the bloody coat, the widow, John John’s salute.

That’s an anniversary that’s coming up and here among the residents of our village in Georgetown, the residue of his presence remains like a cobblestone that has a place of honor, never to be removed. He was so older then in our young minds, and that much younger now.

Georgetowner •

The late Monday afternoon bombshell hit Washingtonians like a vengeful Washington Star. The Washington Post, an icon of print journalism and of the nation’s capital, is to be sold for $250 million to one of the Internet’s first and biggest digital innovators, billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com.

In an interview with his own newspaper, the Washington Post Co.’s chief executive Donald Graham said Aug. 5: “Every member of my family started out with the same emotion—shock—in even thinking about [selling The Post]. But when the idea of a transaction with Jeff Bezos came up, it altered my feelings. The Post could have survived under the company’s ownership and been profitable for the foreseeable future. But we wanted to do more than survive. I’m not saying this guarantees success but it gives us a much greater chance of success.”

For Georgetown, the sale of its big and influential hometown national newspaper that arrives — or did arrive — on its homes’ steps early in the morning is more personal. Some of the top editors or writers who worked at the Post lived or live here: the Grahams for years, Ben Bradlee and Sally Quinn, Bob Woodward, to name but the more famous. We also would like to think we have some extra knowledge of what’s going on. Like everyone else, we were stunned. For Post employees, present and former, the sale brings forth the emotion of loss.

Yet for those of us in the media for decades, we should not be surprised. We experienced the rise of computers in the workplace earlier than most, jumping to a full digitally environment fairly quickly — even as early as the 1980s. We first saw the consolidation of jobs. Did we know what impact the digital world would have on print journalism? We might have sensed it, but it seems we looked away. Then, all those new news websites popped up. After all, we write about many different things, but it is safe to say that economics and the future is not at the top of the list. The Internet turned everything upside.

Another media sale with a Georgetown connection: Allbritton Communications TV holdings’ purchase for almost $1 billion. Its chairman, Robert Allbritton lives here and wants to focus on the company’s web businesses, especially Politico.com.

Elsewhere, we saw the Boston Globe purchased last week for $70 million — and a year or two ago, the sale of Newsweek and the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News.

So, where does that leave a hometown newspaper and website like The Georgetowner? It is nearing its 60th anniversary. It has felt that same pressures, albeit on a smaller scale. It has changed with the times — and benefits, in part, by its hyperlocal news and influence. This week, its Downtowner website — DowntownerDC.com — had its debut. The always exciting world of journalism is also always changing. We’ve gotten used to that.

Still, changes can be personal. For Washington, D.C., and its Washington Post, this week is personal. It hit home.
We salute the Graham family for its 80 years of service — and beyond. This family knows something about newspapers and other media that we also know: you may own it, but it doesn’t belong to you alone. That’s the magic of journalism, and that’s how we feel this week.