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1925. "Glen Echo Park Co." Picnic tables at the Montgomery County, Maryland, amusement park. National Photo Company glass negative. View full size.
That area is still full of picnic tables. Although its no longer an amusement park, its still a great place to visit. The Bumper Car Pavilion is used for dancing (real dancing, like swing) in the spring and summer seasons and the glorious Spanish Ballroom from the 1930's (where my grandparents danced) holds dances all seasons. I've gone swing dancing there and it is magical.
That Glen Echo still exists and that some of the rides have been restored so that everyone can enjoy them. This was out in the 'country' when this picture was taken and a street car line carried you to the Park from Georgetown.
This looks like the same area, near the bumper cars, where I waited for several hours around 1955 to meet Buffalo Bob from Howdy Doody.
After the long wait we were rewarded with Buffalo Joe or some such name as Bob had a more pressing commitment.
I have fond memories of Glen Echo from my childhood. I can still see the airplane ride at the entrance to the park. Please post more pictures!
And yes, it was all-white. Washington DC was, alas, much segregated until the mid-1960s. The Maryland suburbs weren't much better, and Virginia was simply shameful. I myself grew up listening to kids casually using the "n-" bomb.
The outdoor atmosphere, the trees and the picnic tables hark back to the German-American beer gardens that were once common. However, based upon the somewhat sad to uninterested faces, like the man in left center, it's clear this is indeed during the less than Gemutlichkeit period of American Prohibition.
sitting on the picnic hamper in the immediate foreground would look perfect on the bobbed haired flapper standing left of the tree!
I'm surprised to see so many men in suits. It doesn't look like a lot of people having fun. I wonder if was a company picnic. And of course, everyone at Glen Echo was white, and would be until 1960.
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