DIY History | Transcribe | Campus Culture | Adelia M. Hoyt memoir and photographs

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Page 67

UNFOLDING YEARS, 67

Two great World Wars wrought many changes, expanding the clean quiet Capital into a bustling, crowded city, where much that was beautiful had to be sacrificed for expediency. I am glad that I knew it as it was in those early days -- not a great city-- but clean and beautiful with its broad streets, magnificent trees through which gleamed the white marble of stately buildings unsullied by grime and smoke. It seemed then a quiet, dignified, unhurried place-- proudly upholding its tradition and memories of the past and all the great people who had made it what it was !
Mr. Charles F. F. Campbell had written telling me all about the various activities for the blind in the District of Columbia. He advised me to make my first contact with the work for the blind in the Library of Congress. Accordingly, as soon as time permitted, escorted by my father I visited the Library. We found Mrs. Gertrude T. Kider in charge of the Room for the Blind. In fact, she was the whole thing at that time. The one large room on the ground floor housed the entire collection of embossed books; and furnished accommodations for exhibit tables, office space and reception room. 
Mrs. Rider received us most graciously, and while my father explored the rest of the Library, she and I got acquainted. I felt at home with her from the very first and later we became good friends. While I was there Harriet Stone, a bright young blind woman, came in with her sister Helen. Harriet and I were attracted to each other and were destined to be much together. There too I met Mr. H.R.W. Miles, a blind music teacher and President of the Columbia Polytechnic Institute for the Blind. 
In a few days I received a formal invitation to visit the Polytechnic which I did. There i met a group of people with some of whom I was later to be closely associated. These included Mr. R. W. Swann and his sister who were In Charge of the Institute, Susie I . Duffy, Catherine L. Grady, Louise Patterson and others who were employed there. Every month this group had a social evening and my sister and I, Harriet Stone and her sister, and a few others. were

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UNFOLDING YEARS, 67 Two great World Wars wrought many changes, expanding the clean quiet Capital into a bustling, crowded city, where much that was beautiful had to be sacrificed for expediency. I am glad that I knew it as it was in those early days -- not a great city-- but clean and beautiful with its broad streets, magnificent trees through which gleamed the white marble of stately buildings unsullied by grime and smoke. It seemed then a quiet, dignified, unhurried place-- proudly upholding its tradition and memories of the past and all the great people who had made it what it was ! Mr. Charles F. F. Campbell had written telling me all about the various activities for the blind in the District of Columbia. He advised me to make my first contact with the work for the blind in the Library of Congress. Accordingly, as soon as time permitted, escorted by my father I visited the Library. We found Mrs. Gertrude T. Kider in charge of the Room for the Blind. In fact, she was the whole thing at that time. The one large room on the ground floor housed the entire collection of embossed books; and furnished accommodations for exhibit tables, office space and reception room. Mrs. Rider received us most graciously, and while my father explored the rest of the Library, she and I got acquainted. I felt at home with her from the very first and later we became good friends. While I was there Harriet Stone, a bright young blind woman, came in with her sister Helen. Harriet and I were attracted to each other and were destined to be much together. There too I met Mr. H.R.W. Miles, a blind music teacher and President of the Columbia Polytechnic Institute for the Blind. In a few days I received a formal invitation to visit the Polytechnic which I did. There i met a group of people with some of whom I was later to be closely associated. These included Mr. R. W. Swann and his sister who were In Charge of the Institute, Susie I . Duffy, Catherine L. Grady, Louise Patterson and others who were employed there. Every month this group had a social evening and my sister and I, Harriet Stone and her sister, and a few others. were