Huntley Part 4

The _Gazette_ noted that:

Mr. Albert W. Harrison, an old, well known and esteemed resident of Fairfax County, died at his home "Huntley" in the Woodlawn neighborhood at 7:30 o'clock last night. The deceased was 80 years old. He leaves four children, a son and three daughters. Mr.

Harrison was a native of Montclair, New Jersey, but moved to Fairfax County in 1869. His frequent visits to this city for more than forty years made him as well known in Alexandria as any resident of the City. Mr. Harrison was a member of the Second Presbyterian Church. His funeral will take place Sat.u.r.day afternoon at the residence. The interment will be in Alexandria.[45]

On April 5, 1911 the married daughter, Margaret N. Harrison Gibbs, and her husband J. Norman Gibbs, deeded:

... all of their right, t.i.tle and interest, legal and equitable in and to the personal estate of said Albert W. Harrison, deceased, except his watch, and also to hold as tenants in common, the following described tract of land containing three hundred fifty eight and three quarters (358 3/4) being part of "Huntley" so called and known ...[46]

to Clara B. Harrison, unmarried; Mary C. Harrison, unmarried, and Albert R. Harrison, unmarried. The part of the Huntley tract transferred contained the house.

For the next 19 years neither the Harrisons nor Huntley seem to have made the news. Then in 1930, a full page _Alexandria Gazette_ article appeared ent.i.tled "Nation's Greatest Air Center."[47] The rest of the headline read:

George Washington Air Junction Tract Found Ideal for Trans-Atlantic Terminal for Airships of Zeppelin and R-101 types without Interfering with Thousand-Acre Airport for Planes--Admiral Chester Shows That Historic Ancestral Lands of George Washington and George Mason, First Selected by War Department 12 Years Ago for Army Aviation Field, Afford Only Tract Ideal for Great National Air Center.

The "only ideal tract" was the valley in front of Huntley. Admiral Chester was reported as saying that the War Department in 1916-17, made an investigation:

... of all possible sites for an Army Aviation field near Washington, and found that the Air Junction site was the only ideal site for a large air center.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Figure 8. Hindenburg disaster, Lakehurst, New Jersey, May 6, 1937. Photo published in =New York Times=, National Archives print.]

Public Relations men for the Air Junction certainly used local history as a promotional gimmick:

It will be a twentieth century aeronautic, scientific and historic center, but retaining the gorgeous 18th Century pastoral setting, including beautiful groves that teem with birdlife ... a dozen bubbling springs that have been making for centuries the sparkling Little Hunting Creek and Dogue Creek.... There are many other alluring surprises that one would not dream of finding within only nine miles from the Capital, such as Mason's poetic "Huntley," a gem of colonial architecture, surrounded by stately trees. George Mason's "Huntley" and "Okeley" are both part of the George Washington Air Junction. These estates ... had been forgotten, due to the lack of signs on the Washington-Richmond Highway to make known that a modest lane led to them. The lane has now been widened into a 50 foot gravel road and has become the entrance to the Air Junction.

As the visitors drive into the Junction, past the historic Little Hunting Creek, about 3,000 feet westward, they behold "Huntley," a gem of colonial architecture, which graces one of the hills on the north side of the Washington Air Junction Drive and overlooks the Thousand Acres Airport. It is surrounded by stately trees, and its sides are screened by vines and picturesque thick bushes of lilacs, roses and other flowers.

"May I carry it away?" is the usual query from visitors, as from the distance "Huntley" looks small enough to carry away. Failing to obtain permission to remove this colonial gem, the visitors feel happy in being photographed on the quaint porch and steps....

The writer had apparently convinced himself of at least one thing, for under the photograph of Huntley, which accompanies the article, the house is again called "a gem of colonial architecture."

Air Junction promoters invited the Graf Zeppelin and subsequent airships to make their base here rather than at Lakehurst, New Jersey. The same invitation went to the British and to others, but the accidental burning of the Hindenburg at Lakehurst on May 6, 1937, seems to have put an end to dreams of a great airship junction at Huntley, though there was an operative airport there. Such names as Lockheed Boulevard, Fairchild Drive, Piper Lane, Beechcraft Drive and Fordson Road still survive.

Later Owners

Albert R. Harrison, still unmarried and last of the Harrison children, died on March 24, 1946, and in September his executors sold Huntley to August W. and Eleanor S. Nagel.[48] For some reason the Nagels had Edward M. Pitt, an Arlington architect, do seven sheets of drawings of Huntley that same year.[49]

Less than three years later the Nagels sold the house to the present owners, Colonel and Mrs. Ransom G. Amlong.[50]

Chapter 2 Notes

[Footnote 16: Deed Book B., No. 4, p. 448, November 7, 1859 Fairfax County, Virginia. T.F. Mason's first name is spelled "Thomason,"

"Thompson" and "Thomson."]

[Footnote 17: Helen Hill Miller, =George Mason Const.i.tutionalist= (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1938), p. 18.]

[Footnote 18: Stevens Thompson Mason, =Mason Family Chart=.]

[Footnote 19: Ann was not Mason's grandmother, but the first wife of his grandfather. Thomson was a favorite of Grandfather Chichester and he would have known of Ann Gordon. Mr. Chichester had, as a matter of fact, spent his first married years with the Gordon family.]

[Footnote 20: C.A. Gordon, =History of the House of Gordon= (Aberdeen: D. Wyllie & Son, 1890), p. 11.]

[Footnote 21: Will Book M, No. 1, p. 130, November 21, 1820, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 22: Deed Book W, No. 2, p. 199, October 1, 1823, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 23: January 29, 1818, Letter to Alexandria Baggett from Thomson F. Mason, Alexandria, William Francis Smith Collection, Thomson F. Mason Papers.]

[Footnote 24: =Ibid.=, A.P. Glover [?] to T.F. Mason, October 18, 1819.]

[Footnote 25: =Ibid.=, P. Taylor "sent T.F. Mason, esq...." February 5, 1823. Mason either was not at Huntley at the time, or the items were for his tenant. The bill notes specifically that the delivery was for "W.T.R.".]

[Footnote 26: Lee vs. Chichester, #60, Fairfax County Court House. From a deposition of Bernard Hooe.]

[Footnote 27: Letter, William Francis Smith Collection.]

[Footnote 28: =Ibid.=, Price Skinner to T.F. Mason, December 7, 1832.]

[Footnote 29: At least 10 doc.u.ments concerning the work which Mason did at Colross are in the William Francis Smith Collection.]

[Footnote 30: Will Book T, No. 1, p. 3, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 31: Will Book T, No. 1, pps. 1-4, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 32: Deed Book B, No. 4, p. 448, November 7, 1859, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 33: Deed Book B, No. 4, pps. 449-50, November 7, 1859, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 34: Deed Book B, No. 4, p. 451, December 7, 1859, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 35: United States, National Archives, Record Group 77, Map of Eastern Virginia and Vicinity of Washington, Arlington, January 1, 1862, Bureau of Topographical Engineers.]

[Footnote 36: Deed Book E, No. 4, p. 195, June 12, 1862, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 37: =Alexandria Gazette=, June 12, 1862.]

[Footnote 38: =Alexandria Gazette=, May 13, 1868. King, then in the U.S.

Army, married on May 18, 1827, according to the Christ Church Register.

On May 14, 1879, when he sold Lloyd's Lot, which is adjacent to the Huntley property, to Pierson and Harrison, he is listed as "Benjamin King of Anne Arundel County." King, John Mason, and T.F. Mason, all married girls named Price and may have been relatives. It is possible therefore that King was the brother-in-law of T.F.]

[Footnote 39: Deed Book I, No. 4, p. 236, November 21, 1868, Fairfax County, Virginia.]

[Footnote 40: =Alexandria Gazette=, May 16, 1870.]

[Footnote 41: 1870 Census, Reel 108, Frame Number 197, National Archives. In earlier censuses neither Mason nor King appeared. The actual occupant at Huntley prior to this time was usually an overseer or tenant. Not knowing who most of these were and having no maps coded to the census, the author was unable to gather any earlier information from the census.]

[Footnote 42: Deed Book O, No. 4, p. 338, March 11, 1871, Fairfax County, Virginia.]