Yesterday we posted the three-part oral history interview with Mrs. Lauretta Jackson.  It turns out that another neighborhood resident, a professional documentarian, is about to start filming a 30-minute documentary about the neighborhood.  When it’s finished, the program will air on DCTV, the District’s public access channel.  We’ll let you know when it airs.

In the meantime, are there any facets of LeDroit Park you want to know about or you think might be interesting to feature?

Remember when we wrote about this mural a few days ago? Well, local arts blog ReadysetDC provided some more details. The mural is titled “Scout” and was painted by native Washingtonian Kelly Towles.  Filmmaker/travel writer Sebastien Tobler made this movie about the mural and the subject of childhood exploration.  Very cute.

SCOUT from Kelly Towles on Vimeo.

The Watha T. Daniel/Shaw Library opened yesterday. We took a quick look inside this afternoon and will have a thorough report later this week.  Our initial impressions were positive.  The new library, though offering the limited collection of a branch library, houses it all in a pleasant, bright, airy building.  The new library contrasts sharply with its previous brutalist incarnation that resembled a prison for mischievous books.

Drop by and check it out.

A new mural graces the side of a house near Twelfth and W Streets NW.  The mural’s bright colors and cartoonish theme have provoked us to think about murals.

Over the past few years, more stunning public art has adorned the sides of Washington’s buildings.  Murals in Washington’s neighborhoods, unlike our national monuments and museums, are usually local in subject matter and local in intended audience.

In the mural above, bright colors strike the view because they dominate vast expanses of the canvas.  The background is plain white, but that actually enhances the rest of the colors— the corn yellow hair and flesh, the turquoise hat, the brick-red bandanna.  This palate is no shrinking violet.

The mural’s cartoon illustration style differs drastically from traditional painting. Notice the lack of gradients; the colors are not blended. The shapes are filled in solidly as they are in a coloring book. As a result there are no shadows and no obvious sources of light.

The subject matter is whimsical, but cohesive. The children on the left are watering flowers in the most cumbersome way.  One girl strains to hold up another girl on her shoulders.  The girl on the bottom exhibits an expression on her fact that confirms the strain placed on her deeply arched spine.

On the right, a boy dressed like a vagrant in the winter places one hand against the edge of the painting to support himself as he kneels down to inspect a plant on the ground.  His left hand on the edge of the painting and the fact the the flowers and grass merge with the grassy field beside the painting subtly call attention to the physical location of the painting.  It’s not obvious at first, but this mural is in fact well suited for its location.

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We can contrast this mural with our very own masterpiece in LeDroit Park, “This is How We Live”, another brilliant work, but of a different sort.

The most striking feature of the LeDroit mural is that it makes clear that it is a neighborhood mural.  The mural is composed of four scenes skillfully merged into one cohesive work.

The upper-left corner depicts a wreath of tree foliage surrounding the bell tower atop Founders Library on Howard University.  The wreath-lined cameo honors the university as a prize.

The lower scene of the LeDroit mural depicts the corner of T Street, Sixth Street, and Florida Avenue.  The scene here is an autumnal entry to LeDroit Park featuring the historic McGill architecture on the 500 block of T Street.  Our entry gate, a recent addition to the neighborhood, serves as a prominent architectural feature.

The top-right corner features children looking at the viewer— a neighborhood image as children tend to spend much of their time near home.  To their left is a view of the Capitol from Pennsylvania Avenue NW.  The inclusion of the Capitol is a nod to Washington’s national identity.

The pixelated seams between each scene are unusual, yet successful, methods of merging different subjects. Pixelation is a product of the Digital Age and at first appear out of place in a mural employing traditional portraiture and landscape panting. Nonetheless, the pixelation in our mural is a skillful work of transition.

What do you think of these two murals?

If you haven’t heard, Cookie’s Corner at the Second and Elm Streets NW is now open for business. It’s somewhat like the LeDroit Park Market, which is owned by the same person, but Cookie’s Corner will serve pizza in addition to sandwiches.

We, like others, are a tad disappointed with the inclusion of a curtain of bulletproof glass at the counter.  Then again, it’s easy to issue that criticism if you’re not the person who has to staff the counter.

We paid a visit on Tuesday and were informed that food service begins this weekend.

Zipping through the City Paper we came across this mention of two glamorous LeDroit Park residents— a peacock and a peahen— discovered on the 500 block of U Street.

“A person claiming to be the owner of the birds did not know they were illegal to own,” according to the Humane Society. The owner surrendered the birds, which were relocated to a sanctuary in Virginia.

At least it’s a more innocuous form of fowl play.

The trees at the LeDroit Park gate are budding and will soon bloom. It seems like only yesterday we were shoveling mountains of snow. In case you forgot all about that, here’s a cool video account of our recently departed winter:

We reported earlier on the proposed U Street Music Hall, a dance club venue to occupy the former Cue Bar at 1115 U Street NW. According to their Facebook page, the curtains will go up for the first time on Saint Patrick’s Day with music by the Belgian group AEROPLANE and the Maryland group Beautiful Swimmers.

We’re glad to see new businesses sprouting in this economy.

Broadcast Center One as viewed from the CVS at 7th & T Streets

Snowpocalypse 2: Electric Boogaloo and other matters kept us too busy to follow up on the February meeting of ANC1B, so here is the belated report of the highlights.

The owner of 1916 Ninth Street requested a variance to allow him to use the house as an art gallery.  His description of the renovation included achieving LEED Platinum certification for the old rowhouse.

The owner of 321 T Street sought and received ANC support for his conceptual design of his proposed renovations to the rowhouse on T Street here in LeDroit Park.  The owner had presented the plan at the previous LeDroit Park Civic Association meeting and didn’t receive any opposition.

Finally, a lawyer representing Media Center One (a.k.a. Broadcast Center One) (pictured above) requested and received approval for a two-year extension for the planned unit development (PUD) application for the project.  The developer’s representative blamed the financial markets (of course), sympathized with the community’s “development fatigue” and said that the project was moving forward thanks to the successful leasing of office space to the United Negro College Fund in addition to Radio One.

The reconfigured project will remain largely the same, except 50,000 square feet of apartment space will become office space.  That means the project will include 133 apartments instead of 180 and will include 160,000 square feet of offices instead of 110,000 square feet.

Groundbreaking is now set for June or July 2010.

On the liquor front, Ulah Bistro received the ANC’s assent to host DJs and jazz bands Sunday through Thursday nights 9 pm to 1:30 am and Friday and Saturday nights 9 pm to 2:30 am.  Ulah is one of the few licensees in the U Street area without a voluntary agreement.

The proprietors for Bella (900 Florida Avenue NW) did not show up and the ANC protested their request for a license.

Finally, the proprietor of Masa 14 (1825 Fourteenth Street) presented the most contentious proposal of the night, requesting that their liquor license extend to their proposed roof deck (see the drawings) permitting them to sell alcohol Sunday through Thursday 8 am to 2 am and Friday and Saturday 8 am to 3 am.  Some neighbors voiced concern that the roof deck would create too much noise and doubted that a place described as restaurant would need to serve alcohol so late into the night.  The ANC voted to protest the application until the owner and the ANC could come to a voluntary agreement. [Clarification: the ANC typically protests all new liquor licenses as a tactical move to goad applicants to reach what is called a “voluntary agreement” (VA) with the ANC. These voluntary agreements are less permissive than the District’s standing liquor laws.]

The next meeting is set for Thursday, March 4, 2010, at 7 pm on the second floor of the Reeves Building at Fourteenth and U Streets.

WETA is airing the second in a series of documentaries about the recent history of Washington. It began with Washington in the ’60s, since, as baby-boomers insist, history began in 1960— the rest was a trifling prelude.

Tonight comes Washington in the ’70s, the bellbottom-clad follow-up featuring the construction of the Metro system, Marion Barry getting shot, and a president losing his job over a local burglary.

Catch it on channel 26 (WETA) tonight at 9 pm.  (Check rebroadcast times)