How Our Playground Was Born

by Ann Kessler
(Part 2 of 2; see the first post, about Mrs. Wright’s efforts to build and improve our neighborhood schools here.)

When Mrs. Wright moved into her Forest Hills home in 1917, there was no dedicated place for kids to play. (1918 photo from the Library of Congress)

Establishing a playground and providing recreational facilities for the children of Forest Hills was a constant concern of Mrs. Leslie Boudinot Flenner Wright, a neighborhood activist from the 1920s through the 1950s. As the mother of 4 children, 3 boys and one girl, she was instrumental in getting the city to set aside valuable land for a Forest Hills playground.

Already known as an effective activist from her experience in advocating for neighborhood schools, Mrs. Wright was appointed to the District Committee on Recreation by Commissioner Melvin Hazen in 1935. She supported the development of a Recreation Center in the Reno area, near the three neighborhood schools, but still wanted a playground for the Forest Hills neighborhood itself. In 1936 Mrs. Wright endorsed the Citizens Association suggestion that the plot of ground at Davenport Street and Linnean Avenue NW, just west of Grant Road, become a neighborhood park with tennis courts. This particular lot had historical significance as it was the site where Union soldiers had stopped and rested on their march out Grant Road during the Civil War.

While this Davenport Street land was never set aside, land for a neighborhood park was finally obtained in 1942. Using the Capper-Crampton Act for preserving open areas in residential neighborhoods, the federal government purchased 3.27 acres in Forest Hills and assigned it to the District government. Mrs. Wright lobbied the Department of the Interior to designate this lot as a park for the Forest Hills neighborhood. Under Land Transfer Order 1206, the National Capital Park and Planning Commission (NCPC) acquired, for $19,500, a total of 76,374.65 square feet between Brandywine and Chesapeake Streets to the east of Connecticut Avenue NW. According to the order, this land “will be known hereafter as portions of Forest Hills Playground, U.S. Reservation No. 654.”

Mrs. Wright was years away from realizing her dream of a Forest Hills playground when this photo was taken at another DC playground in 1918. (photo from the Library of Congress)

The dedication of this land for a playground was only a first step. The Citizens Association continued to appeal to the city, specifically Milo F. Christiansen, Superintendent of Recreation, for the construction of the playground. By 1955 when no playground had been installed and the land had not yet been cleared and graded, Mrs. Wright was appointed by the Association president as a committee of one to meet with Mr. Christiansen on the development of the playground. In 1956, no doubt through Mrs. Wright’s efforts, funding for the playground was appropriated and the grading and installation of equipment scheduled.

In 1967, Citizens Association President Leon Brown requested in a letter to the DC Board of Recreation that the Forest Hills playground be named in honor of Mrs. Leslie Wright. A city official responded that designated names for playgrounds were selected at the time the NCPC condemned and acquired a property. Thus it was too late to honor Mrs. Wright. The city official suggested that the small recreation building to be included in the site under the Six Year Capital Outlay Budget of 1969 be named for Mrs. Wright. This building, of course, was never constructed.

But thanks to Mrs. Leslie Wright’s hard work and determination, the children of Forest Hills not only had good neighborhood public schools to attend, but a safe playground in which to play.