DATE: Wednesday, November 26, 1997          TAG: 9711260080

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Larry Maddry 

                                            LENGTH:   95 lines

OLD-TIME GHENT IS FEATURED IN 1998 CALENDAR

WITH ITS fortress-like old mansions overlooking the Hague and it's many stately old homes, the century-old neighborhood of Ghent is unique in Hampton Roads.

A celebration of that uniqueness is contained in a photo calendar for '98 that makes a great Christmas gift. It's called ``Moments Past: Seasons in Ghent,'' published by the Ghent Neighborhood League.

There's a nice photo on the cover of children lined up with sleds on the Ghent Bridge after a snowfall in February 1934. That shot - and the others - should evoke lots of memories from folks who live in Ghent, or once did.

The calendar photos - and photo captions - were provided by John Parker Jr., the former city librarian. They were drawn from his personal trove of hundreds of Ghent photos.

Most of the photos are copies of those in the Kirn Library in Norfolk. Others were given to John by folks who knew of his interest in Ghent. A Ghentian himself, with a home on Warren Crescent, he's collected the photos over the past 20 years.

When I phoned John to ask about the calendar project, we got into a discussion of the Fergus Reid House - one of the first five houses constructed in Ghent - which was built in 1892.

The total cost of construction for the substantial structure was $11,448, he said. He ticked off the cost of other items in the home - all uncommonly inexpensive by today's standards - and stopped me in my tracks with one of the furnishings.

``The cost for installation of the speaking tube was only sixteen dollars,'' he said.

A speaking tube? I had seen one once in an old British movie but had no idea houses in Ghent had them.

``Oh yes,'' he said. ``I have one in my home.'' He said the speaking tubes, made of brass or copper, connected the kitchen with the upstairs of many Ghent houses in days when many people had servants.

It must have been fun to have grown up in a house with a speaking tube. I could almost see a young boy or girl rolling marbles down the tube, or maybe dropping a dead or live mouse down it. John said his tube has a circumference of about a quarter. The mouthpiece is covered with a lid that opens with the press of a button.

Well . . . back to the calendar.

January is illustrated with a photo of the foyer of the L.P. Roberts House taken in 1900 when Roberts was Norfolk's leading grocer. It shows the handsome woodwork and stairway, dramatically framed by a scalloped drapery, likely velvet. That's where John lives. I kinda wish he had shown the speaking tube too.

February has a nice view of wintertime in Stockley Gardens with trees and park benches drenched in snow, taken in February 1941.

March is illustrated with a photo of Easter traffic on Colonial Avenue in 1937. Nearly every sedan sports a spare tire on the trunk - like today's sport utility vehicles.

April is represented with a scene from Stone Park (on the Hague) during a summer afternoon in 1944. Children are playing in a sandbox in the middle of the park. (The sandbox was once a popular feature there but has disappeared.)

May shows five little guys in sailor suits sitting on an empty lot on Mowbray Arch in 1910. John believes they may have been waiting for Halley's Comet, which was expected to appear in the sky on May 18. The comet didn't show up, but the fellows in the photo - most of whom wear bangs and the look of troublemakers - doubtless didn't have a helluva lot to do anyway.

The June photo has an undeniable charm. It shows Louse Willcox, a writer, seated at a writing desk, her hand beside a silver bowl containing roses, with a shelf of books in the background. Leaning back against the writer's knee in a posture of self-satisfaction is young Louise Jenkins. Jenkins is remarkably self-possessed in that photo. She has the confidence, as Twain once said, of a Christian holding four aces.

The Willcox-Jenkins photo was taken about 1912 and was so appealing that it later appeared in Ladies Home Journal. The little girl lived a few doors down from Willcox on Warren Crescent but now lives in Virginia Beach. She is Mrs. Wilson Driver, 92, who, true to form, is not interested in speaking on the phone with the likes of a newspaper wretch.

Her daughter, Doobie Hogan, said her mother has retained the insouciance displayed in that photo to the present.

There are too many photos in the calendar to write about, but my favorite may be the photo of Beans Borland. Beans was a French bulldog who once resided at 408 Fairfax Ave. The dog is shown on the steps there, in harness. The dog was named Beans because his owner, Armistead Borland, purchased him while visiting Boston. Captured with ears erect and a no-nonsense look in his eye, the dog has an unmistakable self-assurance (not unlike that displayed by Mrs. Driver in her photo).

The $6 calendar, the first calendar undertaking by the GNL, can be purchased at Artifax and at Harbor Gallery in Ghent or can be ordered from the league by writing to P.O. Box 11431, Norfolk, Va. 23517. Mail orders should include an extra $1 for postage and handling. ILLUSTRATION: This photo, taken around 1912, shows writer Louise

Willcox and young neighbor Louise Jenkins.

NORFOLK PUBLIC LIBRARY

Dozens of children pose on the Ghent Bridge in February 1934.

Similar photos appear in a 1998 calendar.

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