DC By the Book

Excerpt: Jimmy marched past towering government buildings, past parks with statues. In the distance, he saw the white dome of the Capitol and the stately Washington Monument. After a while, they crossed another bridge, under which the oil-slicked Anacostia River flowed. / On the other side was an amazing sight. An entire village fashioned from cardboard, tin, and other pieces of scrap sprawled along the muddy flats. One of the men grinned at Jimmy. “Welcome to Camp Marks.” / “Looks like a Hooverville to me,” another man commented. / Jimmy had heard about the homemade towns people built when they lost their homes. “Hoovervilles” were named after the president. Many blamed President Hoover for the hard times. Jimmy thought this place looked like the biggest hobo camp in the world. Mr. Watkins laughed at Jimmy’s awestruck face. “We have to build ourselves a place to stay. Are you game?”

Excerpt: Camp Marks was better than a carnival. The huts weren’t colorful and the smells from the riverfront made Jimmy’s nose wrinkle, but there was something interesting going on everywhere he looked. / A man pounded nails straight with a rock. A group of men in their BVD underwear tops sat around a gramophone, listening to a scratchy-sounding record. Jimmy hung around the gramophone a while. He’d always wanted one. Anything that made music fascinated him. / Farther down the flats, a woman cleaned the inside of a rusty automobile. Children played in the dust. Jimmy realized with amazement that the family lived in the car.

Excerpt: Life at Camp Marks was not much different from life at home, Jimmy observed after they had been in Washington a week. Food was the most important subject, just like at home. / Jimmy quickly learned there weren’t many provisions to feed the thousands of veterans camped on the Anacostia Flats. They had something called mulligan stew almost every day. “Water and anything that can be boiled in it,” was Mr. Morris’s description. Sometimes they had beans and bread, but mostly stew. / Water for showers was scarce, too. Jimmy stood in line every morning to duck his head under a hose connected to a fire hydrant. / Yet the men stayed. A sign on one shack read, “We’re Not Budging!” Jimmy gulped when he read the sign on another hut: “Stay Till 1945.” He hoped they wouldn’t have to stay that long to get their bonus. But it began to seem that way.

Excerpt: Someone did give them a lift, as far as the C.O. Canal. Then they walked along the towpath. Jimmy was too tired to watch the barges gliding down the moonlit canal. He stumbled, half asleep, and his father caught him.

Excerpt: Finally they reached Chain Bridge. On unsteady legs, Jimmy staggered across the bridge suspended high above the Potomac River. The three of them walked for hours, it seemed, down winding Chain Bridge Road before another car offered them a ride.