But she concedes times have changed.įor years Mrs. They just don't want any notoriety, they don't want their names used.'' They are the docents at the galleries, the hospital volunteers and the supporters of the symphony. Addison said, ''but there are many people here who live very privately and they are the backbone of Washington. ''I'm a member of such groups as the Colonial Dames and the Junior League, of course,'' Mrs. John Addison, who settled in Maryland in 1667. ''We choose to be invisible,'' Sherrard Addison said with gentle emphasis on the word ''choose.'' Her banker husband, Francis Girault Addison 3d, is a descendant of Col. The Addisons do not choose to ''make it'' socially. ''That didn't use to be so, but it is now.'' Conger, the White House and State Department curator who traces his own lineage to William Ramsay, founder of the town of Alexandria. ''This is now a town where if you've got money, the clothes and the jewels, you can make it socially,'' says Clement E. They include the contractors, real estate developers and automobile dealers (''the Yellow Pages,'' one hostess remarked) who contribute heavily to cultural and philanthrophic institutions where a sort of ''jamming'' goes on among the capital's diplomatic, Congressional and administrative wings. Their Washington roots are not as deep, but they have won themselves a listing in the Green Book, Washington's social list. There is a group of people here who make it their business to mix it up socially, especially with the politicians. ''My mother keeps asking,'' she added, '' 'Why don't you do Junior League instead of Common Cause?' '' I don't think we are as snobby these days.'' ''We would keep pretty much to our own circle and look at all the newcomers and sort of ask, 'Who are they?' But Washington has become such a cosmopolitan city, we've been absorbed. ''This used to be such a small town,'' Miss Peter said. In that period, thousands of new faces have come to town, the diplomatic corps has expanded rapidly and the turnover in Congress has accelerated. She says the change in Washington's social order has been especially notable over the past 20 years. ''I'm not really interested in getting to know them, and I don't think they would be interested in getting to know us.''Ī younger blueblood who does not quite fit the mold is Martha Custis Peter, 33 years old, a direct descendant of both Martha Custis Washington and Robert Peter who nevertheless works as a paralegal and is involved in political activities. ''We don't have the slightest interest in those who come and go,'' said Emily Bradley, whose husband, Fontaine Bradley, is a descendant of Robert Peter. They leave that to those who are more recently arrived on the scene, from places distant and backgrounds obscure. But few of the city's bluebloods are found at political gatherings, splashy charity balls, corporate fund-raising events or diplomatic dinners. ![]() They still play golf at Chevy Chase, dine at the Metropolitan Club and entertain in their spacious homes. These days the cave dwellers live more quietly, quite removed from most social and political comings and goings that in earlier, less complex times they helped control. They are but a sampling of the families here who trace their lineage to such figures as Robert Peter, the first Mayor of Georgetown Bishop Thomas John Claggett, the first chaplain of the Senate and the Leiter sisters, who set the social tone in the capital in the 1800's. Such names as Claggett, Belin, Glover, Leiter, Beall and Peter can be found in history books about Washington - and, in many cases, in the 1985 Washington telephone directory as well. Farr, whose grandfather, Francis Griffith Newlands, founded one of the city's most exclusive enclaves, the Chevy Chase Club. ''Oh, yes, they used to call us that even when I was young,'' said Mrs. Janet Farr, an octogenarian who has lived in Washington all her life, cheerily acknowledges that she is ''a cave dweller,'' a term, indigenous to Washington, that defines a member of those families who have resided here for generations and whose bloodlines are woven into the warp and woof of the nation's capital.
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