Henrietta Adams, Clarke School Teacher

Henrietta S. Adams was born in 1902 to R.L Adams and Lettie Adams. Gertie Adams was Henrietta’s older sister, and Beulah and Florence Adams were cousins; all had confirmed relationships with the Clarke School. Henrietta completed four years of high school, according to the 1940 census. She continued to live with her parents as of 1920, according to the census, and in 1921 she was working at the Clarke School. 

Fairfax Herald, 4 March 1921. Note how the area between Lawyers Road and the Railroad was known as “Beulah” at the time.
This map is from 1915, when Henrietta Adams lived in the area. The local press reported on Henrietta’s association with the Clarke School as a teacher; she must also have been a student at Clarke when she was younger, given her residence nearby.
Henrietta Adams grew up at the home of her parents, R.L. and Lettie Adams, remaining there until the early 1920s, some fifteen years before this aerial photo was taken. Her cousin Beulah grew up at the residence of Beulah’s father, Thomas Adams, and lived as an adult at a house that still stands at Clarks Crossing Road, adjacent to the W&OD bike trail.
Henrietta Adams, according to the Daniel Ange collection on Familysearch.org.

In 1922, Henrietta married Leo J. Thomas, a clerk, in Washington, DC, according to marriage, draft, and census records.  The couple had their only child, a daughter, in 1925. The family was living with Leo’s parents on O Street in Georgetown as of 1930 and 1940, according to the census.

By 1950, Henrietta and Leo were separated, judging from his record in the 1950 census. A 1953 deed refers to Henrietta as unmarried, suggesting that the couple had divorced by that point. Henrietta had been a clerk for the Department of the Navy, according to her death certificate from many years later.  Presumably this was her occupation after her divorce and perhaps she started it in 1952, judging from social security records. At the time of her mother’s death in 1957, Henrietta was living at the Hunting Towers apartment complex in Alexandria. Hunting Towers is now known as The Bridgeyard and is just to the south of the Beltway as it approaches the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. 

By 1963, Henrietta had remarried, according to another Fairfax County deed. Her new husband was Vito Mirabile.  A native of Naples, Italy, Vito was a naturalized U.S citizen and, as of 1950, a claims adjudicator for the federal government’s General Accounting Office, according to immigration and census records.

Henrietta Adams Mirabile, right. From the Suzanne Bunce family tree on Ancestry.com

In 1963, Henrietta and her extended family disposed of 20 of the 30 acres that Henrietta’s parents had owned, although it would be almost 20 years before these 20 acres would be developed as the Wendover Section 2 subdivision, according to county property records. To determine the fate of the remaining 10 acres of the R.L. Adams property—the portion which included the house, judging from property records and early 20th century maps— family members went to court. The Circuit Court of Fairfax County resolved the matter in 1967, and the family sold the property in 1972, according to county deeds. For that final disposition of the parcel which R.L. Adams had acquired in 1887, Henrietta A. Mirabile was the trustee. The 10 acres constitute a portion of the Wendover III development, which was dedicated in 1984.  

Henrietta was widowed in 1972 with Vito’s death. Henrietta lived in an apartment at Skyline Towers in Falls Church at the end of her life, judging from her address on her death certificate.  Henrietta Adams Mirabile, 90, died in 1993 of a heart attack, according to her death certificate.  She’s buried in Andrew Chapel Cemetery.  

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