In the heart of old Chinatown, on 5th Street between H and Eye, the Gospel Rescue Ministries’ (GRM) stuccoed hive of men and mortar squats defiantly. Now the forces of things new and sleek have ordained this place, known popularly as “”The Gospel Mission,” must shut its doors.
Condos shall fill the spaces now cluttered with chapel, refectory, chicken-wire partitions, cots and more cozy cubicles. Frank Gioia, a World War II vet and justifiably proud of his long tenure as a director of adult recovery programs at the Ministries, can confidently proclaim, “of the thousands of guys processed through these doors, hundreds are still leading sober and productive lives — they have successfully returned to society!”
I encountered “Jeff,” who told me his “eyes just started going bad,” among other health concerns. He’s “so glad the mission has been there for [him],” although he is not sure when the place is shutting down; perhaps after Easter Sunday, which was the rumor from the streets. At this point my thought was, wow — if by any chance the GRM might relocate somewhere nearby in Chinatown, or even NoMa. This of course has been the classic area where the homeless have been served. For the benefit of down-trodden and addicted members of the Old City community — why, that would be a many-splendored act of deliverance!
Now guys in trouble will have to head for the periphery of the city rather than seek help in the core, as had been the tradition for so many decades. When drays and delivery carts and the occasional Stanley Steamer rattled the cobbles of 5th and H, in 1907, the Mission was set up by a handful of ministers and lay folk for the absolution of hard drinkers from the local “doss houses” and the gutter itself.
Nearby the Central Union Mission was already open, serving tomato-can vags and broken souls and drawing the watchful gaze of 19th-century reformers.The writings of Jacob Riis (“How The Other Half Lives”) and Josiah Flynt (“Tramping With Tramps”) on indigent life in New York had raised society’s consciousness of so-called “hoboes” and “bums,” who today would fall under the more empathetic “homeless” category. But the core has made the quantum leap from ghost town to gentrified, and there’s scarcely a niche to be found for the old-style Mission of soup and salvation. Behind the Babel-like towers of the central pavilion, one might still hear the whiny strain of a worn electric organ, as the preacher of the week opens his battered missal and exhorts the weary to praise the Savior. Then the stragglers shuffle in from the 6th Street alley, slurp their soup and sandwiches. Finally there is the rumble of tired bodies to the cots and lights out. Some time, after Easter, March 31, it’s lights out forever on a classic pattern of urban struggle and deliverance.
Sally Cox of GRM sent me a nice memo which I’ll paraphrase to close the story.
Not only would it be nice for the Gospel Rescue Ministries to remain in Chinatown, but according to Sally, that will be just what the spiritual doctor has ordered! The core operations of the Mission shall relocate shortly around the corner of the same block where operations have gone on yea these past 107 years — to the Fulton, a gracious 19th century structure at 512 Eye Street, NW. This was previously the site of a longtime SRO hotel; more recently the Fulton housed special women’s recovery programs. We of Street Sense, even our dear Glarph the Shark, offer best wishes to service providers and clients too. All Godspeed as the GRM moves along into its second century of saving lives and souls in downtown Washington.
