Stratford teen Willa Denton mans the front desk where she’ll greet friends all summer.
Alexandria — Kicking off Memorial Day weekend, Willa Denton, 15, was happy at her job
sitting behind the front table at the Stratford Recreation Association (SRA) pool, a community attraction where she’s lived practically her entire life. The pool is a social spot in Stratford and with the newly completed renovations, will remain a focal point of her neighborhood.
“I’ve made a lot of friends coming to this pool,” she said.
The sense of community is one thing the neighborhood was preserving when they came up with the idea for a new pool house, locker rooms and dressing rooms to go along with other improvements they’ve made over the last few years including a new wading area and improved concession stand. As they cut the ribbon on May 27, SRA President David Fleischman recognized the importance of this neighborhood amenity, pointing out the hours of volunteer work from the community members. “This building was four years in the making,” he said.
The architects JC Schaub and Khrysti Uhrin live in the community and did the design work pro bono, as well as Larry Newman at Fort Hunt Construction that built it. The community raised the money, which was over $100,000 without a special assessment. Newman discussed the job with his wife before the construction .
“If I mess this up, we’re going to have to move,” he said.
Mount Vernon District Supervisor Dan Storck lives in the community next door, and was at the ribbon cutting. Storck has been the president of his community pool, and their swim team has an ongoing challenge with Stratford. “Pools have a way of cementing communities together,” he said. “Pools and schools are major things to pull people together.”
Karen Corbett Sanders, a member of the Fairfax County School Board, also lives in Stratford and swam on the swim team as a teenager. She has seen generations grow up and start their families in Stratford. The pool is an attraction “that makes Stratford the kind of place the kids are going to want to come back to and raise their kids,” she said. “It’s weathering the test of time, when it needed a new look, the community got together,” she added.
In 1964, the pool was built and Colonel Brinitzer was a founding member that lived by the book, restrapping the chairs by hand when needed. He was a holocaust survivor, spent time in a German prisoner of war camp, and later helped design Tysons Corner while on the Fairfax County planning division in the 1970s. The street the pool is on, Brinitzer Way, was named after him. His son, Scott Brinitzer, traveled from his Arlington home to the ribbon cutting. “This pool was a tradition of Stratford that started when I was 4 years old,” he said, and pointed at two trees towering over the grounds. “I planted those trees, they arrived in the back of our Pontiac station wagon,” he said. “Those trees have deep roots now, we are all rooted to summer at the SRA,” he said, holding up his old swim team jacket from 1971.
A new concession stand and pavilion is next on the list for the SRA and their fundraising efforts have begun. Back at the check-in table out front, Willa Denton had a summer of friendships and responsibilities to look forward to with her new job which is a short bike ride from her house.
“The Fourth of July party is always so much fun,” she said.