The Cokinos Brothers came to America one at a time, one after another. The eldest, Adam, came first and let me tell you, the town they came from was tiny-a one donkey burg-way over the Peloponese Mountains a long way from Athens. Farming and the sea were the top two industries-and still are. Then there is the monastery - the one my father always threatened to send me to if I didn't straighten up. They could have used me. When we went to visit in 2005-only three nuns were left, and they weren't spring chickens. (They call it a monastery;we would say convent) Anyway, it just boggles my mind that my Papou and his brothers ever got out of Dodge way back at the turn of the century over those mountains and down to a port. My grandfather, Panos (Peter) Kokinos came on a steam ship called the Georgia and arrived in America on October 7, 1905. It took him thirty days to get here. The eldest brother, Adam had already arrived and opened a candy store on K Street. They worked together making candy and icecream by hand in the basement until there was enough money for Peter to open his own store at 1103 H Street NE. In 1909, another brother, Dionisios arrived, but he decided not to stay. Then after WWI, they sent for their brother, Alec who lived with his brother, Peter until he got married.
Meanwhile back in Greece, somewhere in the countryside near Sparta, a man walked out to his yard, and a bullet mowed him down. No one knows why. He left behind a daughter, Panyiota, my Yiya, who was soon shipped off to America to live with her brother, Tom and his wife, Christina in New Jersey. Fortunately someone knew a lonely Greek bachelor in Washington who had a candy shop, and no one to share it with. Peter got on a train and went to looK her over. He was a much older man, but a handsome one. In later years, with every story, he would always get older, and Paniyota much younger. The Greeks never put much weight on actual birthdays. At any rate, at age 30, 35 or 40, Peter wasn’t getting any younger back then. They were married at 3 p.m. on July 30, 1914, and took the 6 p.m. train back to Washington.
My father, George, was born at home -919 11th Street NE-right around the corner from the candy shop. He wasn’t allowed to sample so he took to wearing a big overcoat with lots of pockets-winter and summer-and soon lost all his baby teeth to his sugar habit. He didn’t speak English until he got to kindergarten at Wheatley Elementary. The candy stores did great, but then Woolworth’s moved into the neighborhood around the mid 1920s. Adam had bought a farm way out in Rockville, and Peter had bought property at the end of the trolley line - where the street car turned off Wisconsin Avenue at Macomb Street and went on to American University. Peter built almost a block's worth of storefronts that he rented with apartments upstairs. It was going to be his retirement. You can see this building today - it has big fake cactuses out front and is mostly occupied by the restaurant Cactus Cantina.
Adam also had a retirement plan of living in the country. He bought a farm near Tuckerman Lane in Rockville. Unfortunately, his caretaker smoked in bed, and that was the end of that plan. Uncle Adam sold his candy store to the Vilanos family and ended up moving up to Philadelphia, where his wife came from. He started a coffee company up there.
Peter opened another candy shop on Macomb Street, but this time there were no customers. No people lived out there. The workmen building the cathedral would come by though, asking for lunch, so Panyiota ran upstairs and made them soup. Soon the Macomb Cafeteria was born, and they were in business again.
Alec moved uptown with them. Meanwhile, the Haramkapolos brothers had just brought their sister, Koula over from Greece where according to legend, she couldn’t find a man that was good enough to be her husband. Then she met Alec, and when she shook hands with him, she decided he was the one. Koula and Alec were married in 1926 and lived in the apartment over Burka’s liquor.
So that is how the Cokinos Brothers came to America... and stayed.
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