The campus of Saint Elizabeths Hospital is sited pleasantly atop a wooded ridge in the Anacostia Hills. It is a National Historic Landmark whose story and impact on mental health treatment in the United States can be read in the historic buildings and landscapes that cover its 350 acres. Prior to the 1840s, when Dorothea Lynde Dix first began advocating for better housing conditions for people suffering from mental illness, mental illness treatment and care was at best haphazard and at worst…

The port of Georgetown was founded in 1751. Established 40 years prior to the decision to make Washington, DC the nation's capital, Georgetown is the city's oldest neighborhood. Throughout much of its history, Georgetown was a mixed-use commercial and industrial center, surrounded by housing for residents of all income levels. In the mid-18th century, Georgetown was little more than a trading post where tobacco farmers sold their crops. The Revolutionary War changed the town into a depot for…

Ambling up and down one of DC’s leading thoroughfares, the D70 Metrobus’s path along Connecticut Avenue covers major ground in the northwest section of the city. In the years following World War I, Connecticut Avenue developed into a major residential and commercial corridor, with high-style apartment buildings popping up along the avenue. Residents were able to move farther away from downtown and commute using public transportation – first on streetcars, then on buses, and eventually on…

Data recorded in 2020 determined that only 2% of 95,000 designated sites on the National Register of Historic Places focused on the African American experience. This percentage reflects a critical gap in historic preservation: sustained neglect of African American properties, particularly those associated with slavery. Very few sites on the National Register describe or identify histories of enslavement. Even famous examples of national register nomination sites, such as George Washington’s…

As the nation’s capital, the District has long been an epicenter of political activism and cultural progression. For the women’s suffrage movement, D.C. quickly became a central arena for collaborative meetings, government lobbying, and public demonstrations. Women’s suffrage groups established headquarters in the city to develop strategic plans intended to increase women’s visibility in the political arena and strengthen the collective bonds of suffragists across the United States. The sites…