The U.S. Chamber of Commerce Building, designed by Cass Gilbert in 1925, is an excellent example of Gilbert's work and of the influence of the City Beautiful Movement and the MacMillan Commission Report on DC. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which continues to occupy the building, embodies the institutional role of 20th century government lobbying organizations in Washington.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce exemplifies the institutional role played by voluntary associations in national government in the 20th century. These organizations reach well beyond lobbying to play an important role in coordinating membership participation in government. The associations not only provide a voice for their members, they inform them about common concerns as well. They clarify public policy issues for members, provide technical information to legislators and public officials, and educate the general public. As the role of government increased during the 20th century, the importance and influence of these organizations grew proportionally.

DC Inventory: November 8, 1964 (Joint Committee on Landmarks)

National Register: May 13, 1992

Within Lafayette Square Historic District

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Organized in 1899, the Union Trust and Storage Company is one of DC’s earliest trust organizations. Operating both as a storage concern and a trust company, the organization served as a depository for both material and fiduciary resources held by corporations, trustees of estates, and wealthy individuals.

The Union Trust Building is a key structure in the District of Columbia's Financial Historic District. But it holds even greater significance within the larger context of banking architecture, standing as physical evidence of the aspirations and realities of the financial world in the early twentieth century.

This banking house and office structure was designed in the Neoclassical style by the noted Washington architectural firm of Wood, Donn and Deming in 1906. Inspired by the City Beautiful Movement, the building is a product of both its time and the planning conditions unique to the nation’s capital, further illustrating the influences of the federal presence on private design.

DC Inventory: November 8, 1964 (Joint Committee on Landmarks)

National Register: January 19, 1984

Within Financial Historic District

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One of the first great union terminals, this imperial station with its vast interior spaces was the cornerstone of the McMillan Commission’s efforts to revive Pierre L’Enfant’s original plan of the city. Following the 1901 McMillan Commission, its members realized that any further development of L’Enfant’s Plan necessitated removing existing railroad facilities from the National Mall. In cooperation with the railroad companies, Congress approved a union terminal site on the northside of Massachusetts Avenue in 1903.

The architect of Union Station was the Chairman of the McMillan Commission, Daniel H. Burnham (1846-1912). In order to make Union Station a truly monumental gateway to the capital, Burnham turned to the triumphal architecture of Rome for design inspiration, deriving the central pavilion from the Arch of Constantine and modeling the interior after the Baths of Diocletian.

The first train to arrive at Union Station, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad’s Pittsburgh Express, made its way into the station on October 27, 1907. The building was completed the following year. With virtually no other means of long-distance transportation available, Union Station became the “grand gateway to the capital.”

DC Inventory: November 8, 1964 (Joint Committee on Landmarks)

National Register: March 24, 1969 (Columbus Fountain and Plaza listed on April 9, 1980)

National Register (Additional Documentation): October 12, 2007

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Constructed over a period of decades at the turn of the 20th century, the McMillan Park Reservoir’s original slow sand filtration system was DC’s first water purification facility. Connected to the Washington Aqueduct, the reservoir treated the city’s public water supply and in doing so eliminated typhoid and malaria epidemics in DC. The McMillan Park Reservoir’s name honors Senator James McMillan of Michigan, best known for his work with the Senate Park Improvement Commission. The commission’s McMillan Plan sought to redesign the National Mall to better reflect Pierre L’Enfant’s original plan for the city. Although McMillan did not live to see the reservoir completed, his work and his collaboration with major figures of the City Beautiful movement, such as Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., Charles F. McKim, Herbert Adams, and Charles Platt are reflected in the original design of McMillan Park. This is especially true of Olmsted’s landscaping, which concealed the water treatment facility under a public park. McMillan Park remained open to and popular with the public until World War II, when it was fenced off for fear of enemies sabotaging the city’s water supply. In the 1980s, the original filtration system was decommissioned, having become obsolete, and a new treatment facility now operates next to the old one. Debates ensued over the proposed redevelopment of much of the original McMillan Park. A plan was finally selected and the space between North Capitol and First streets NW is now in the process of being redeveloped.

In 2024, the redeveloped southern portion of the site opened as part of the new Reservoir District. Here, visitors will find the restored McMillan Memorial Fountain (which was also moved to a new location), as well as ten concrete sand bins and two regulator houses. The site also includes a new community/recreation center, playground, fountains, and public park. The Slow Sand Filtration Plant is visible as well.

The next phase of the redevelopment, on the central and northern portions of the site, will include new housing, a grocery store, restaurants and stores, and two health centers. The other concrete sand bins and regulator houses will be incorporated into the new, mixed-use development. 

Developed chiefly between 1928 and 1938, under the direction of Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon's "Mellon Board," the buildings that comprise the Federal Triangle Historic District are a visible symbol of the tremendous growth of the federal government in the 20th century and a desire to create a grand capital city.

The oldest of the buildings in Federal Triangle, the Old Post Office, was designed by W.J. Edbrooke and constructed between 1891 and 1899, and was followed by the Beaux-Arts style District Building, designed by Cope & Stewardson and constructed between 1904 and 1908. The Mellon Board's Neoclassical ensemble consists of nine enormous federal buildings constructed around a series of outdoor plazas and inner courts. It is this country's most imposing example of the monumental civic center concept and City Beautiful Movement, popular among city planners in the early decades of the 20th century.

In addition to the Old Post Office and District Building, the historic district encompasses the following buildings: the Herbert Hoover Building, Department of Commerce (1932, York and Sawyer); the Department of Labor, Departmental Auditorium (now Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium), and Interstate Commerce Commission (1934, Arthur Brown, Jr.) (now the Environmental Protection Agency; the West Building; Post Office Department (1934, Arthur Brown, Jr.) (now the Environmental Protection Agency, East Building); the Robert F. Kennedy Building, Department of Justice (1935, Zantzinger, Borie & Medary); the National Archives Building (1935, John Russell Pope); the Internal Revenue Service (1936, Louis A. Simon); and the Federal Trade Commission (1938, Bennett, Parsons and Frost).

Federal Triangle was officially completed in 1998, with the addition of the Ronald Reagan Building. The construction of Federal Triangle led to the demolition of numerous buildings and structures, and the erasure of DC's first Chinatown (centered at Pennsylvania Avenue and 4th Street NW), which was forced to relocate in the early 1930s.

DC Inventory: March 7, 1968 (Joint Committee on Landmarks)

Within the Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site

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