Nannie Helen Burroughs, a leader in advocating for African American women’s education and a civil rights activist, combined her education and leadership roles in the National Baptist Convention with her organizing skills to create what would become the National Training School for Women and Girls. The school, established in 1909, was the first of its kind to offer multiple education programs in different fields, and was the first school owned and operated by an African American woman outside of the Deep South. The Historic District includes three buildings and the school’s original entrance, all contributing to the growth and mission of the school: the Trades Hall, a National Historic Landmark; a dormitory; the National Memorial Chapel; and the Lincoln Memorial Arch. Born in 1878 in Orange, Virginia, Nannie Helen Burroughs moved to DC as a child with her family. Undeterred from financial and social limitations surrounding African American women’s education, Nannie Helen Burroughs was determined to open a school for women and girls to pursue academic, religious, and practical educations. After struggling herself to find educational and occupational opportunities as a young woman, Burroughs helped to found the Women’s Industrial Service Club. The program offered night classes for women pursuing office and domestic work. Because of her close relationship and work with the Women’s Convention Auxiliary of the National Baptist Convention, Burroughs looked to the organization to help fund and support the school’s construction. Having fostered relationships with fellow African American activists, such as the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Lucy Diggs Slowe, and Mary Church Terrell, Burroughs continued to advocate for training and education within the nation’s capital. While the Convention aided her somewhat, most of the school’s funding came from African American families and churches, especially African American women who lacked access to education in their youth. After opening in 1909, the school had periods of financial uncertainty, with Burroughs investing much of her own money into the school, and she took little pay from her position as president. One of few original structures remaining on the campus, the Lincoln Memorial Arch was built in 1914 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of President Lincoln’s untimely death. The arch also served as the school’s main entrance and featured a portrait silhouette bas-relief of the former president. A few changes were made to the structure throughout the years, with the school’s name being added to the archway. Later, the name was updated to match the school’s new name, National Training and Professional School, in order to distinguish it from another institution that had previously shared the same name. In 1956, the school added the metal gate seen in the archway today, and the name was repainted once again when the Progressive National Baptist Convention took ownership of the building. The Progressive National Baptist Convention (PNBC) grew out of the National Baptist Convention in 1961 as the rise of the civil rights movement split activists’ ideals for the future of the convention. The PNBC gave more support to elevating African American women to positions of leadership both within the organization and within the church. Burroughs’s goals for the school aligned more so with the PNBC, and the school transferred its affiliation to the PNBC’s Women’s Department shortly after. Activists like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. also aligned themselves with the PNBC. Because of their enduring support for Burroughs and the school’s mission, the organization purchased the building for their headquarters in 1978. Of the existing buildings, the Trades Hall serves as the largest on the campus from the school’s operating years. Built from 1927 to 1928 with Renaissance Revival elements in a modernist style, the building served as a schoolhouse and office building, and housed trade workshops. The building’s original plan included a third-story addition, but only two were ever constructed. Currently, the Trades Hall operates as the headquarters and offices for the PNBC. The dormitory, constructed from 1954 to 1956, increased the number of women who could live on-campus while pursuing their education; the building hosted 52 rooms that could accommodate 70 occupants. To match the campus aesthetic, the dormitory borrowed design elements seen in the Trades Hall constructed two decades prior. In 1961, the school opened a chapel. The building was dedicated shortly after Burroughs had passed away, and hosted her public memorial service as its first event. The building has a Stripped Classicism design, and was funded by donors much like the other buildings on campus. Formal education efforts for African American, especially women, had existed since the Civil War, and the National Training School for Women and Girls continued this work. Burroughs’s mission to educate African American children continued even after her death. In 1964, the school was restructured into a private, co-ed elementary school and renamed after Burroughs as a testament to her legacy. In 1971, a new school building was constructed and remains within the historic district’s boundaries. While the Nannie Helen Burroughs Elementary School closed in 2013, a new school, the Monroe School, opened its doors to students in 2015 and continues to operate today.
DC Inventory: October 27, 2022
]]>Constructed in two phases between 1848 and 1885, the Washington Monument stands as a memorial to America’s first president: George Washington. The surrounding historic district is located in the center of the National Mall, bounded by Constitution Avenue on the north; 14th Street, Raoul Wallenberg Place (15th Street), and Independence Avenue on the east; the Tidal Basin on the south; and 17th Street on the west. The surrounding grounds include the grassy knoll created in the 1880s to cover the monument’s foundation, a network of pedestrian walkways, and D.C.’s world-famous cherry blossom trees. Additional structures within the historic district include the Survey Lodge and Monument Lodge, two one-story buildings constructed with the same granite and marble as the Washington Monument. These structures served visitors, operated as archival space, and functioned as an office upon the monument’s opening in 1888. Separate contributing structures and objects include: the Jefferson Pier Marker, Bullfinch Gateposts, Washington Globe streetlights, the Elevation Obelisk, Independence Avenue Corridor, German-American Friendship Garden, cobblestone gutters, and the Sylvan Theater. Today, the Washington Monument and its surrounding grounds remain a popular tourist attraction, as well as a site of festivals and protests, with a wealth of history that stretches from the 1790s into the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
DC Inventory: December 15, 2016
]]>As the seat of the Union at the intersection of the North and the South, Washington D.C. played a pivotal role in the Civil War. Throughout the progression of the conflict, D.C. constructed numerous fort sites around the city center to protect the Union capital. By the end of the war, this extensive 37-mile defense system included 68 enclosed forts and batteries, 20-miles of trenches, and 93 unarmed batteries. The Civil War Forts Sites include Batteries Kemble and Ricketts; and Forts Bayard, Bunker Hill, Carroll, Chaplin, Davis, DeRussy, Dupont, Greble, Lincoln, Mahan, Reno, Slocum, Stanton, Stevens, and Totten. In the 1890s, during a national era of parkway construction, a “Fort to Fort Drive” was proposed. As the city was growing in all directions into these former fort sites, the 1902 Senate Park Commission Plan (McMillan Commission) proposed that 17 of the sites be converted into open parkland, with two portions of Fort Drive (one west of the Anacostia River and another east of the Anacostia) connecting most of the sites. However, despite these grand plans, Congress failed to comprehensively act. Action finally took place following the establishment of the National Capital Park and Planning Commission (NCPPC) – now the National Capital Planning Commission – in 1926. By the early 1930s, a majority of the historic sites and the land needed for Fort Drive had been purchased by NCPPC. However, because of eventual funding issues, surface streets had to suffice for portions of the “parkway” – as opposed to a formal, newly-constructed Fort Drive parkway. During the Great Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and Works Progress Administration (WPA) constructed some sections of Fort Drive. The CCC also established picnic areas at some of the new parks – at former fort sites – and even constructed an amphitheater at Fort Bunker Hill Park. Most notably, the CCC reconstructed Fort Stevens – the site of DC’s only Civil War battle and, today, the most famous of the fortifications. Despite not being fully realized, the planning resulted in various open spaces across the District – from Battery Kemble in Northwest to Fort Circle Park in Southeast. Additionally, portions of the parkway can be seen, for instance in Southeast (Fort Davis Drive, Fort Dupont Drive, and Fort Drive), Northeast (Fort Totten to Barnard Hill Park), and Northwest (Fort Drive near Fort Reno Park). Most importantly, residents can now enjoy the outdoors in numerous parks and witness history at the reconstructed fortifications at Fort Stevens. The properties are currently administered by the National Park Service and are utilized as educational and historical resources.
DC Inventory: November 8, 1964 (Joint Committee on Landmarks)
(Amended June 19, 1973)
National Register: July 15, 1974 (Documentation revised September 13, 1978)
]]>The Washington National Cathedral has been a landmark of religious significance for over a century, and its surrounding structures date back to the early twentieth century. The Cathedral Close (an enclosed area surrounding the designated spot for the Cathedral) was selected in the late 1800s, an open space that seemed more suitable for religious worship than the cluttered center of the city. The space also allowed for future expansion.
First opened to the public in 1901, the Cathedral Close gardens and grounds soon filled with administrative buildings, greenhouses, and schools. The first building constructed on the site, the Renaissance Revival style Hearst Hall, was designed by Robert Gibson to “harmonize with the future cathedral.” Construction of the National Cathedral began in 1907 after the completion of numerous buildings in the Close. Despite this lapse in timing, the majority of buildings were designed in the Neo-Tudor and Neo-Gothic styles, providing the historic district with a cohesive feel. The Cathedral was finally completed in 1990 -- a full 83-years after construction began.
The Close is bounded by Woodley Road on the north, Wisconsin Avenue on the west, Massachusetts Avenue at the southwest corner, Garfield Street on the south, and 34th Street on the east.
Today, the Close is home to notable schools (such as St. Alban’s and the National Cathedral School for Girls), an expansive garden (tended by the All Hallows Guild), and various administrative buildings for National Cathedral staff.
DC Inventory: March 7, 1968
National Register: May 3, 1974
]]>President’s Park South constituted a signal piece of L’Enfant’s early city plan for Washington, and was acquired by the Federal Government in the 1790s. L’Enfant initially envisioned a large, 80-acre landscaped area upon which the Executive Mansion would sit. Despite the construction of the White House, the land remained practically vacant and untended until the mid-1800s.
Development began in 1851, when noted landscape architect Andrew Jackson Downing developed a new vision for the National Mall and the surrounding lands of President’s Park. His plan proposed a wealth of open green space dotted with trees, sloping downward into an Ellipse formed by a curving roadway. This original organization remains the basic outline of President’s Park South today, with the addition of surrounding buildings and structures.
Numerous historical buildings and structures are located within the park, including gatehouses, statues, fountains, and individual buildings. Certain memorials date back to the early 1900s, and are representative of historical values and visions of heroism, national pride, and American identity.
Today, President’s Park South is home to the White House, the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, the Ellipse, and General William T. Sherman’s equestrian statue and surrounding plaza. It is bounded by State Place, South Executive Avenue, and Alexander Hamilton Place on the north, 15th Street NW on the east, Constitution Avenue NW on the south, and 17th Street NW on the west.
National Register: May 6, 1980
]]>The Bloomingdale Historic District is a group of 1,692 contributing resources bounded by Channing Street to the north; North Capital Street to the east; Florida Avenue to the south; and 2nd Street to the west.
Bloomingdale is significant for its status as one of DC’s largest cohesive row house neighborhoods. Its development began with the arrival of a streetcar line and was continued rapidly by a small group of speculative developers and builders. It boasts a large stock of row houses of high-quality design and materials, houses intended to attract stable middle-class residents. The size and quality of the architecture illustrate that the success of speculative development for DC’s rising middle class was all but assured during the years in which the neighborhood was built.
Bloomingdale also demonstrates the architectural transition of DC’s row houses away from fanciful three-story Victorian buildings of the early 1890s to the more regular, two-story, front-porch row houses of the 1910s. Bloomingdale is also one of the first large developments in DC laid out in conformance with the Permanent Highway Plan of 1893, which standardized the layout of new subdivisions beyond the city’s original boundaries.
These factors, along with Bloomingdale’s prominent role in the struggle to abolish racially restrictive housing covenants in the District and nation from 1907-1948, make the neighborhood significant. The Bloomingdale Historic District’s period of significance is 1892-1948.
DC Inventory: July 26, 2018
National Register: November 26, 2018
]]>In the 1930s, Colony Hill – near Reservoir and Foxhall roads – emerged as a distinctive suburban development built in an architectural style that echoed the Georgian and Federal styles of the early American nation. In the decade between 1931 and 1941, notable real estate firm Boss & Phelps collaborated with renowned architect Horace Peaslee, landscape architect Rose Greeley, and local architect Harvey Baxter. Early residents were primarily upper middle-class citizens, including physicians, businessmen, military officers, and government officials.
The historic district includes 50 houses, 37 of which are contributing properties. Distinctive elements of the single-family residences include cornice detailing, rhythmic fenestration, and simple massing. Colony Hill planners integrated revivalist architecture with naturalistic landscape design in a style that is still clear today—as current residents continue to preserve this vision in their neighborhood.
The Colony Hill Historic District includes the homes of Hoban Road, Hadfield Lane, and 45th Street NW. It is bounded by Glover Archbold on the east, Reservoir Road on the south, and Foxhall Road on the west.
DC Inventory: February 4, 2021
National Register: May 21, 2021
]]>The Kingman Park Historic District, located at the northeastern end of today’s Capitol Hill, was principally developed during the late 1920s through 1940s as a residential neighborhood for African Americans. The district was part of a larger area that until that time, was underdeveloped due to a lack of basic infrastructure and to unhealthy and insanitary conditions caused by the tidal flats along the Anacostia River. As the city expanded its infrastructure services easterly beyond 13th Street NE, and as the reclamation of the Anacostia River undertaken by the Corps of Engineers reached the section of the river bordering today’s Kingman Park in the late 1920s, the area became ripe for speculative real estate development.
Real estate developers such as Charles Sager who was the first and most prolific builder and developer of Kingman Park housing, seized the opportunity to build rows of residences for middle-class homebuyers on previously undeveloped or underdeveloped land. Sager named the area Kingman Park after Kingman Lake which was being carved out of the Anacostia River for recreational purposes, and which was itself named for the chief engineer at the US Army Corps of Engineers in charge of the Anacostia reclamation efforts. Sager did not necessarily conceive of building houses for African Americans at the outset, but he very quickly realized a ready market and began targeting his new houses to African Americans, a practice emulated by other developers.
The new rows of brick dwellings reflecting a variety of revival styles popular in the interwar period provided affordable and quality housing to Blacks during the height of segregation, when legally enforced practices in real estate limited the supply of housing for the city’s growing African American population. As a result, Kingman Park took off, attracting an exclusively African American population, and engendering the further growth of segregated facilities in the area, including city and federally funded residential, educational, and recreational institutions.
Some of these sites include residential areas like the cohesive collection of twenty blocks of two-story rowhouses and flats, built between 1928 and 1951 that line the streets between 21st Street and Oklahoma Avenue south of Benning Road or the several blocks of rowhouses located in the nineteenth-century residential subdivisions of Rosedale and Isherwood that became an integral part of the social, cultural and physical fabric of Kingman Park after its development beginning in 1928. The Langston Terrace Dwellings (1935-1938) consists of a federally-sponsored public housing complex of garden apartments for low-income African Americans, designed in the International style by Bauhaus-trained architect, Hilyard Robinson (1899-1986). This historic district also includes educational and recreational facilities, like the Young, Browne, Phelps and Spingarn Education Campus (1931-1952) consisting of four public schools, and the Langston Golf Course (1939-1955), open to African Americans, and laid out along the western banks of the Anacostia River and on Kingman Island.
During the late 1940s and early 1950s, many of these institutions in Kingman Park would become the scene of Civil Rights demonstrations and activities that ultimately led to the end of legally sanctioned segregation practices in education, recreation and housing in the city.
DC Inventory: May 3, 2018
DC Inventory (Boundary Expansion): September 24, 2020
National Register: December 17, 2018
National Register (Boundary Expansion): April 22, 2021
]]>Union Market Terminal is a large complex of wholesale warehouse buildings occupying an approximately forty-acre tract of land located east of Union Station between Florida and New York Avenues NE. Conceived in 1928 by a federation of wholesalers called the Union Terminal Market Association, these merchants anticipated the demolition of Center Market and the associated wholesale buildings for construction of the Federal Triangle. Since the wholesale merchants were not in the Center Market building itself, rather in adjacent privately owned buildings, there were no government contingencies made for their displacement as there were being made for the farmers and merchants of Center Market itself. So, acting on its own, the private association purchased the land, devised a street plan for the wholesale market complex, and established a standard building form and style for the individual market buildings. Opened as the Union Market Terminal, the warehouses that were constructed in the first years of the market’s establishment (1929-1931) are all two-story, buff brick industrial buildings that feature overall symmetry and repetitive Classical Revival-style features. Many of these warehouses were historically connected to the nearby railroad freight lines via railroad spurs. By August 1931, about one hundred merchants had moved into the complex and plans were underway for expansion. Although the local press anticipated an equally vigorous building campaign in ensuing years, construction continued at a relatively modest pace. To begin with, designs for the individual buildings followed the uniform model already established for the complex. Following a World War II building hiatus, however, the standard building type and style had been abandoned as longer and lower, utilitarian buildings with little attention to design or architectural detail were built instead. Today, many of the individual buildings dating to the original period of construction (1929- 1931), have been altered by filled-in loading docks, filled-in windows, additions atop the loading docks, missing flagpoles, and other alterations. However, as an entity, the complex retains its integrity and character, and as a building type, this collection of wholesale warehouses is unique to DC. Most of the alterations are reversible in character, providing incentives and opportunity for historic restoration and rehabilitation.
DC Inventory: November 3, 2016
National Register: January 31, 2017
]]>The Smithsonian Quadrangle features four buildings in a campus-like setting on the south side of the National Mall: the Smithsonian Castle (1847-55), the Arts and Industries Building (1879-81), the Freer Gallery of Art (1923), and the largely underground Quadrangle Building (1983-87). The Quadrangle Building houses the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, National Museum of African Art, and S. Dillon Ripley Center, each with its above-ground entrance pavilion. The Haupt Garden covering the main roof of the building also incorporates the Renwick Gates, the Downing Urn, and nineteenth century lampposts and garden furnishings from the Bicentennial Victorian Garden that once occupied a portion of the site.
The Quadrangle Building occupies the area historically known as the “South Yard.” For many years, the Castle and its sparsely planted back yard served as an incubator for fledgling museums and research programs. Over time, the yard became a convenient place for various utilitarian structures and uses. In the 1870s, it served as a museum construction yard; in the 1880s, bison were kept in a paddock, awaiting the opening of the National Zoo in 1889. After the bison left, an astrophysical observatory was built, followed by various sheds and annexes. A taxidermist shop appeared in 1917, and the same year, the Army erected a metal building for wartime repair of aircraft engines. By 1920, that structure was repurposed with public displays as the Aircraft Building, and in 1946, it became the National Air Museum, whose public displays grew to include a startling outdoor collection of rockets.
The 1960s urban renewal of Southwest, and its transformation of Independence Avenue into a formal row of federal office buildings, rendered the jumble of the South Yard embarrassingly obsolete. The Smithsonian’s then Secretary, S. Dillon Ripley began to envision the Yard as a more formal space in keeping with the redeveloped Independence Avenue. By 1980, the American architectural team of Shepley Bulfinch Richardson & Abbott (SBRA) was hired to implement Japanese architect Junzo Yoshimura’s design. However, architect Jean Paul Carlhian is credited as the principal designer of the Quandrangle Building, since there were significant redesigns of Yoshimura’s building plans. Carlhian’s key collaborator in designing the Haupt Garden was landscape architect Lester A. Collins.
The Commission of Fine Arts and the National Capital Planning Commission played key roles in reviewing the design of the project. For seven years, between the initial stages of design until the building’s completion, the design review bodies critiqued and approved the complex, element by element. The Haupt Garden, the finishing touch, opened to the public in May 1987, followed in September by the underground museum spaces.
DC Inventory: April 27, 2017
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