Sports and Recreation Tour: DC Armory: The DC Armory has hosted a range of events from sporting events to trade shows to inaugural balls.

The DC Armory opened in 1941 as a military training center. Designed by Nathan C. Wyeth, it was completed as a project by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and was primarily a training facility for the DC National Guard. However, during World War II, it was used as the FBI’s fingerprinting bureau.

The armory has served as a multi-purpose arena. Over the years, the armory has hosted a range of events from sporting events to trade shows to inaugural balls – from Harry Truman to John F. Kennedy to Barack Obama. The armory can seat up to 10,000 people and has a 70,000 square feet drill floor space. This space can be converted to host indoor soccer and football games, rodeos, tractor pulls, and roller derby leagues. The space is the home of the DC Rollergirls, the Washington Diplomats, an indoor soccer club, and the DC Armor, an American indoor football association. This versatile space has, for the past couple of decades, been a prime spot for sports and recreation as well as important military and political events. It still serves as the DC National Guard headquarters.

This site is a stop on the Sports and Recreation in DC tour. It is not a desginated historic landmark.