Sports and Recreation Tour: Griffith Stadium (1911-1965): Griffith Stadium was described as a no-frills stadium designed to be easily used for both baseball and football.

Griffith Stadium stood between Georgia Avenue and 5th Street NW from 1911 to 1965, and was the home stadium for some of DC's popular sports teams. Described as a no-frills stadium designed to be easily used for both baseball and football, Griffith Stadium took the place of an earlier wooden stadium after a fire destroyed a majority of that venue. The new stadium was the home of the Washington Senators from 1911 to 1960 and the Washington Redskins* (now the Washington Commanders) from 1937 to 1960. The stadium also hosted other sporting events, including boxing and soccer matches.

Named for owner Clark Griffith, the stadium was also an important site in Black sporting history, as it was one of the first major stadiums to host the Negro Leagues, as the home of the Homestead Grays. The Homestead Grays was DC’s official Negro League team. The team was founded in Pennsylvania in 1910 when a group of Black steelworkers wanted to play baseball. Due to the team’s size and growing popularity, the club moved to DC in 1937. Their popularity further exploded in DC and their games at Griffith Stadium quickly began to sell-out.

Griffith stadium hosted World Series games in 1924, 1925, and 1933. The stadium was also the venue that started the tradition of presidents throwing out the first pitch of the baseball season. The first president to do this was William Howard Taft in 1910, who threw the first pitch from his seat instead of the pitcher’s mound. Every president from Taft through John F. Kennedy threw out a pitch at Griffith Stadium. When World War I broke out in 1914, baseball players joined the effort to prepare for a potential war. In the first game of the season following the start of the war, the Washington Senators performed military drills with baseball bats – directed by Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Assistant Secretary of the Navy at the time.

Griffith Stadium was renovated multiple times and held a capacity of around 30,000 people. It was demolished in 1965 and eventually replaced by Howard University Hospital. Following the demolition, RFK Stadium, which opened in 1961, became the city’s premier sporting venue.

This site is a stop on the Sports and Recreation in DC tour. It is no longer extant and is not a desginated historic landmark.

*This term is harmful to indigenous communities and has not been in use since 2020