Tune Inn Capitol Hill: 79 Years of a DC Dive Bar
Three blocks from the Capitol dome sits a 1947 dive bar with deer butts on the wall and a Nardelli behind the counter.
1940s
World War II reshaped Washington completely. The Pentagon rose across the river in just 16 months, the federal workforce exploded, and the city became the command center for the Allied war effort. Housing was impossibly scarce, rationing was everywhere, and Washington hummed with wartime urgency from 1941 to 1945.
When Was the Pentagon Built? The 16-Month Wartime Sprint
Sixteen months from groundbreaking to dedication. Thirteen thousand workers on round-the-clock shifts. Segregated cafeterias FDR personally overruled.
Dallas Williams, the Bad Man of Swampoodle
On January 31, 1958, the Evening Star started calling Dallas O. Williams “the Bad Man of Swampoodle.” The nickname stuck through five trials, three vacated convictions, and a 1961 double murder that exposed the broken machinery of DC’s insanity defense.
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Crystal Heights: DC’s Lost Glass City
Frank Lloyd Wright drew Washington a glass city of twenty-one towers on a Connecticut Avenue hill. The height limit refused to let it rise.
Engine Company No. 4: DC’s First All-Black Firehouse
Gordon Parks photographed Engine Company No. 4 in 1943: men trusted to run into a fire, and made to eat off separate plates.
Langston Golf Course: D.C.’s Segregated Public Course
Langston Golf Course opened June 11, 1939 as DC’s only public links for Black golfers. The fight for equal access took longer than the build.
Eastern Air Lines Flight 537: The 1949 Crash That Killed 55 Near National Airport
At 11:46 on November 1st, 1949, a young controller kept calling: Bolivia 927, turn left. The pilot never answered. Fifty-five died.
Washington’s First AI Panic Happened in 1950
AI anxiety isn’t new. In 1949, an MIT professor turned down a corporate contract because he feared machines would replace human judgment. A year later, Washington had its own “electronic brain” on Connecticut Avenue. We’ve been having this argument for 75 years.
Gas Rationing in Washington, D.C.: The Long Lines of 1942
In June 1942, Washington D.C. gas stations on upper Wisconsin Avenue ran dry by 8:30 a.m. These Office of War Information photos show how the city lived through wartime gas rationing.