Pauline Floyd was a pioneer and an excellent role model for women pursing a career in law. She was the youngest female lawyer admitted to practice before the Supreme Court.

Whenever I stroll through D.C. cemeteries, given my fascination with the stories of regular Washingtonians, I’m always curious what the story is behind the names on the headstones. Hundreds and thousands of people who lived decades, or their entire lives in our city now reduced to a simple engraving in stone. I’ve been pretty busy […]

Every once in a while, I get an email from someone who has an amazing attachment to the historic fabric of Washington. Not too long ago, I received one of those emails from Phil Hochberg. Above is the photo he sent from his time with the Washington Senators. Phil was once the voice of the […]

This is a morbid story from The Baltimore Sun, printed on March 10th, 1923. What is extremely striking is how graphic the depiction was back then. Washington, March 9.–For the first time in the 35 years that the Washington Monument has been completed a man today hurled himself from the top of the shaft to instant […]

We came across this photo of White House police officer Roland Ford in the Library of Congress archives. Source: Library of Congress We did a little digging to see what we could find on Roland. According to the U.S. Census record of 1940, he lived with his wife Maude and son little Roland at 1710 […]

We often wonder what the city was like in the early days. By all accounts, it was a miserable place to be. We dug up an interesting article in The Baltimore Sun from December 17th, 1853, which makes the same claims. The article quotes a letter written by Oliver Wolcott, Jr., written on July 4th, 1800 […]

We’ve stumbled across an amazing character from Washington’s past, one to rival (but not surpass, of course) Officer Sprinkle. No doubt, the two of them crossed paths at one point and one was likely well-acquainted with the other’s work, and most likely, it was a mutual awareness. They were equally represented in the newspapers, one […]

Washington is a baseball town. There is no doubt about that. In fact, there is a rich history going back to the 19th century including an Irishman’s bar fully dedicated to the love of the game. We were without a team for 34 years, so it’s taking a little time to shake off the rust, […]

I never knew about the significance of the November poppy for certain countries until I left to study in Brussels back in 2004. Now, I notice it. Every November, I notice the poppy. My wife pins a red flower with a black middle onto her coat. I see it on NHL hockey coaches. I see it […]

Most young girls dream of being a princess and young women of finding a love so strong that the prince would leave his throne for her. Though this happened to Grace Kelly and Wallis Simpson, it wouldn’t be so for young Katherine Elkins, who had a much gossiped about relationship with the Duke of Abruzzi. […]

As the hamlet of Georgetown grew alongside the capital, it became a place for foreign dignitaries to reside, hoping to include themselves in the upper echelons of society. Marriage between prominent families to secure wealth, reputation, land and good name was all too common in Georgetown. Soon, members of the diplomatic corps were marrying into […]

It’s been a while since we dug into the story of someone we found in a an old photograph. The last one was the fascinating story of Annie O’Connell. Though these are not always the most popular posts, they certainly are a fascinating insight into the lives of individuals who lived in our city many […]

This is an interesting article that we came across, published in the Washington Post on February 10th, 1924. A 10-year-old student in high school! She is Sylvia Altman, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. Altman, 612 Otis place northwest. The girl will not be 11 years old until June, and she entered Central high school […]

You all have been waiting a long, long time for this. So have we. Thanks to one of our GoDC fans, we have in our possession, the biography of Officer Sprinkle from the 1908 Metropolitan Police Department’s official history book. LIEUTENANT J. L. SPRINKLE Lieutenant J. L. Sprinkle, stationed at No. 2 precinct, was born […]

I love when this stuff happens. GoDCer Steve did a little Googling and came up with this amazing piece of Internet gold. Remember Marjorie Morris? The intrepid young Washingtonian, noted for her adventures in Chevy Chase? We wrote some more about her here and here. Also, the Cleveland Park Historical Society has a pretty cool website that […]

Photos like this really captivate us. This is Miriam Auerbach at the age of 12 in 1924. Her father was Joseph Auerbach, clothing store merchant from Germany, who had arrived in the U.S. in 1906. He married her mother Edna, almost 20 years his junior, in 1919. Miriam and her younger brother, Joseph Jr., were […]

I was trying to dig up a photo, or at least some more information on what happened to Marjorie. I was able to find two documents related to her on Ancestry.com. The first one I found was a record of her crossing the Pacific as a passenger on the U.S.S. U.S.A.T. “Thomas”, which departed Manila […]

Initially, this was going to be part of the previous post about Cathedral Highlands, but it was too good. This deserves it’s own post. Trust me when I say this is crazy. We learned from the advertisement in the previous post that Matteson worked in the Colorado Building on G St. Side note … Thomas […]

It’s been a little while since we’ve done a “Reader’s Choice” post, so this one is for GoDCer Samantha, who tweeted the request to do something on Cathedral Heights. I also haven’t really done anything about that area, so this works out well. Let me start with a quick fact … Cathedral Heights started out as […]

Archibald Willingham Butt was a successful and well-known military aide to presidents Roosevelt and Taft. He was fiercely loyal to both men and near the end of Taft’s term in 1912, it was clear that Roosevelt was disgruntled with Taft and would run against him. Major Butt was caught in the middle with equal but divided loyalties.