This series of maps shows property values, pavement times, public schools, railroads, street sweeping schedules and more. Don't miss these incredible maps showing 1880s life in Washington.

Vermont Avenue was almost extended all the way to Georgia Avenue near Howard University. See the map of the proposed extension.

These homes on Euclid Street were some of the first in Washington designed by a woman. Check our the ads from 1907.

Hazy blue smoke surrounds the origins of the annual Fourth of July Smoke-In. Though it now takes place in Lafayette Square, across the barricaded street from the White House, it began on the Mall.

What a fascinating and bizarre old photo from 1923. You’ll clearly never see something like this again, not unlike the one we shared from the White House of an airplane taking off. Source: Library of Congress

This great old photo shows the view looking north on 15th St., just east of the White House and Treasury Department. The intersection is with Pennsylvania Ave. Source: Shorpy

Samuel Brown sold all the surrounding land of Pleasant Plains estate and named the remainder Mt. Pleasant because it invited the highest part of the original estate.

Do you know where the Harvard St. Bridge is? I couldn’t place it until I looked it up, and obviously, it’s the bridge at the end of Harvard St. within the National Zoo. Pretty obvious, right? Anyway, here’s a photo of the old bridge in 1909. A modern bridge was completed in 1965, connecting with the […]

Whoa, how cool is this photo from 1913? This shows the intersection at 32nd St. and Woodland Dr. NW. Source: Library of Congress Here’s the Google Street View of the area today. UPDATE: We received an email from Sian pointing out that this is the undeveloped corner where the Savopoulous murder occurred on May 14th, 2015. […]

Oh, things sure were different. Check out these great apartment advertisements from July 3rd, 1932. These were printed in The Washington Post. Below is an ad for The Parkside, which still stands at 1702 Summit Pl. NW. Here are a couple more old buildings. The Westmoreland is now a co-op. We found some more amazing listings […]

Here’s a photo of Logan Circle, probably some time in the 1920s (though it was named Iowa Circle until 1930). Source: Library of Congress

Here’s an old photo of Western High School taken by Frances Benjamin Johnston. The photo is from about 1900 and today, the building houses the Duke Ellington School of the Arts. Source: Library of Congress

Even though the Washington Post had a new owner, things were tough financially for the paper in the depth of the Depression in 1933, the last year Washington had a baseball team in the World Series. The Post, formerly owned by Edward (Ned) McLean, had just been sold at a bankruptcy auction to Eugene Meyer. […]

You may or may not be aware of this, but in the early days, Cleveland Park was referred to as Cleveland Heights (i.e., Columbia Heights, and Adams Morgan formerly known as Washington Heights). Below is a cool article that we came across in The Washington Post from June 22nd, 1890. Three hundred feet above the tidewaters […]

This is what a traffic jam looked like on 15th St. right next to the Treasury Department around 1915. These two photos were from the Library of Congress. Source: Library of Congress Source: Library of Congress

Here’s a cool page from the newspaper in 1915. This was printed in The Washington Times on October 19th, of that year.

This is an old advertisement for railroad tickets between Washington, Baltimore and points west. A ticket from Washington to Cincinnati was $11, Chicago was $18, and St. Louis was $26.50. That ticket to St. Louis is roughly $660 in today’s money. A direct flight from DCA to STL today is about $280. We found this […]

This is a photograph from, what appears to be, Central High School (Cardozo), some time in the 1920s. These young ladies are competing in the low hurdle race.

Here is a very different photo of the “Big Train” in April 1939. He is looking at a box of baseballs, autographed by six presidents. These are baseballs that were thrown out as the first pitch by presidents when Johnson was pitching in Washington. A pretty impressive collection, which was donated to the Baseball Hall […]

Another great one for GoDCers who love maps. This is an 1890 map of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad route from Washington to Rockville.