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.
Notable People & Places
Famous and infamous Washingtonians and the buildings tied to their names. Presidents, mobsters, madams, and the corner addresses that outlasted them.
Suburban Gardens: DC’s Black Amusement Park in Deanwood
Suburban Gardens opened at 50th and Hayes NE in June 1921, built by a Black-owned company. It was the only major amusement park ever inside the District, born because the region’s white parks barred Black Washingtonians.
Before she was the Duchess: Wallis Simpson in DC
Before the abdication crisis, the future Duchess of Windsor spent four quiet years in Washington as a young, separated Navy wife. She shared a small house in Georgetown, lunched at the Hotel Hamilton on K Street, and met an Argentine diplomat who would change her mind about her marriage. Her mother ran a boarding house on Woodley Road.
Army and Navy Club: 140 Years at 17th and I in DC
The Army and Navy Club has held the corner of 17th and I Streets NW since 1891, in a building that opened in 1912. In 1987 Shalom Baranes gutted everything behind that facade. The facade survived. Almost nothing else did.
The Willard Brother Who Built the Ebbitt House
Three Willard brothers ran the Willard Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue. The fourth, Caleb, ran a hotel just as big a block away. He just had the misfortune of calling it the Ebbitt House.
Korea’s Logan Circle Legation: Sold for $5, Bought Back
In 1891, King Gojong paid $25,000 for a Victorian townhouse on Iowa Circle to house Joseon’s first mission to the United States. Nineteen years later, after Japan forced the protectorate, the empire sold the building for five dollars. Korea bought it back in 2012 for $3.5 million. The museum opened in 2018.
David Crockett’s Vote Against Indian Removal: The 1830 Stand That Cost Him Congress
On May 26, 1830, the House passed the Indian Removal Bill 102-97. Tennessee’s David Crockett was the only member of his delegation to vote no.
Martin’s Tavern Georgetown: JFK, Booth 3, and 93 Years
The man whose name is over the door at 1264 Wisconsin Avenue was a Boston Braves shortstop in the 1914 World Series before he opened a Georgetown tavern the year Prohibition ended. Ninety-three years and four generations later, it is still open, still owned by the same family, and still has a brass plaque on the booth where John F. Kennedy proposed to Jacqueline Bouvier.
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.