What is the history behind the names of popular locations in Washington?
Centreville, VA was established in 1792 by local landowners with the intent of creating a center point between the more established towns: Alexandria, Colchester, Dumfries, Middleburg, Georgetown, Warrenton, and Leesburg. Learn more about its fascinating origin story here.
Robert E Simon purchased 6,750 acres of land in Fairfax in 1961 after his family sold Carnegie Hall in New York. He built a planned community with his initials RES and town as its name.
Hains point is named for Peter Conover Hains, a prominent Major General in the U.S. Army and served in the Civil War, Spanish-American War and World War I.
Pierre L’Enfant had originally planned the City of Washington around a right triangle, with the eastern portion at the Capitol, the northern portion at the White House and the 90 degree angle close to where the Washington Monument sits today. Thomas Jefferson marked this spot in 1793 with a wooden post, which was replaced in 1804 with the Jefferson Pier.
The name Adams Morgan is from the names of two formerly segregated area elementary schools—the older, all-black Thomas P. Morgan Elementary School and the all-white John Quincy Adams Elementary School, which merged in 1955 following desegregation.
Do you know why we have a neighborhood named after a Caribbean island? Find out how it’s related to today’s George Washington University too.
Career criminal Joseph Francis Fearon of Fairfax was the original ring leader of the “Beltway Bandits” of the late 1960s, robbing neighborhood homes neighboring the then-new Capital Beltway.
Learn about the history of D.C. public elementary schools Janney, Gibbs, Eaton and Watkins. We explore the background behind their names and the people they were named for.
Wonder what Washington DC diagonal roads are named after? Here’s the history of DC’s street names including states, letters, and numbers.
Langley, VA is the headquarters for the CIA. What’s the history behind the area’s name?
