The 1910s brought World War I and a massive wave of federal construction that reshaped downtown Washington. The war brought hundreds of thousands of workers flooding into the city, straining housing, transit, and every civic institution to its limits. Woodrow Wilson’s Washington was also the decade when the federal government was formally segregated.
Take a look at this photograph of Washington, D.C. from the 1920s and see if you can recognize it. Click for more details and leave your thoughts in the comments!
The first State of the Union was in 1800 by our second president, John Adams. Thomas Jefferson began the tradition of passing along the state of the union in writing to Congress, allegedly because he felt he was an inadequate public speaker. In 1913, the task of speaking directly to a joint session of Congress … Read more
Take a look back in time with this old advertisement for 1201 Clifton St. NW in Columbia Heights from 1910. See the original ad and the street view today.
Explore the highways of Washington, D.C. in 1911 with this historic map from the Library of Congress. See roads, routes, and more from over 100 years ago.
Get a rare glimpse of downtown DC in 1911 with this photo taken from the air. See the amazing details of the Old Post Office and other points of interest in this panoramic view.
Take a step back in time with this incredible old photo of 7th and Pennsylvania Ave. during World War I. Get a glimpse of what the streets of DC looked like during the war
Taken from the top of the Washington Monument in 1911, this photograph shows a Washington where the Lincoln Memorial didn’t exist yet, the Reflecting Pool hadn’t been dug, and the Mall was still crossed by rail lines. Click through for the full-resolution version.
This is an amazing find on YouTube showing a trip down the C&O Canal back in 1917.
The entire trip took about seven days and they end up down in Washington.
On March 3, 1913, the day before Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration, thousands of suffragists marched down Pennsylvania Avenue and straight into a hostile mob. Alice Paul planned it to force the vote into the national conversation. It worked.
