Washington has one of the great baseball histories in the country, from the Washington Senators and Griffith Stadium to the return of the Nationals and two World Series championships. These posts dig into DC’s long love affair with the national pastime.
For most of the 1990s, Arlington was the favorite to land the Montreal Expos. There was an HKS rendering on the Potomac, a governor in support, and three candidate sites in Pentagon City. Then in eighteen months it all collapsed, and the rejected block eventually became Amazon HQ2.
A rough, all-Irish neighborhood called Swampoodle once stood where Union Station is now. The railroad cleared it, and DC forgot.
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.
A fatal pitch during a 1912 church baseball game at 14th and A Streets NE claimed the life of George S. Hiett. This forgotten tragedy unfolded against a backdrop of neighborhood games, citywide injuries, and the shadow of the Titanic.
In 1957 Calvin Griffith swore the Senators weren’t moving to California. He’d just toured LA. Four years later they left.
An 1880s photograph of the Washington Nationals playing at Swampoodle Grounds. Click through for the full-resolution version to pick out the details.
Learn about the lease requirements for a new baseball stadium in D.C., as revealed in a document from the 1950s. Follow the history of the Washington Senators and the legacy of Clark Griffith in this fascinating story.
Take a look back at the 1925 World Series at Griffith Stadium with this photo and film footage. We were in the World Series that year, for the second year in a row. Unfortunately, we lost that year.
Rare color photographs from inside Griffith Stadium in Washington, D.C., taken during the 1956 Major League Baseball All-Star Game.
