The JBG apartment project on the 700 and 800 blocks of Florida Avenue NW moved forward last week when the Historic Preservation Review Board (HPRB) gave partial approval to the project.  The modernist design will likely have to endure a few more refinements before the board grants its final approval for the site.

Building alterations, additions, demolitions, and construction in historic districts are subject to review by the Historic Preservation Review Board.  Since the site sits in the U Street Historic District, it must also gain HPRB approval before it can receive building permits.

Though we are supporters of historic preservation, we can see why this extra level of review frustrates builders and property owners.  The main problem is that historic review requires property owners, architects, and developers to adjust their designs based on subjective judgments of historic compatibility.

The historic review process is less predictable that the typical building process, which simply requires that a builder meet unambiguous zoning regulations and building codes.  For instance, the JBG site is zoned C-2-B, which permits residential projects to rise to 65 feet or to rise to 70 feet if they include affordable housing.

Distances are easy and unambiguous measurements, but how does one determine if a proposed design is historically compatible?

As in most cases where subjectivity needs analysis, you can easily define the extreme cases.  The Weaver Building (HUD’s headquarters) is undoubtedly incompatible with the Victorian rowhouse architecture of the U Street area.  Likewise, a good number of preservationists despise projects that attempt precise replication of historic structures.  The right answers lies somewhere between aping historic forms and shunnig them all together.

For its Florida Avenue sites JBG project solicited design proposals from architecture firms nationwide.  The winner, Seattle-based Miller Hull, designed a truly modernist project.

Modernism, a 20th century invention, can work well in historic districts if done right and Miller Hull has worked to refine its designs to pass HPRB muster.

Though the HPRB asked for further refinement that will have to go to the board again, the board did support the design on six features so far:

1. Relocation of the front, original section of 1933-35 9th Street to the southern portion of the site, adjacent to the row of similarly-sized and scaled historic buildings, and removal of the later rear additions
2. Reconfiguration of the alley on the western parcel to exit on 9th Street
3. Subdivision to allow lot combination on both the west and east sites
4. Overall site organization of the new construction
5. Height and massing along Florida Avenue
6. General architectural direction, subject to further development and material selection.

Here are the concept designs the board reviewed when it reached this decision:

Looking west from 8th Street

Looking southwest from Florida Avenue

Looking south along 8th Street from Florida Avenue

Looking northwest along 8th Street

Looking east from 8th Street

Who are your neighbors? In December, LeDroit Park resident Robert Sullivan launched a website Portait City that features audio and photographic profiles of several LeDroit Park residents.  You may not know these subjects personally and perhaps maybe you have seen them in the neighborhood.  Nonetheless, they each provide a fascinating mosaic of LeDroit Park.

Interview subjects include Bobby Donaldson, the South Carolina native who opened B&J Barbeque at Rhode Island Avenue and 3rd Street.  You’ll find out what inspired him to open a restaurant and what people like in their barbeque.

LeDroit resident and former Ward 1 councilmember Frank Smith spent part of his youth as a civil rights worker in rural Mississippi. Mr. Smith recorded and reported civil rights abuses, such as bogus “literacy tests” that southern states used to prohibit black residents from voting.  Here how he reacted to Marion Barry’s infamous arrest.

Hear from the Elks Lodge and their relationship with the neighborhood.  You can also hear Elks reminisce about performances at the Howard Theatre back in the day.

The flamboyantly dressed “Hollywood” explains his eclectic attire and Bloomingdaler John Salatti sings the praises of his wife and Bloomingdale.

Finally, Robert was able to interview LeDroit residents Dolores Baylor and her daughter Mechelle just before Dolores died in December.  Mechelle explains what it was like growing up in the neighborhood and Dolores recounts what it was like living through the riots of 1968.

The lives of famous figures in history are well-documented, but it is also important to record the experiences and views of the not-so-famous.  Robert contracted your author, who is a professional web developer by day, to build the site.  While building the site, we couldn’t help but notice that each story delivered its own unexpected poignancy.

In reviewing Howard University’s proposed campus plan, we started to take account of all of the property in DC that the university owns.  Up until 10 years ago, Howard University was accused of being LeDroit Park’s biggest slumlord, owning numerous properties in the neighborhood and letting them lie vacant, blighted, and decaying.

Under the reign of university president H. Patrick Swygert, Howard made a significant and commendable effort to rehab and sell many of its vacant properties in the neighborhood.

For instance, the university owned all but one house on 400 block of Oakdale Place.  It let these houses lie vacant, blighted, and boarded up.  Under Pres. Swygert, the university renovated the houses and sold them to employees.  Today the 400 block of Oakdale Place is fully occupied and a new condo building is nearing completion on the western end.

531 & 533 U St NW in 2004. Howard University renovated 531 (right) in 2004. Image from the DC government.

In other cases, the university renovated properties but has retained ownership.  531 U Street NW looked terrible in 2004 (right), but now looks very nice. We can’t quite tell if the house is occupied, but it consistently appears to be in good condition.

Elsewhere on the 500 and 600 blocks of U Street, Howard built historic infill houses (below) on vacant lots it owned on the north side of the street. The result is a block with with a continuous wall of housing on the street’s northern face. The houses’ façades are of high quality, with detailed brick work, ornate porches, and a variety of detailing.

The job is not entirely done, however, and Howard University retains ownership of a few properties that raise eyebrows. Let’s look at these three:

649 Florida Avenue (left) sits as a vacant lot, frequently collecting trash and debris. A university official told us that long ago Howard had considered using the lot to create a delightful pedestrian path to the university from the Shaw Metro. That never happened and now the lot sits vacant.

408-410 T Street (center) was the home of Walter Washington, DC’s first elected mayor. The university owns the property, and though it’s not blighted, it may be vacant. With some renovation work, this would make an excellent rental home for a Howard professor or anyone else for that matter.

326 T Street (right) is the Mary Church Terrell House, future home of the Robert and Mary Church Terrell House & LeDroit Park Museum and Cultural Center.  Though it’s vacant and undoubtedly meets the District’s definition of blight, we are willing to cut the university more slack in this case since the eventual outcome will be a wonderful addition to the neighborhood.   Unfortunately, the campus plan does not specify any additional Howard funding to restore the site.

In addition to the properties above, Howard owns a few more properties in LeDroit Park:

• Gravel parking lot at the SE corner of 5th and W Streets. (Square 3072, Lot 818).  Campus plan does not mention any change to this lot.
• Carver Hall, 211 Elm St NW (Square 3084, Lot 830). Campus plan mentions the dorm’s decommission, but no reuse plans.
• Slowe Hall, 1919 3rd St NW (Square 3088, Lot 835). Campus plan mentions the dorm’s decommission, but no reuse plans.
• Howard University Hospital daycare, 1907-11 5th St NW (Square 3090, Lot 41)
• 420 T St NW – a house that appears to be occupied (Square 3094, Lot 800)
• Howard University Hospital (Square 3075, Lot 807)
• Parking garage bounded by 4th St, Oakdale Pl, 5th St, and V St. (Square 3080, Lot 73)
• Parking garage bounded by 4th St, V St, 5th St, and an alley. (Square 3072, Lot 52)

Though Howard retains a few problematic properties, it’s important to note the great strides the university has made in taking responsibility for its property portfolio in the neighborhood. A plan for these few remaining properties, even one in which the university retains ownership but leases, would put residents at greater ease.

Cultural Tourism DC is finishing the installation of the signs for the Georgia Ave./Pleasant Plains Heritage Trail. Here is one we spotted outside the Dunbar Theater (now Wells Fargo bank) at 7th and T Streets NW.

The trail opening event will be on Saturday, October 15 at 11 am at the plaza in front of Howard University Hospital.

Work on the heritage trail for LeDroit Park and Bloomingdale has progressed greatly and we are on our way to having our own trail to honor LeDroit Park’s rich history.

Two century-old DC fountains sit decaying and neglected in the woods of a national park in Maryland. The fountains had been missing from the 1940s until they were rediscovered in the woods of Fort Washington National Park in the 1970s.

The top portion of the McMillan fountain, pictured below, was returned to Crispus Attucks park in the Bloomingdale neighborhood in 1983. In 1992 it was moved back to the fenced-off grounds of the McMillan Reservoir just a few blocks away.

The fountain was installed in 1913 at the McMillan Reservoir as a memorial to Senator James McMillan (R – Michigan), who is more remembered locally for his his ambitious McMillan Plan to beautify Washington. The fountain was dismantled in 1941, when the reservoir was fenced off from the public.

Top of the McMillan Fountain today (left) and in 1912 (right).

Though the top of the McMillan Fountain had been restored to the reservoir grounds, a Bloomingdale ANC commissioner told me the base of the fountain was in the woods in Fort Washington along with the remains of the fountain that stood at the center of the now-razed Truxton Circle.

I went to Fort Washington in search of these discarded works of art. I asked a park ranger where the fountain was and she drew me a map, saying that it stood in the park’s “dump” and partly behind a fence.

I went to the picnic area nearest the site and walked into the woods a short distance where I found a fence. Behind it stood piles of bricks and other discarded building materials.

Beside the site is a dugout that serves as the back court to Battery Emory, a concrete gun battery built in 1898 to protect the capital city from enemy ships.

As I passed through the unfenced dugout, I immediately spotted few granite blocks that served as the cornerstones of the base bowl. Though they are strewn about the ground, a 1912 photograph can help us identify what pieces went where.

A cornerstone sitting on the ground (left) formed part of the fountain’s bottom basin (right).

The elements of the fountain were stacked like totem pole. The bottom element features carved classical allegorical heads from whose mouths water gushed into the carved bowls below.

Fence material and tree debris cover the carved granite (left) that stood as the fountain base (right).

The next element of the stack is the fluted base to the top bowl.

Upside down on the ground (left) is the fluted base for the top bowl (right).

Several other large granite stones are stacked and marked with numbers, presumably to help in reassembly.

The site also contains the rusting remains of the fountain that stood at Truxton Circle, which formed the intersection of North Capitol Street, Florida Avenue, Lincoln Road, and Q Street. The circle was built around 1901 and the fountain installed there originally stood at the triangle park at Pennsylvania Avenue and M Street in Georgetown.

Truxton Circle stood at Florida Avenue, North Capitol Street, Q Street, and Lincoln Road from 1901 to 1940, when it was demolished to aid commuter traffic.

A newspaper at the time described it as one of the largest fountains in the city. The circle was removed in 1940 to ease the flow of commuter traffic. At that time, the fountain, which may date to as early as the 1880s, made its way to Fort Washington to rust in the woods.

The metal pedestal (left) held up the fountain bowl whose rim rusts in pieces on the ground (right). Notice the classical egg-and-dart pattern.

The fountain was also noted for the metal grates that stood near its base. Now these grates sit rusting in the woods.

If you want to see the fountain remains for yourself at Fort Washington National Park, go to picnic area C. Beyond the end of the parking lot is a restroom building and behind that is the fountain “graveyard.” A fence encloses part of the site, but you can enter through the large gap down the hillside.

Rather than tossing aside our city’s artistic patrimony, we should aim to restore these treasures to the neighborhoods from which they came. Public art is part of what differentiates cherished neighborhoods from unmemorable places.

These works remind us of the accomplishments and civic-mindedness of generations past and urge us to carry on the tradition of civic improvement for generations to come.

Two years ago we wrote about the old street names for LeDroit Park. Finding out just when the name change occurred is hard to pin down.  Different sources, from address directories to newspaper articles, refer to old names and new names during the same period of time.

The mystery is closer to resolution, however, as we found what we believe to be the earliest reference to the name change:

New Names for Le Droit Park Streets.
Washington Post
July 31, 1890

The names of the streets in Le Droit Park have been changed as follows: Le Droit Park avenue to Second street, Harewood avenue to Third street, Linden street to Fourth street, Larch street to Fifth street, Juniper street to Sixth street, and Maple avenue to T street.

There appears to be an error in the article as ‘Le Droit avenue’ never actually had ‘Park’ in its name.

The Park at LeDroit was built on the site of the Gage-Eckington School. The school, built in the 1970s, was itself built over streets, houses and apartment buildings.

At the time, 3rd Street extended north of Elm Street and dead-ended just before reaching V Street. Oakdale Place extended eastward from its current terminus at the park to dead-end at what is now the eastern boundary of the park.

Two apartment buildings on the site, the Linden and the Harewood were named after local streets. Before the city changed the neighborhood’s street names, 3rd Street was Harewood Avenue and 4th Street was Linden Street.

We found this 1901 description of the apartments. What’s most notable is that the apartments are marketed to black Washingtonians and thus reflects the neighborhood’s turn-of-the-century transition from a white neighborhood to a black neighborhood.

THE LINDEN AND HAREWOOD FLATS
Le Droit Park—Corner of Harewood and Oak Streets.
The Colored American
January 5, 1901

Mr. Banes the the real estate dealer has erected two of the most modern flats in Washington situated in Le Droit Park. The situation of these flats is an ideal one, on Third street, two doors from the Fourt street car line. The finish of the flats is elegant, and they have a preposessing appearance. They are three stories high, and each floor has three flats of four rooms each and bath. The whole flat is heated by steam, thus saving the necessary expense of buying fuel. Each flat has a parlor, dinning [sic] room, bed room, kitchen, and bath room and private hall rooms, and halls are heated by steam. The kitchens have a modern gas range, hot and cold water, cupboards, pantry attachment. These flats are no doubt, the best in the city. Persons having a large family can easily rent two adjoining flats saving the enormous rent of an entire house. They are thoroughly and artistically finished. The walls are papered and frescoed, and glasses of a large size, supported by a modern mantel piece are in each parlor. Le Droit Park has become a pleasant part of Washington in which to reside and these beautiful flats are a happy addition to the residences there. Mr. Banes has spared no pains in making these flats comfortable and inviting and already applications are being made for retals thereof. Colored people with first class reference who desire a beautiful part of the city in which to live, and at the same time occupy comfortable and improved apartments without renting a whole house, and paying high rent, can find a happy medium in these flats. The terms are easy. The buildings are open daily for inspection. For further information call at the office of Mr. Charles E. Banes, corner of 14th and G sts. n. w.

Dolores Kendrick. Photo by dbking on Flickr.

Paul Laurence Dunbar isn’t the only poet to have graced our neighborhood.  Dolores Kendrick is DC’s poet laureate and, as the Post reports, grew up in LeDroit Park in the 1930s.

Kedrick has authored four books, including “Why the Woman is Singing on the Corner: A Verse Narrative”, a 2001 work that takes place here in DC. Kendrick has an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and National Endowment for the Arts fellowship under her belt.

In the Post article Kendrick reflects on the changes she has seen in Washington:

I suppose the Washington that exists today had to come. The old Washington was segregationist and racist to the point where we couldn’t go downtown to get a hot dog. Our parents would fix us meals before we left so we would not have to endure that indignity. . . . But integration also brought its own problems. The black community somewhat disintegrated, and the seasons changed. It is a very different time, now.

Kendrick will speak at 1 pm on Sunday at the National Book Festival.

This photo, taken around 1910, shows the fire brigade on T Street just west of Anna J. Cooper Circle. The circle’s landscaping was much sparser then than it is today, but you will also notice that this was taken before the city altered 3rd Street to bisect the circle for several decades.

One will also notice the now-razed McGill house on the right side of the photo. That lot now hosts the rectangular brick apartment building that clearly never faced historic preservation review.

We haven’t been able to find any news stories explaining what exactly happened the day of the photo.

If you’re interested in the history of LeDroit Park and would like a free history walking tour, you’re in luck!

As part of the biannual WalkingTown DC, your favorite LeDroit blogger will host four free walking tours of the neighborhood.

• Saturday, September 24, 9 – 10:30 am
• Sunday, September 25, 9 – 10:30 am
• Saturday, October 1, 9 – 10:30 am
• Sunday, October 2, 9 – 10:30 am

Worthy Ambition: LeDroit Park/Bloomingdale Heritage Trail Preview (LeDroit Park Only)
Meet and end at the arch at Florida Ave. and T St., NW.

Explore the unique architecture and historical figures of LeDroit Park durning this specail preveiw of the Cultural Tourism DC’s LeDroit Park/Bloomingdale Heritage Trail, which is currently in development. The neighborhood was developed in 1873 as an exclusive white suburban enclave just beyond the boundaries of the original city. Learn about the neighborhood’s transition in the early 19th century to home of Washington’s black intelligentsia. Neighborhood notables included Dr. Anna J. Cooper, Mayor Walter Washington, Sen. Edward Brooke, Rep. Oscar De Priest, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Mary Church Terrell, Duke Ellington, and Rev. Jesse Jackson, among others. See unique 19th-century houses built in the Second Empire, Gothic Revival, and Italianate styles. Many of these original house designs appear nowhere else in Washington.

Presented by Left for LeDroit and led by LeDroit resident, blogger, and Cultural Tourism DC’s LeDroit Park/Bloomingdale Heritage Trail working group member Eric Fidler.

WalkingTown DC will have free tours citywide.