Pennsylvania farmer and dairyman, Isaac Newton served as the first United States Commissioner of Agriculture. Under Newton, the agency focused on research and education, disseminating information to farmers throughout the nation. Newton advocated for…
Solomon Northrup, a free African American from New York, arrived in Washington in 1841 in the company of two white men who had promised him a job as a fiddler. After a day touring the Capitol and White House Grounds, the men drugged him and handed…
In 1783, the Senate Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds commissioned Olmsted, who had co-designed Central Park in New York City, to design the grounds of the Capitol. Olmsted created a park-like plan that complimented the Capitol building. His…
Olmsted Jr. was a landscape architect appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt to serve on the Senate Park Commission in 1901. The Commission was charged with improving the Mall's design and restoring elements of Pierre Charles L'Enfant's original…
In 1791, 15 landowners negotiated with President George Washington to give the government land for the creation of a new federal capital, Washington. Land from Daniel Carroll of Duddington, David Burnes, and Notley Young became the National Mall.…
Activist and leader of the National Woman's Party, Alice Paul organized the Woman Suffrage Parade on Pennsylvania Avenue the day before Woodrow Wilson's inauguration in March, 1913. Four years later, Paul led a demonstration in front of the White…
Civil rights leader and labor organizer A. Philip Randolph built coalitions of African Americans who pressured presidents, Congress, and local governments to end racial discrimination. In 1941, he organized a proposed march on Washington by African…
Jeanette Rankin was the first woman member of Congress. Rankin served two nonconsecutive terms in 1916 and again in 1940, giving her the unique ability to vote against US entry into war for both World War I and World War II. Rankin continued her…
Philip Reed was an enslaved man who worked in the foundry operated by his owner, Clark Mills. The foundry cast the statues of Andrew Jackson in Lafayette Square and the statue of "Freedom" which tops the Capitol dome. The plaster cast for "Freedom"…
James Renwick Jr. won the 1846 competition to design the first Smithsonian Institution building. His design drew heavily from architectural styles of 12th-century Europe that gave the building a castle-like appearance. Although Renwick took pains to…
