By 1800, the new capital city had begun to develop near the Potomac in the view down the river from the port of Georgetown. Rolling hills, prolific vegetation, and the powerful Potomac river promised a beautiful Capitol city and vibrant commercial…

This early aquatint shows the landscape surrounding Washington. Looking east from the land of the federal city, it shows views of the Potomac River.

Three-quarters of a century of a century after the founding of the city of Washington, Dr. Joseph Toner, an amateur historian of the District of Columbia, decided to find out who had owned the land of the nation's capital before the city was…

During the 1890s, archaeologists, geologists, and paleontologist affiliated with the Smithsonian began extensive excavations in stone quarries dotting the land in the District of Columbia. "The spot now the political center of the nation was, in…

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…

Hundreds of tractors paraded into Washington in February 5, 1979 to protest existing agriculture policies. The American Agriculture Movement organized this protest in 1979 after the 1st Tractorcade in 1978 did not bring changes they demanded. After…

In this photo, residents of Resurrection City wash mud from their feet. In the late spring and early summer of 1968, 2800 demonstrators camped on the Mall on 15 acres of open space south of the Reflecting Pool, including the area which is now the…

This program cover for the 1913 March shows a woman dressed as a knight, carrying the banner of "Votes for Women" upon her white steed. The Capitol is shown in the background. On the day of the Suffrage Parade over 5,000 mostly female marchers…

In September 1888 a tornado, called a cyclone by the press, touched down on Maryland Avenue SW. It damaged the roofs of the National Museum and the Fish Commission buildings. Just north of the Fish Commission buildings, a group of houses and…

In 1943 a group of more than 400 rabbis, many of whom were Jewish Orthodox, demonstrated on the National Mall to urge the US to help the Jewish people of Nazi occupied Europe. Held three days before Yom Kippur, the October 6 rally generated national…