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How Mount Pleasant was built, from DC's historic building permits, and what the newspaper said about it a hundred years ago this week.
| Decade | Buildings |
|---|---|
| 1880s | 6 |
| 1890s | 28 |
| 1900s | 409 |
| 1910s | 515 |
| 1920s | 338 |
| 1930s | 177 |
| 1940s | 49 |
Each record is one building listed on a historic DC building permit; a single permit can cover many buildings. The busiest decade is highlighted in the chart.
In 1913, L. E. Breuninger built 44 buildings on the 1600 block of Hobart Street NW under 4 permits, designed by H. L. Breuninger. The largest permit covered 30 buildings at an estimated $125,000 in total.
Mentions of Mount Pleasant in the Evening Star, October 31 – November 6, 1926. Searched for "Mount Pleasant Citizens", "Mount Pleasant Library", "Mount Pleasant", "Irving street".
“Miss Louclle Bowie Roberts and j Miss Marian Kent Roberts, daughters of Mrs. Alice Muriele Roberts of 1739 Irving street northwest, attend ed the Navy- Michigan foot ball game In Baltimore last Saturday.”See page 20 at loc.gov ↗
“Liberal reward if returned 1613 Harvard st.. Apt. 202.”See page 9 at loc.gov ↗
“The Men’s Chib of Mount Pleasant Congregational Church will meet Mon day, 8 p.m. Rev. Moses R. Lovell will speak of “The Economic Situation In Europe and America: “The Contrast and the Method.” Dr. Gertrude V. …”See page 9 at loc.gov ↗
“A mnn who gave the name of I Thomas M. Price, 1811 Irving street, Washington, was being detained at police headquarters in Wilmington.”See page 56 at loc.gov ↗
“The Mount Pleasant Citizens’ As sociation will meet, 8 o’clock, at Mount Pleasant Public Library.”See page 9 at loc.gov ↗
“The Mount Pleasant Congregational Church, Columbia road near Four teenth street, has arranged a series of open forums, t< be I n R j. b. scott. irr oils works on 1: ternational law and kindred subjects, will speak November 14 on the theme.”See page 12 at loc.gov ↗
Clips are machine-read text (OCR) from scanned Evening Star pages on the Library of Congress's Chronicling America, lightly cleaned (line-break hyphens rejoined, stray symbols removed); misspellings are the scanner's. Newspapers this old are public domain. Each clip links to its page at loc.gov. Clips that mention race, covenants, deed restrictions or slurs are skipped automatically (keyword list: race, races, racial, colored, coloured, negro, negroes, white only, whites only, for whites, white people, white persons, white residents, caucasian, segregation, segregated, covenant, covenants, restricted, restriction, restrictions, plus a list of slurs), because they need an editor's context; legal notices and lists of private individuals are skipped too.
![Asbury statue, [Washington, D.C.], [between 1910 and 1935]](https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/pnp/npcc/31300/31301r.jpg)
![Dedication of Francis Asbury statue, [Washington, D.C.], 10/15/24, [19]24 October 15.](https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/pnp/npcc/26300/26317r.jpg)
![Pres. Coolidge at unveiling of Francis Asbury statue, [Washington, D.C., 10/15/24], [1924 October 15]](https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/pnp/npcc/26300/26314r.jpg)
Photographs from the Library of Congress (National Photo Company Collection), each with no known restrictions on publication or in the public domain, per the Library. Titles are the Library's, written when the photos were catalogued; some use the language of their time. Each links to its record.
The neighborhood's eastern edge. It was straightened and extended north in the early 1900s (sources give 1901 and 1903). Socialite developer Mary Henderson, wife of Senator John Henderson, worked to make it the city's most fashionable street and had it renamed Avenue of the Presidents, a name that lasted one year.
Earlier: Avenue of the PresidentsSources: Fashionable 16th Street, Mount Pleasant Heritage Trail (HMdb) · Architectural Legacy of Mount Pleasant Street (Historic Mount Pleasant)Historic Mount Pleasant gives its old name as Piney Branch Road. William Selden's house, built after he acquired the land in 1850, overlooked this road; the Union Army later used the house as a hospital.
Earlier: Piney Branch RoadSource: Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant)The southern edge of Mount Pleasant. John Sherman's 1881 Columbia Heights plat used Yale, Harvard, Princeton and Dartmouth to advertise the suburb's aspirations, and Harvard kept its name through the 1905 renaming.
Sources: Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC) · Mount Pleasant (Washington, D.C.) - WikipediaFormerly Kenesaw, a name Ghosts of DC ties to the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain in William T. Sherman's Atlanta campaign. The 1905 renaming made it Irving Street. The Kenesaw apartment house, opened around 1905, kept the old name.
Earlier: Kenesaw AvenueSources: Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC) · Architectural Legacy of Mount Pleasant Street (Historic Mount Pleasant) · Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant)One of the few names left alone in the 1905 renaming that rewrote most of Columbia Heights and Mount Pleasant. The schedules Ghosts of DC quotes list it as not changed. No source we read says what the name refers to.
Source: Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC)A public road from 1839, first known as Klingle Ford Road and Klingle's Road. Klingle inherited his uncle's land and in 1891 sold a large part of it. The valley it follows is mostly National Park Service land.
Earlier: Klingle Ford Road, Klingle's RoadSource: Klingle Road - WikipediaWhere the streetcar stopped when the line reached Mount Pleasant in 1903. The neighborhood's first stores went up across the street from this terminus. It now hosts the Saturday farmers market, and Wikipedia calls it Lamont Plaza.
Sources: Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant) · Mount Pleasant (Washington, D.C.) - WikipediaOriginally Dartmouth Street, one of the college names on the Columbia Heights plat. The August 1905 schedule renamed it Lawrence Street, and the October revision changed that to Lamont. No source we read says who Lamont was.
Earlier: Dartmouth StreetSource: Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC)A street of Lanier Heights, a subdivision begun in 1883 by Elizabeth Lanier Dunn and her husband, retired Army general William M. Dunn. The source does not say outright that the street takes her family name. Wikipedia counts Lanier Heights as part of Adams Morgan.
Source: Lanier Heights - WikipediaSamuel P. Brown bought William Selden's 73 acres in 1862. After the Union Army's hospital left, he subdivided the land east of Piney Branch and called it Mount Pleasant, by one account because it held the highest ground of the old Pleasant Plains estate. The name later moved west of 16th Street.
Earlier: Mount Pleasant VillageSources: Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant) · Mount Pleasant: From Pleasant Plains to the Raven (Ghosts of DC, 2015) · Mount Pleasant (Washington, D.C.) - WikipediaA 1903 Baist map labels it 16 1/2 Street, as it was known right after the new 16th Street was laid out. Through the 1890s 16th Street itself jogged along this line. The streetcar arrived in 1903 and developers quickly lined it with rowhouses and shops.
Earlier: 16 1/2 StreetSources: Architectural Legacy of Mount Pleasant Street (Historic Mount Pleasant) · Fashionable 16th Street, Mount Pleasant Heritage Trail (HMdb)Shown as Howard on 1880s maps; Ghosts of DC says that name honored Oliver O. Howard, founder of Howard University. Newton replaced it. The Walbridge house, built in 1851, had its entrance moved to this street after the land around it was subdivided.
Earlier: Howard AvenueSources: 1887 Map of Mt. Pleasant and Columbia Heights (Ghosts of DC) · Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC) · Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant)Historic Mount Pleasant calls it Peirce Mill Road in the 1850s. Maps of the 1880s and 1890s show Whitney Avenue. The District's August 1905 schedule proposed Marshall Road before the October revision settled on Park Road, according to Ghosts of DC.
Earlier: Peirce Mill Road, Whitney AvenueSources: Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant) · 1887 Map of Mt. Pleasant and Columbia Heights (Ghosts of DC) · Old Columbia Heights Street Names (Ghosts of DC)Hiram Walbridge, a New York congressman who died in 1870, owned the Ingleside estate west of the Selden land. His heirs sold part in 1889 and subdivided the rest after 1903. His 1851 house, by Capitol architect Thomas U. Walter, is the neighborhood's oldest building. The source does not explicitly tie the street to him.
Source: Mount Pleasant Neighborhood History (Historic Mount Pleasant)Still looking for a reliable source on Adams Mill Road NW, Argonne Place NW, Brown Street NW, Hobart Street NW, Kilbourne Place NW, Oak Street NW, Oakwood Terrace NW, Rosemount Avenue NW. We don't publish a name's story until we can cite one. Know it? Tell us.
Ten audio interviews, with transcripts, recorded by Pat Scallen with people who were part of the community during the 1991 riot, set off by a police shooting of a Salvadoran man. They cover the riot, policing, neighborhood history, gentrification and what changed afterward.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative) · 1991 riot, police-community relations, gentrification, Latino communityFleming moved to Mount Pleasant in 1975, served three terms as an ANC commissioner in the 1980s and co-founded Neighbors Consejo. He discusses the riot, gentrification, public intoxication, improvements in community policing afterward, and relations among the neighborhood's communities.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · ANC, 1991 riot, community policing, gentrificationA Salvadoran American and longtime resident, Avilés describes arriving in Adams Morgan in 1974, the Sacred Heart Church theatre group, tensions between teachers and non-English-speaking students, the riot, and his later role as founding member and director of the DC Latino Civil Rights Task Force.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · Sacred Heart, DC Latino Civil Rights Task Force, 1991 riot, schoolsGriffiths, a longtime resident and activist born in Panama, co-founded the Latin American Youth Center. He talks about learning English, Howard University, Mayor Barry and the Latino community, how the riot affected Latinos in Mount Pleasant, and gentrification.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · Latin American Youth Center, Marion Barry, 1991 riot, gentrificationA longtime resident from one of the neighborhood's few remaining multigenerational African American families, Howard talks about growing up there, residents' political activism in the 1970s, police-community language barriers, the riot and gentrification.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · multigenerational family, 1970s activism, 1991 riot, gentrificationHart bought a home in Mount Pleasant in 1974 and has worked with the Main Street Association and Historic Mt. Pleasant. She covers changing demographics, the controversy over historic district designation, the riot, police-community relations and gentrification.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · historic district, 1991 riot, Main Street, affordable housingKelly has lived in Mount Pleasant since 1983 and has been active in the local ANC. She describes her first impressions of the neighborhood, improvements at the elementary school, community work on the main street, and the riot.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library (DC Oral History Collaborative: Mount Pleasant Riot Oral History Project) · ANC, local school, Main Street, 1991 riotA barbershop owner who came to Washington from New York talks about his shop in Mount Pleasant, his immigration to the United States, the D.C. Hispanic community and groups such as Ayuda and the Catholic Hispanic Center, and education here and at home.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library · barbershop, immigration, Hispanic communityA Latino police officer in the Mt. Pleasant area describes his duties as a bilingual officer, relations between police and the community, disillusionment among Hispanic officers, and the problems and agencies of the Latino community. A two-part interview.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library · police, Latino community, bilingual officersCleary describes growing up Filipino American in Massachusetts, joining the Marine Corps, and opening and running her restaurant in Washington while promoting Filipino cuisine. The archive tags the interview to Mount Pleasant.
At Dig DC, DC Public Library · Filipino Americans, restaurants, Marine CorpsSearch the archives yourself: The People's Archive, DC Public Library · Historic Chevy Chase DC Oral History Archive · Humanities Truck Community Archive, American University · Tenleytown Historical Society · Boundary Stones (WETA) · Glover Park History: Oral History and Reminiscences · Cleveland Park Historical Society Oral Histories · Rainbow History Project Digital Collections · hometown DC (DC History Center) · Hola Cultura: Adams Morgan History · Citizens Association of Georgetown · Peabody Room, Georgetown Neighborhood Library (DC Public Library) · Smithsonian Anacostia Community Museum Archives: A Right to the City Exhibition Records · Ruth Ann Overbeck Capitol Hill History Project · Mosaic Theater H Street Oral History Project · Library of Congress, Manuscript Division · Anacostia Community Museum Archives (Smithsonian) · Naval History and Heritage Command, Navy Department Library · The Catholic University of America Archives · Bygone Brookland · Dig DC, DC Public Library · hometown DC (HumanitiesDC / Historical Society of Washington, D.C.) · Dig DC, DC Public Library's digital repository · A Right to the City exhibition records, Anacostia Community Museum Archives (Smithsonian) · Rainbow History Project Digital Collections · Palisades Community Association · Forest Hills Connection (neighborhood history series) · Foggy Bottom Association History Project: Oral Histories · George Washington University Special Collections Research Center · Woodley Park Community: A Sketch of Our Past · Empower DC: Ivy City · Power of Preserving the Black Deaf Experience (Dig DC) · Gallaudet University Archives. Summaries are ours; the recordings and their rights stay with each archive.