In the summer of 1969, thousands of young people gathered together to attend a festival showcasing many of the greatest musicians of their generation. Huddled around each other in the mud, these counterculture youth engaged in a capstone event to the rebellious and liberating 1960s. This event, of course, was Maryland’s Laurel Pop Festival.
Those who travelled into the District in the early part of May could enjoy a rock concert, good food, and plenty of protesting. In May 1971, the culmination of months of anti-Vietnam protesting took hold of D.C., when thousands of young Americans attempted to block traffic, execute sit-ins, and make their voices heard.
“Immaculate” and “modern to the nth degree” read a Washington Post ad one December day in 1930. Sounds intriguing, but what dazzling, new technology was it describing? A television set? One of those new electric razors? Penicillin?
Decades before Venus and Serena Williams dominated women’s tennis on the WTA tour, the Peters Sisters — Margaret Peters, a.k.a. “Pete", and Roumania Peters, a.k.a. “Repeat” — from Georgetown, were unstoppable champions in the all-black American Tennis Association.
"The visions that baseball fans could conjure only in their fondest dreams will evolve as realisms at Griffith Stadium on Wednesday when spectacle will be heaped on spectacle, thrill piled on thrill. There, in a contest apart from all the rest, the dream game comes to life." Though few others described the mood as eloquently as Shirley Povich, many in the nation’s capital shared his excitement as Washington prepared to host its first baseball All-Star game in 1937.
When it comes to music, Washington D.C is known as the birthplace of Go-Go, and a foundational city for Hardcore Punk. However, the city’s musical presence doesn’t end there. Perhaps less well known is D.C’s importance for American Primitive Guitar, a somewhat more obscure though nevertheless highly influential genre.
In November 1985, the last thing Washingtonians expected to see was the Princess of Wales strolling through the Springfield Mall...sadly she didn't stop for a soft pretzel along the way.
In 1992, D.C. was rife with three “C’s”: Clinton, crack, and comedians. The first found a home in the White House, the second began to disappear from the streets, but the third—eager to make it as Stand-Ups—were left to wander in a city that offered them limited opportunities to perform. The opening of a new comedy club that July, the DC Improv, could not have come at a better time.
Few people in history have skipped their senior prom for the opportunity to play baseball in Hagerstown, Maryland. Few people in history have also hit 660 home runs, played in 24 All-Star games, and won 13 Gold Glove Awards. As far as we know, there’s only one who has done both.
It’s Washington in 1967, and the District’s old reputation as a sleepy, southern city is being squashed by the feet of Vietnam War protesters and the voices of Washingtonians calling for racial equality. That same year, local theatre Arena Stage announced that, on December 12, it would be putting on the world premiere of Howard Sackler’s play, The Great White Hope. At the time of its production, the play was completely unknown. No one would have imagined that 50 years later, the production of the now-Tony-winning show would go down in history as one of the most influential moments in shaping the political and cultural landscape of Washington in the 1960s.
Few would believe that Arlington County once contained its own Little Italy – and few would recognize it if they saw it. Unlike the prototypical image of urban markets and crowded apartments, what Arlingtonians once referred to as "Little Italy" (or "Little Sicily") was an isolated makeshift village occupied by Italian quarrymen and their families on the banks of the Potomac, accessible only by footpath.
On Friday, January 27, 1950, Mary Church Terrell met three friends for a late lunch in downtown Washington. Terrell, then 86, entered Thompson’s Restaurant on 14th Street NW around 2:45 pm with Rev. William H. Jernigan, Geneva Brown and David Scull. Their party was integrated – Scull was white while the others were black – however, Thompson’s Restaurant was not. Like most other D.C. eating establishments at the time, it was whites only.
As the group went about selecting entrees along the cafeteria line, Manager Levin Ange emerged and informed them that Thompson’s did not serve “colored” people. Terrell clarified, “Do you mean to tell me that you are not going to serve me?” When Ange confirmed that was the case, the group left the restaurant.
The chain of events was, of course, entirely expected. As a leader of Washington’s civil rights movement for half a century, Mary Church Terrell was well aware of Thompson’s policy. But she and the others didn’t go to the restaurant to be served. Rather they went with the expectation of being turned away – the necessary, if also demeaning, first step toward bringing a new sort of legal challenge, which they hoped would topple segregation in the nation’s capital.
