Articles

For about 10 years following the fall of Saigon in April 1975, Arlington, Virginia became a destination for Vietnamese immigrants fleeing communist rule. Then, almost as quickly as it had developed, Arlington's so called "Little Saigon" faded away. 

Ezra Pound was an acclaimed writer who was a central figure in the modernist movement, editing T.S. Eliot’s landmark poem The Waste Land and helping to get other modern writers published, including Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce. When Pound lived in D.C. for twelve years after World War II, you might assume that he called a literary haven or Capitol Hill row house home, but that is far from the case.

April 1922 was a busy time for Washington socialites and the newspapers that followed them, as the city hosted no less than five national and international women’s groups in the span of a few short weeks. DC had long been a party town (pun intended) but these gatherings provide a glimpse of the changing dynamics of womens’ political involvement during the 1920s, immediately following the passage of the nineteenth amendment.

At Howard University in 1967, Muhammad Ali delivered a defiant, electrifying speech—melding sharp critique of the Vietnam War, a fierce defense of his refusal to be drafted, and an unapologetic call for Black pride that echoed across the nation.

Tourists often try to time their visits to Washington to coincide with the annual blooming of its famous cherry blossom trees along the Tidal Basin in April, and inevitably, someone tells them that the trees originally came from Japan as a gesture of international friendship. But the complete story is a bit more complicated, and includes plenty of odd twists and turns.

Years after Marian Anderson was famously barred from performing at D.A.R. Constitution Hall because of her race, she gave a concert at venue. It was an overdue coda to a painful chapter in America’s cultural history.

During World War II, the job market in D.C. exploded; between 1940 and 1945, the number of civilians employed by the government almost quadrupled. The Defense Housing Registry, created by the DC government to help these new employees find housing, processed around 10,000 newcomers every month. The result? A housing crunch.

There was a period, from the late 1940s until the early 1960s, when Washington, D.C. was a veritable Nashville on the Potomac, a mecca that provided country performers a chance to get their records played, and to perform before big audiences. The man who was most responsible for the District's country preeminence was a charismatic impresario who originally hailed from Lizard Lick, N.C. named Connie Barriot Gay.

Director Frank Capra's classic 1939 film, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,  a comedy-drama about an ordinary citizen who ascends to the U.S. Senate, today is widely regarded as an uplifting, if overly sentimental, tribute to the egalitarianism at the heart of American-style democracy. But when it was released, it seemed utterly scandalous to legislators of the day, who vehemently denounced the film and sought to punish Hollywood for daring to make it. 

Elvis Presley made headlines when he showed up at the White House unannounced and offered his services to President Nixon to fight the war on drugs in 1970. It was an odd event, which led to an even odder photo. But the Elvis-Nixon meeting was memorable for another reason: It was one of only four public appearances that Elvis made in the Washington, D.C. area.

High on Lewis Mountain, to the west of the picturesque college town of Charlottesville, sits a house that looks down on the University of Virginia. According to legend, Massachusetts resident Dr. Theodore Giesel  – better known as Dr. Seuss – bought the house after his application to the university was rejected. Is the story true?

In 1966 the University of Maryland's Cole Field House hosted the NCAA Final Four where Texas Western’s five-black starters upset all-white Kentucky. It was a watershed victory that helped accelerate the integration of college basketball.