The White House, Lafayette Square and African Americans
To imagine what it was like here when the White House was being constructed in the 1790s, erase everything else...
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Self-emancipation in Lafayette Park
In 1810 an enslaved woman named Alethia Browning Tanner purchased her freedom with $1400 she had earned selling vegetables in the area...
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Daniel Webster's House
Before the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Building was built during 1922-25, a simple three-and-a-half story brick home stood in...
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712 Jackson Place
Many people know the sensational story of Congressman Daniel Sickles who shot his wife's lover in broad daylight in 1859 on...
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African Americans in Lafayette Square, 1795-1965
The phrase "The Half Had Not Been Told Me" is taken from a Biblical reference Frederick Douglass used to describe...
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The President and His Steward Meet with a Calamity
John Quincy Adams hired Antoine Michel Giusta as his valet after they met in Belgium in 1814. Giusta was a deserter...
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Rodgers House and Belasco Theater
The Rodgers HouseThe Rodgers House, formerly at 717 Madison Place, was constructed in 1831 by Commodore John Rodgers, a high-ranking naval officer....
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First Lady Hoover's Tea Party with Mrs. De Priest Creates a Stir
Oscar De Priest’s election to Congress as a Republican representative from Chicago in 1928 created an interesting political and social di...
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William Monroe Trotter Challenges President Wilson
Civil Rights activist and journalist William Monroe Trotter caused a stir in 1914 because he strongly protested President Woodrow Wilson’s su...
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President Truman and Civil Rights
Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in major league baseball on April 15, 1947 signaling a historic step forward in the movement...
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President Johnson and Civil Rights
A master of the art of practical politics, Lyndon Johnson came into the White House after the tragedy of President...
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Tayloe House
Five hundred and forty-seven dollars and fifty cents. According to the records of the District of Columbia that is the...