Raleigh Hotel (Washington D.C.)

Last updated
The Raleigh Hotel
The Raleigh Hotel - Washington, D.C..jpg
Location map Washington, D.C. central.png
Red pog.svg
Location within Central Washington, D.C.
General information
Type Office
Location Washington, D.C., United States
Coordinates 38°53′43″N77°01′40″W / 38.895304°N 77.027684°W / 38.895304; -77.027684 Coordinates: 38°53′43″N77°01′40″W / 38.895304°N 77.027684°W / 38.895304; -77.027684
Completed 1893
Demolished 1964
Height
Roof 160 feet (49 m)
Design and construction
Architect Leon E. Dessez;
Henry Janeway Hardenbergh

Raleigh Hotel was an historic high-rise office and then hotel building located in Washington, D.C., United States, on 12th Street, N.W., and Pennsylvania Avenue, in the downtown neighborhood.

Washington, D.C. Capital of the United States

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington or D.C., is the capital of the United States. Founded after the American Revolution as the seat of government of the newly independent country, Washington was named after George Washington, the first President of the United States and a Founding Father. As the seat of the United States federal government and several international organizations, Washington is an important world political capital. The city is also one of the most visited cities in the world, with more than 20 million tourists annually.

United States Federal republic in North America

The United States of America (USA), commonly known as the United States or America, is a country comprising 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, and various possessions. At 3.8 million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is slightly smaller than the entire continent of Europe's 3.9 million square miles. With a population of over 327 million people, the U.S. is the third most populous country. The capital is Washington, D.C., and the largest city by population is New York City. Forty-eight states and the capital's federal district are contiguous in North America between Canada and Mexico. The State of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east and across the Bering Strait from Russia to the west. The State of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U.S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, stretching across nine official time zones. The extremely diverse geography, climate, and wildlife of the United States make it one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries.

Contents

History

The site, on the northeast corner of 12th Street N.W., and Pennsylvania Avenue, was originally occupied by the Fountain Inn, erected in 1815 [1] after the burning of Washington. This structure was razed and in 1847 the four-story Fuller Hotel opened. [1] Renamed the Kirkwood House, it was the residence of Vice President Andrew Johnson; he took the oath of office of the President of the United States there in April 1865 after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. [1]

Burning of Washington

The Burning of Washington was a British invasion of Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, during the Battle of Bladensburg in the War of 1812. On August 24, 1814, after defeating the Americans at the Battle of Bladensburg, a British force led by Major General Robert Ross burned down multiple buildings, including the White House, the Capitol building, as well as other facilities of the U.S. government. The attack was in part a retaliation for the recent American destruction of Port Dover in Upper Canada. The Burning of Washington marks the only time since the American Revolutionary War that a foreign power has captured and occupied the United States capital.

Vice President of the United States Second highest executive office in United States

The Vice President of the United States is the second-highest officer in the executive branch of the U.S. federal government, after the president of the United States, and ranks first in the presidential line of succession. The vice president is also an officer in the legislative branch, as President of the Senate. In this capacity, the vice president presides over Senate deliberations, but may not vote except to cast a tie-breaking vote. The vice president also presides over joint sessions of Congress.

Andrew Johnson 17th president of the United States

Andrew Johnson was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. Johnson assumed the presidency as he was vice president of the United States at the time of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union ticket, Johnson came to office as the Civil War concluded. He favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union. His plans did not give protection to the former slaves; he came into conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote. Johnson's main accomplishment as president is the Alaska purchase.

Kirkwood House was razed in 1875 and replaced with the Shepherd Centennial Building, a seven-story office building in the Second Empire style (it opened in 1876). [1] The upper floors were rented by the Pension Office from 1876 to 1885, as they apparently had to use multiple private office buildings until their new building, the Pension Bureau building was ready. The ground floor on the Pennsylvania Avenue. side was rented by the Palais Royal department store from 1877 to 1893.

National Building Museum museum in Washington, D.C.

The National Building Museum is located at 401 F Street NW in Washington, D.C., United States. It is a museum of "architecture, design, engineering, construction, and urban planning". It was created by an act of Congress in 1980, and is a private non-profit institution; it is adjacent to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial and the Judiciary Square Metro station. The museum hosts various temporary exhibits in galleries around the spacious Great Hall.

The Shepherd Centennial Building was converted into a hotel in 1893 by architect Leon E. Dessez and renamed the Raleigh Hotel. [2] The Raleigh Hotel was razed in 1911 and rebuilt by architect Henry Janeway Hardenbergh as a 13-story Beaux Arts hotel with a rusticated brick, white limestone, and terra cotta exterior. [2] Congress changed the height limit for buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue NW from 130 feet (40 m) to 160 feet (49 m) in 1910 in order to accommodate the Raleigh Hotel. [2] In 1936, there was a major interior renovation. Curt Schliffeler managed the hotel from 1936 to 1954. In 1964, the Raleigh was demolished. [3]

Leon E. Dessez American architect

Leon Emil Dessez was an architect in Washington D.C.. He designed public buildings in Washington D.C. and residences in Washington D.C., Maryland, and Virginia, including some of the first in Chevy Chase, Maryland, where he was the community's first resident. His work includes the 1893 the conversion of 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue, The Shepherd Centennial Building, into the Raleigh Hotel and the Normal School for Colored Girls (1913) designed with Snowden Ashford.

Henry Janeway Hardenbergh architect

Henry Janeway Hardenbergh was an American architect, best known for his hotels and apartment buildings.

Beaux-Arts architecture expresses the academic neoclassical architectural style

Beaux-Artsarchitecture was the academic architectural style taught at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, particularly from the 1830s to the end of the 19th century. It drew upon the principles of French neoclassicism, but also incorporated Gothic and Renaissance elements, and used modern materials, such as iron and glass. It was an important style in France until the end of the 19th century. It also had a strong influence on architecture in the United States, because of the many prominent American architects who studied at the Beaux-Arts, including Henry Hobson Richardson, John Galen Howard, Daniel Burnham, and Louis Sullivan.

The site is now known as 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue.

See also

Related Research Articles

George B. Post American architect

George Browne Post was an American architect trained in the Beaux-Arts tradition. Many of his most characteristic projects were for commercial buildings where new requirements pushed the traditional boundaries of design. Many have been demolished, since their central locations in New York and other cities made them vulnerable to rebuilding in the twentieth century. Some of his lost buildings were regarded as landmarks of their era. He was active from 1869 almost until his death in 1913. His sons, who had been taken into the firm in 1904, continued as George B. Post and Sons through 1930.

J. Edgar Hoover Building architectural structure

The J. Edgar Hoover Building is a low-rise office building located at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., in the United States. It is the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Planning for the building began in 1962, and a site was formally selected in January 1963. Design work, focusing on avoiding the typical blocky, monolithic structure typical of most federal architecture at the time, began in 1963 and was largely complete by 1964. Land clearance and excavation of the foundation began in March 1965; delays in obtaining congressional funding meant that only the three-story substructure was complete by 1970. Work on the superstructure began in May 1971. These delays meant that the cost of the project grew to $126.108 million from $60 million. Construction finished in September 1975, and President Gerald Ford dedicated the structure on September 30, 1975.

Paul Philippe Cret French-American architect and industrial designer

Paul Philippe Cret was a French-born Philadelphia architect and industrial designer. For more than thirty years, he taught a design studio in the Department of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site National Historic Site in the city of Washington, D.C.

Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site is a National Historic Site in the city of Washington, D.C. Established on September 30, 1965, the site is roughly bounded by Constitution Avenue, 15th Street NW, F Street NW, and 3rd Street NW. The historic district includes a number of culturally, aesthetically, and historically significant structures and places, including Pennsylvania Avenue NW from the White House to the United States Capitol, the Treasury Building, Freedom Plaza, Federal Triangle, Ford's Theatre, the Old Patent Office Building, the Old Pension Office Building, Judiciary Square, and the Peace Monument.

Treasury Building (Washington, D.C.) US government building

The Treasury Building in Washington, D.C., is a National Historic Landmark building which is the headquarters of the United States Department of the Treasury. An image of the Treasury Building is featured on the back of the United States ten-dollar bill.

15 Penn Plaza skyscraper

15 Penn Plaza, also known as the Vornado Tower, is a 68-story tower proposed by Vornado Realty Trust to be located in Midtown Manhattan on Seventh Avenue between 32nd and 33rd Streets, on the site of present-day Hotel Pennsylvania. The Hiller Group is the designer. Despite only having 68 floors, it would be just 10 metres (33 ft) shorter than the Empire State Building, which has 102 floors.

1111 Pennsylvania Avenue

1111 Pennsylvania Avenue is a mid-rise Postmodern office building located in Washington, D.C., in the United States. It is 180 feet (55 m) tall, has 14 stories, and has a four-story underground parking garage. It is a "contributing" resource to the Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site.

Edward H. Kendall American architect

Edward Hale Kendall was an American architect with a practice in New York City.

Paul Amos Batholomew (1883–1973) was an architect in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. From the beginning of his practice, he received a variety of high-profile commissions for both residential and non-residential structures, mainly in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. His buildings typically had historicist facades, with neoclassical or Italianate ornamentation covering a modern framework. It was only in the 1950s, toward the end of his career, that he created buildings that were purely modern in design. During the Great Depression, a particularly trying time for architects, he received the commission to design Norvelt, which was a new town created as part of President Roosevelt's New Deal policies.

William Lee Stoddart (1868–1940) was an architect best known for designing urban hotels in the eastern United States. Although he was born in Tenafly, New Jersey, most of his commissions were in the South. He maintained offices in Atlanta and New York City.

Wilson Brothers & Company prominent Victorian-era architecture and engineering firm

Wilson Brothers & Company was a prominent Victorian-era architecture and engineering firm established in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that was especially noted for its structural expertise. The brothers designed or contributed engineering work to hundreds of bridges, railroad stations and industrial buildings, including the principal buildings at the 1876 Centennial Exposition. They also designed churches, hospitals, schools, hotels and private residences. Among their surviving major works are the Pennsylvania Railroad, Connecting Railway Bridge over the Schuylkill River (1866–67), the main building of Drexel University (1888–91), and the train shed of Reading Terminal (1891–93), all in Philadelphia.

Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.) historic building in Washington, D.C.

The Old Post Office, listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Old Post Office and Clock Tower and located at 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., was begun in 1892, completed in 1899, and is a contributing property to the Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site. It was used as the city's main General Post Office until 1914 at the beginning of World War I, succeeding an earlier 1839 edifice, G.P.O. of Classical Revival style, expanded in 1866 on F Street, which later was turned over to the Tariff Commission and several other agencies. The Pennsylvania Avenue 1899 landmark structure functioned primarily as an federal office building afterward, and was nearly torn down during the construction of the surrounding Federal Triangle complex in the 1920s. It was again threatened and nearly demolished in the 1970s to make way for proposals for the completion of the enveloping Federal Triangle complex of similar Beaux Arts styled architecture government offices, first begun in the 1920s and 30s.

Cutts–Madison House Historic building in Washington, D.C.

The Cutts–Madison House is an American colonial-style historic home located at 1520 H Street NW in Washington, D.C.The house is best known for being the residence of former First Lady Dolley Madison, who lived there from November 1837 until her death in July 1849.

Globe Building, Beebe Building and Hotel Cecil

The Globe Building, Beebe Building and the Hotel Cecil are a trio of historic office/hotel buildings located in Downtown Seattle, Washington. The buildings occupy the entire west side of the 1000 block of 1st Avenue between Madison and Spring Streets. All three buildings were constructed from late 1900 to 1901 for Syracuse, New York investors Clifford Beebe and William Nottingham by the Clise Investment Company, headed by the prominent Seattlite James Clise (1855–1938), as a result of the Alaska Gold Rush which resulted in the construction of many such buildings in downtown Seattle. James Clise made other major contributions to the future of Seattle including convincing L.C. Smith to build the Smith Tower, securing land on Magnolia Bluff to build Fort Lawton and playing a major part in the Denny Regrade which reshaped the city. He was also active in securing the site for the University of Washington campus as well as the Lake Washington Ship Canal.

Vlastimil Koubek was a Czech American architect who designed more than 100 buildings, most of them in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. When he died, he had designed buildings worth more than $2 billion. Most of his work is Modernist in style, although he developed a few structures in other vernaculars. He created the site plan for the redevelopment of Rosslyn, Virginia, and his Ames Center anchored the area's economic recovery. He also designed the World Building in Silver Spring, Maryland, which sparked redevelopment of that town's downtown and the L'Enfant Plaza Hotel in Washington, D.C. amongst many other buildings. In 1985, Washingtonian magazine considered him to be one of 20 people "who in the past 20 years had the greatest impact on the way we live and who forever altered the look of Washington." In 1988, The Washington Post newspaper said his Willard Hotel renovation was one of 28 projects in the area which made a signal contribution to the "feel" and look of Washington, D.C.

Seven Buildings

The Seven Buildings were seven townhouses constructed on the northwest corner of Pennsylvania Avenue NW and 19th Street NW in Washington, D.C., in 1796. They were some of the earliest residential structures built in the city. One of the Seven Buildings was the presidential home of President James Madison and his wife, Dolley, after the burning of the White House in 1814, and later the residence of Martin Van Buren shortly before and after his inauguration as President. Most of the buildings were demolished in 1959. The facades of two buildings were incorporated into the Embassy of Mexico in 1986.

Waldorf–Astoria (1893–1929) Former hotel in Manhattan, New York City

The Waldorf–Astoria originated as two hotels, built side-by-side by feuding relatives on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Built in 1893 and expanded in 1897, the Waldorf–Astoria was razed in 1929 to make way for construction of the Empire State Building. Its successor, the current Waldorf Astoria New York, was built on Park Avenue in 1931.

Stewarts Castle Former mansion in Washington, D.C.

Stewart's Castle, also referred to as Castle Stewart or Stewart's Folly, was a mansion in Washington, D.C., located on the north side of Dupont Circle between Connecticut Avenue and Massachusetts Avenue. The house owed its various names to the original owner, Senator William Morris Stewart, the imposing, turreted facade and its prominence in an area considered undesirable at the time of its construction. Designed by architect Adolf Cluss, the house was completed in 1873 but only stood for 28 years. It was badly damaged in a fire in 1879, but later repaired and rented to the Chinese Legation from 1886 to 1893. The house was sold to Senator William A. Clark, who razed it in 1901 with the intention of building a new residence. The plans never came to fruition and the site remained vacant for over 20 years until the construction of a commercial building, which still stands.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Goode, James W. Capital Losses: A Cultural History of Washington's Destroyed Buildings. 2d ed. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 2003, p. 388.
  2. 1 2 3 Goode, Capital Losses: A Cultural History of Washington's Destroyed Buildings, 2003, p. 218.
  3. John DeFerrari (2011). Lost Washington. The History Press. pp. 35–39. ISBN   978-1-60949-365-3 . Retrieved 3 September 2013.