Cultural Convergence

—Columbia Heights Heritage Trail —

The 1100 and 1200 blocks of Girard Street once were home to a "Who's Who" of African American leaders. This and nearby "double-blocks" are the heart of John Sherman's Columbia Heights subdivision. By placing all houses 30 feet from the street's center, Sherman created a gracious and inviting streetscape. The elegant rowhouses, built mostly between 1894 and 1912, echoed the social and economic class of their first, white residents. By the 1920s black families began arriving from neighborhoods to the east and south. Many had ties to nearby Howard University. Dr. Montague Cobb of 1221 Girard, a foremost physical anthropologist, headed the Howard Medical School's Anatomy Department and helped lead the NAACP. His colleague, Dr. Roland Scott of 1114 Girard, chaired Pediatrics and led the fight against sickle cell disease. Dorothy Porter Wesley, of 1201 Girard, developed the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, the eminent library of the African Diaspora. Educator Paul Phillips Cooke, who led the American Veterans Committee and became President of D.C. Teachers College, moved to 1203 Girard as a boy in 1928 and remained until 2006. Across Girard Street is Carlos Rosario Public Charter School, originally the white Wilson Normal School (teachers college) and later part of the University of the
District of Columbia. As you walk to Sign 9, you'll pass Fairmont Street, where jazz pianist, composer, and educator Billy Taylor grew up at 1207. Music teacher Henry Grant, mentor to both Taylor and Duke Ellington, once lived at 1114. Home rule activist Rev. Channing Phillips lived at 1232 Fairmont before becoming, in 1968, the first African American nominated for U.S. president at a major party convention. Captions:Hilda (Mrs. Montague) Cobb, top row, right, poses with the Mignonettes social club at her Girard St. home, 1952Dr. W. Montague Cobb, second from left, and the St. George's String Quartet, 1939. Educator Dr. Paul Phillips Cooke in his D.C. Teachers College office and posing in front of his home as a Garnet-Patterson Junior High School graduate, below. Jazz musician Billy Taylor, above, grew up at 1207 Fairmont St. Young Billy, top right, posed with brother Rudy, bottom right, and cousins around 1930. Rev. Channing Phillips, candidate for U.S. president, 1968. Dunbar High School music teacher Henry Grant, at right with the All High Schools Orchestra in 1936, influenced Duke Ellington and Billy Taylor. Dr. Roland Scott, right, and Dorothy Porter Wesley and student, below. Marker reverse:
More than 200 years ago, city planner Pierre Charles L'Enfant designed a new capital city on the
low coastal plain at the confluence of the Potomac and Anacostia rivers, bordered on the north by a steep hill. Today the hill defines Columbia Heights.

Cultural Convergence: Columbia Heights Heritage Trail takes you on a tour of the lively neighborhood that began as a remote suburb of Washington City. Over time, transportation innovations, starting with streetcars, made Columbia Heights accessible and desirable. Soon, men and women of every background populated the neighborhood, people who changed the world with new technology, revolutionary ideas, literature, laws, and leadership. From the low point of the civil disturbances of 1968, Columbia Heights turned to resident leaders and rose again. Metrorail's arrival in 1999 provided a boost, reviving the historically important 14th Street commercial corridor. Experience both the new and old Columbia Heights, with all its cultural and economic diversity, as you talk this walk.
A Description of the Cultural Convergence: Columbia Heights Heritage Trail tour and acknowledgment of its creators follows.
Caption: The Wilson Normal 1924 graduating class in front of the school (Rosario Public Charter School since 2004).The Historical Society of Washington, D.C.

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