Museum's Historic Maps Reveal State of Roads

My husband, Libo, and I visited the City Museum for the first time a couple of weeks ago. We definitely would recommend it to anyone who is interested in D.C.'s history.

The museum features an enormous bird's-eye photograph of D.C. on the floor of one of the exhibition rooms. It took us a while, but we finally managed to find Emerald Street on the map.

Even more interesting to me was the map room, which contained maps from throughout D.C.'s history. We found that by looking at maps with a range of publishing dates, we could figure out the approximate time when an area of D.C. was developed.

A map published in 1857 included "lot 1029," which is still the name of the lot for the block including Emerald and 14th Streets. At that time, though the lot existed, there still were no houses. A map dated 1893 showed the state of roads in the Corner Forum area — 13th Street between Maryland Avenue and Emerald Street was coal and asphalt tar; 14th Street was gravel; and 13th Street south of Emerald was slated for improvements in 1893-1894.

If you are interested in researching the history of your house or your area, the City Museum will host an event this Thursday from 6 to 8 p.m. on techniques for researching specific buildings in D.C., with a focus on residences. Admission is $6 for members of the Historical Society of Washington or the City Museum and $8 for nonmembers.

Originally this event was scheduled for Thursday, Sept. 18, the night that the hurricane descended on D.C. It was rescheduled for this Thursday. §