Introduction Credits:
Craig Clarke

Introduction Date:
04/28/2006

Introduction Text:

On the night of November 27, 1889, prominent leaders of the business community gathered at the Ebbitt House to create The Washington Board of Trade. Originally known as The Board of Trade for the District of Columbia, the Board was formally organized as a legal entity on December 2, 1889. From 1874 until 1974, Washington did not have its own elected local government, as the city was administered with Federal oversight from Congress and the President. Despite being a private organization, the Washington Board of Trade filled the void created by having no locally elected body and transformed into an organization that wielded a government like influence in two ways. In lieu of an elected city government, it addressed the civic concerns of local residents in numerous areas such as urban planning, development, transportation, crime, employment, and many, many more. Also, the Board advocated the needs of the District to the Congressional committees and the Federal commissioners that provided governmental oversight. 

This module explores the history of the Washington Board of Trade in two areas: 

1. A general history of the Board is presented with documents that examine the forces and motivations that brought about its creation. 
   

2. The Board of Trade has spent a considerable amount of resources investing in the cultural infrastructure of the District. Promoting the construction and maintenance of venues for professional sports, civic meetings, conventions, performing arts, cultural events, and large festivals is explored. Having to work within the "peculiar system of government" in Washington, cited in 1889 as the largest reason for creating the Board, made investments in the cultural infrastructure very difficult and often times quite painful.

The Early History of the Washington Board of Trade

The creation of the Washington Board of Trade is a result of the city's bid to be chosen as host of an international festival to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Columbus' voyage to the New World. To be held in 1893, Congress accepted bids in 1889 from cities vying to become host of the six-month long festival. With the winner to be chosen in February of 1890, the cities of Washington, St. Louis, New York, and Chicago all submitted hosting proposals. Throughout 1889, a flurry of articles and editorials were printed in The Washington Post that championed the city as the perfect site for what the D.C. proposal entitled “The Three Americas Exposition.” Washington’s bid fell a distant fourth to Chicago’s winning proposal, which they entitled the “World’s Columbian Exposition.”

Amidst the planning for the February 1890 proposal to Congress, The Washington Post printed an editorial on November 12, 1889 entitled "A Board of Trade Wanted." The column provided a generally negative overview of Washington’s civic culture, noting that D.C. is without manufacturing or a wholesale retail base and that rule via Congressional legislation is a hindrance. Yet, an organization of civic and economic leaders consolidating city interests into one body can lobby Congress for effective and forceful action, especially on matters such as the proposed Three Americas Exposition. The article claims that Washington will always lag behind cities such as New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia until a board of trade is formed.

The response was immediate. The very next day on November 13, 1889, an article runs providing a litany of business leaders going on the public record as highly favoring such a board of trade for the city. Two weeks later on November 27, 1889, the Washington Board of Trade was created during a meeting held at the Ebbitt House. This article credits retailer Isadore Saks with originating the idea for the Board of Trade "a fortnight" prior. Principal owner of The Washington Star, Crosby S. Noyes, was elected the Board’s first president as publisher of The Washington Post, Beriah Wilkins, was elected secretary. 

The board went through several name changes. Formally known as The Board of Trade for the District of Columbia, the organization was referred colloquially to as The Washington Board of Trade. At the 70th annual meeting held on October 20, 1959, on the same day the organization welcomed their first female members when 188 businesswomen were added to the 7,200 total enrollment, a name change was approved:  The Metropolitan Washington Board of Trade. A new name was needed to reflect the area-wide vision of the organization. The name changed again twenty years later. At the 90th annual meeting of the board on November 20, 1979, members of the board approved changing the name from the Metropolitan Washington Board of Trade to The Greater Washington Board of Trade. After the board of directors unanimously approved the name change, they sent a letter to members asking them to also approve because "it now accurately reflects the broad economic area in which the membership functions." The 90th annual meeting also adopted a new logo still used today, a symbol of either three interlocking squares or circles that symbolize Northern Virginia, the District of Columbia, and suburban Maryland. This brochure from 1979 that marketed the Board of Trade to prospective members notes the recent name change, the new logo, and provides a historical overview along with accomplishments obtained through the years. 

The Cultural Infrastructure of Washington D.C. 

The Board decided at its inaugural meeting to address and push for issues through smaller working committees that met monthly while holding one large annual meeting. Interestingly, this model is generally adhered to by the Greater Washington Board of Trade to this day with committees and task forces meeting on a monthly or quarterly basis along with an annual meeting for the entire organization. A critical issue that the Board has focused on since its inception is building and maintaining the cultural infrastructure of the city, an issue still high on the agenda presently.

In January 1922, the Washington Auditorium Corporation was founded with the purpose of raising funds through the sale of bonds and public stock for the construction and maintenance of a sizable venue to hold conventions and cultural events. Construction was completed in the Spring of 1924 at 19th and E Streets and New York Avenue. The Washington Board of Trade provided leadership in forming the Washington Auditorium Corporation, complete with its own officers, public stock, and board of directors. Despite claims of being a financially self-supporting venture that would show a profit, the Auditorium was troubled from the beginning. Stock sales were slow and construction was delayed. As evidenced by these documents, the Auditorium struggled financially after completion. Hit hard by the Depression, it closed in the late 1930s, and was converted to government office space.

A Board committee that invested a great deal of resources into the cultural infrastructure was the Auditorium and Stadium Committee. This committee had an auditorium subcommittee, a stadium subcommittee, and its own planning board. The Auditorium and Stadium Committee committed much time and energy into two proposals that were never realized:  the Eisenhower Civic Center, configured to hold large conventions along with hockey and basketball, and a National Memorial Stadium, slated to hold 65,000 patrons designed for the football, baseball, and large outdoor events; especially the Washington Redskins and the Washington Senators. Two pages of legislative references (1, 2) from 1956 alone show the flurry activity from the Committee as they attempted to secure either the National Memorial Stadium or the Civic Center with Congressional approval.

The saga of the never built Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Bicentennial Civic Center is a painful lesson in how arduous it was to attempt to add to the District's cultural infrastructure under Congressional oversight. These 12 pages are an excerpt from a booklet prepared by the National Capital Planning Commission in concert with the Washington Board of Trade to present three design possibilities to the President and Congress. This document represents H.R. 16261, "a bill to authorize construction of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Bicentennial Civic Center in downtown Washington."

In hopes H.R. 16261 would become a reality, the Washington Area Convention and Visitors Bureau produced this brochure for prospective conventioneers advertising the Eisenhower Civic Center. The Washington Area Convention and Visitors Bureau was started by the Washington Board of Trade in 1931 and affiliated with the Board until it became an independent organization in 1976.

During the span of the many years the proposed Civic Center languished on the drawing board, a flurry of studies and reports were produced concerning the project. A traffic study initiated by the Board of Trade demonstrates the intense level of resources invested into the project and also produces an excellent visual perspective of the proposed Mount Vernon square location for the Eisenhower Civic Center.

As debate begin to heat up in the spring and summer of 1972 over H.R. 16261, the Metropolitan Washington Board of Trade along with a few other like-minded organizations placed this open letter to President Richard Nixon and Congress as a full page ad in the newspaper on August 15, 1972 stating a litany of reasons why they should support the construction of the Civic Center. President Nixon responded two days later with this letter to Congressman Kenneth J. Gray (D-Ill.), chairman of the House Public Works Committee, expressing his full support of H.R. 16261 as the committee was currently reviewing the legislation before the bill made its way to a vote before the full House and Senate.

The Eisenhower Civic Center project never seemed to die a final and complete death. It more or less faded into oblivion inside of Congress in the mid-1970s. But, complicating the urgency for approval of the project in the summer of 1972 was Abe Pollin, the Baltimore Bullets, and Washington's newly awarded NHL hockey franchise. On June 8, 1972, the bid of Washington, D.C. businessman Pollin was selected by the National Hockey League as one of two new expansion franchises to begin play in the 1974-1975 season. Already the existing owner of the NBA Baltimore Bullets, Pollin wished to consolidate his two teams into one arena in Washington. He agreed to have his new, unnamed hockey team and the Bullets play their games in the Eisenhower Civic Center in downtown Washington if it could be ready for the 1974-1975 season. 

This was a complex situation with many forces at work. As the Eisenhower project stalled, Pollin announced his plans to construct a new, privately financed 17,500 seat arena on the Beltway in suburban Maryland. This 27 page selection of documents from the Washington Board of Trade archive provides a narrative on the riff created between the Board and Pollin over the new arena. As the Eisenhower project stalled, officials from the Board of Trade urged Pollin to build his new arena at Union Station instead of suburban Maryland, communicated with a sharp letter dated August 1, 1972. Pollin stands his ground with an equally blunt letter from his lawyer dated the next day, insisting on the Beltway location. This selection of documents also provides important background on why Pollin rejected the Union Station location and on the arena that would become known as the Capital Centre, serving the metro area from December 2, 1973 until it was imploded on December 15, 2002, as it was made obsolete by the Verizon Center in downtown Washington.

Along with auditoriums and civic centers, another frustrating venture was attempting to secure the World's Fair. From 1929 to 1965, the Washington Board of Trade devoted much effort into attempting to become a host for a World's Fair. Washington, D.C. never hosted a World's Fair as every bid came up short. This is an article on the bid to become host of the 1964 World's Fair. The Board contracted renown architect and urban planner Victor Gruen to prepare a study on the proposed World's Fair site on rural farmland in Largo, Maryland. Despite losing to New York City, this article from Horizon heralds the groundbreaking proposal of Gruen and the Board:  converting the Largo World's Fair site after the event into a livable city of 100,000 people, designed with forward looking planning and infrastructure. While the World's Fair has gone defunct, the dream still lives on with the Olympics. Washington, D.C. partnered with Baltimore to become the U.S. candidate city for the 2012 Summer Olympics, losing out to New York City (who eventually lost to London). The Greater Washington Board of Trade aided in funding this report on what the economic and fiscal impact would have been if the Washington-Baltimore bid had secured the 2012 Olympic games. The possibility remains for a second try with the 2016 Summer Olympics. 

Successful ventures in Washington's Cultural Infrastructure

Despite frustrations, successful ventures were enjoyed. When the Washington Redskins wished to expand RFK Stadium, Head Coach and General Manager George Allen turned to Clarence Arata of the Board of Trade for help. This letter dated March 24, 1972 from Allen to Arata details the proposal from the Redskins and the need for help from the Board to expand RFK Stadium. As with the new Anacostia baseball stadium targeted for a 2008 opening, financing arrangements proved to be the stumbling block.

These "Plans for a National Civic Auditorium and Cultural Center" from 1957 became a reality in September 1971 when the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opened to the public. This 27 page report was written by the District of Columbia Auditorium Commission. Created by Congress when H.R. 1825 became law on July 1, 1955, this commission was charged to "formulate plans for the construction in the District of Columbia of a civic auditorium including an Inaugural Hall of Presidents and a music, fine arts, and mass communication center." The prospective ten locations considered are of interest, including the Armory location that became RFK Stadium and Theodore Roosevelt Island. With the aforementioned demise of the Washington Auditorium in the late 1930s, the Daughters of the American Revolution Constitution Hall with only 4,000 seats served as the District's main cultural venue until the Kennedy Center opened in 1971.

Despite basketball and hockey leaving for the suburbs along with termination of the Eisenhower Civic Center project, desire for significant downtown convention space lived on. The home rule era that began in 1974 eased many of the encumbrances to pull off such a project. In 1978, a special hotel tax instituted by the D.C. City Council funded a convention center project. This is the program from the groundbreaking ceremony on April 23, 1980 for the Washington D.C. Convention Center. Serving the city for 21 years, the Convention Center was imploded on December 20, 2004, as it was replaced with the new Washington Convention Center six blocks away on the other side of Mount Vernon Square at M Street and 9th Street.