Demolition Date: 1948

What replaced the old structure?: The D.C. USA Complex

Originally, this building was constructed in c. 1892 and used as a garage for the Georgetown Railroad Company. After a new car barn was constructed two miles away in 1909, the Arcadia Market and Amusement Company purchased the building and converted it.

Opened in February 1910, The Arcade, otherwise known as The Arcadia, featured a movie theater, tennis courts, a skating rink, and bowling alleys. In the entertainment complex, beauty pageants and wrestling matches were hosted there. Admission cost between 15 cents and 25 cents, depending on the times.

Today, the site houses the largest retail center in the District, known as the D.C. USA Complex.

Demolition Date: 1965

What replaced the old structure?: The Howard University Hospital expansion

Before there was a stadium, this site housed a wooden baseball park, called National Park. During this time, the site hosted National League baseball games, starting in 1886. The Washington American League team eventually began using the stadium in 1905.

The eponymous Clark Griffith went on to construct this stadium in the park’s place after it burned down in 1911. The Washington Senators team then began playing at Griffith Stadium once it opened later that year. The first games of the Washington football team were also played here from 1937 until 1961.

Demolition Date: 1948

What replaced the old structure?: Whitehurst Freeway

Francis Scott Key was the author of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the city’s district attorney, and also the owner of this mansion in Georgetown. Key purchased the site in 1805 and later lived in the house for over 20 years.

In 1907, attorney Hugh T. Taggart purchased the building and converted it into a museum. In 1931, the National Park Service then purchased the site. There were attempts to relocate the house, but these efforts failed.

Demolition Date: 1907

What replaced the old structure?: Union Station

Constructed in 1835, this was the first intercity railroad in the U.S. and the first terminal in Washington, D.C. At first, only three to four trains would visit the train station each day.

Eventually, the station became outmoded and was later replaced by Union Station and its adjacent plaza.

[UPDATE: While the mapped location shown here is at Union Station, the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Station was actually closer to New Jersey Avenue NW and C Street NW.]

Demolition Date: 1926

What replaced the old structure?: The National Press Building

This building was named after William E. Ebbitt, who previously owned the site and ran a boarding house there. In 1872, Caleb C. Willard purchased the boarding house, razed it, and constructed the Ebbitt House Hotel on the site with 300 rooms, a restaurant, and elaborately decorated rooms.

Visitors of this hotel included Presidents Ulysses S. Grant, William Howard Taft, and Grover Cleveland as well as Salmon P. Chase, the sixth Chief Justice of the United States.

Eventually, the hotel struggled to make enough funds to survive, leading to its eventual demolition.

Demolition Date: c. 1962

What replaced the old structure?: The John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts

On the site of the Kennedy Center, there was the Christian Heurich Brewery, arguably Washington, D.C.’s most famous brewery, which operated from 1894 to 1956.

Still, the Heurich Brewery is Washington, D.C.’s largest and longest-operating brewery ever, once able to produce 500,000 barrels of beer every year, according to Garrett Peck in his publication, “Capital Beer: A Heady History of Brewing in Washington, D.C.” Heurich was also the District’s second largest landowner and largest non-governmental employer at the time, as reported by the Heurich House Museum website.

The Arena Stage later rented the complex for stage productions before the building was torn down. The Heurich House Museum website reports that the building was torn down in 1962, but in the publication, “Lost Washington, D.C.,” Paul Kelsey Williams recorded the demolition date at 1966.

Demolition Date: c. 1886

What replaced the old structure?: The Library of Congress’ Jefferson building

Constructed in 1805, this row of houses was located across from the U.S. Capitol before being demolished to make room for the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress. The row of buildings was constructed by Daniel Carroll and leased to local innkeeper Pontius D. Stelle.

When the properties were in use, members of Congress and their business associates used to rent the rooms. According to Alexander D. Mitchell, IV in his publication, “Washington, D.C.: Then and Now,” political prisoners during the Civil War were also housed here.

Demolition Date: 1964

What replaced the old structure?: Providence Park

During the 19th century, there were only nine city hospitals in Washington, D.C., this being one of them. Completed in 1872, Providence Hospital was a Second Empire-style building that featured 27 patient rooms, five wards, and 250 beds. The hospital formed after Union army officials seized the Washington Infirmary on Judiciary Square in order to use the site to treat injured soldiers, according to Paul Kelsey Williams in his publication, “Lost Washington, D.C.”

In this new hospital, the institution adopted innovative techniques and procedures. A surgical amphitheater was also built in 1882. Here, the Sisters of Charity in Maryland also provided the first social work for the city’s poor.

Architect Waddy Butler Wood remodeled the building into a Spanish Revival-style building in 1904. Wood is the same designer behind the Woodrow Wilson House and the Masonic Temple, which is now used as the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

The site was eventually abandoned in 1964. In the 1970s, there were plans to construct a parking lot, junior high school, or senior citizen housing on the site, but these proposals fell through. Today, the site houses a park.