History
The brick building that houses the recreation center was constructed in 1951–52 by consolidating, expanding, and adding a second story onto three single-story fuel sheds that stood behind row houses once located at 1621–1625 P Street NW. The unsegregated park was formally opened on November 13, 1953, at a cost of $80,000.
In 2003, plans for a four-story, multi-million-dollar gay community center to be built on a small section of the aging park sparked a dispute among Dupont Circle residents and the Washington D.C. Center for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender People. The plans were ultimately abandoned.
In 2008, the recreation center and playground were renovated. Work began in April and the park reopened on December 15. During the renovation, archaeological work uncovered several artifacts and two brick foundations: one from a row house at 1613 P Street and one at 1625 P Street. Researchers concluded that the latter supported a house built in 1878 by Henry Hurt, a Confederate Army veteran and president of the Washington and Georgetown Railroad Company.
Read more about this topic: Stead Park
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Revolutions are the periods of history when individuals count most.”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“[Men say:] “Don’t you know that we are your natural protectors?” But what is a woman afraid of on a lonely road after dark? The bears and wolves are all gone; there is nothing to be afraid of now but our natural protectors.”
—Frances A. Griffin, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 19, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)