At this ceremonial and commercial crossroads of Washington, a grand parade of 200,000 Union soldiers took two days to complete its victory march down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House for President Johnson's review on May 23 and 24, 1865, an event Walt Whitman vividly evoked. Since the federal government moved to the banks of the Potomac River in 1800, this area had been a central gathering place of the city. Pennsylvania Avenue has served as an inaugural parade route for every president since Thomas Jefferson, and for 130 years this was Market Space, the city's town square and the home of Center Market, where cabinet secretaries, government clerks, and laborers mingled. The surrounding area preserves many Civil War associations, including a statue of Major General Winfield Scott Hancock, a memorial to Dr. Benjamin F. Stephenson, founder of the Grand Army of the Republic, Mathew Brady's nearby studio at 627 Pennsylvania Avenue, and the three small buildings at 637-641 Indiana Avenue built in the 1820s. After the Civil War, Washington's physical expansion contributed to the decline of this historic downtown area, but the end of the 20th century brought a revival with theaters and restaurants, museums, shops, and homes.
