Griffith Stadium

Griffith Stadium occupied this block until it was razed in 1965, and Howard University Hospital opened here ten years later. Abe Pollin, who as a boy paid a quarter to sit in the bleachers, later became a respected real estate developer and opened the MCI Center downtown in 1997, giving the city thousands of good seats. During the 1940s, crowds here cheered Josh Gibson of the Homestead Grays, the Negro League team that won more games than any other hometown team. Walter Johnson led the all-White Washington Senators to their only World Series victory here in 1924. Although Griffith was one of Washington, DC’s few public venues open to all during segregation, the races sat separately. The stadium also hosted the Washington Redskins from 1937 to 1961, student cadet competitions, Boy Scout jamborees, National Negro Opera Company performances, and mass baptisms conducted by Elder Lightfoot Solomon Michaux, whose Church of God still stands across Georgia Avenue. Michaux organized affordable housing, had his own radio show, and served bargain meals at the Happy News Café. In 1946, impresario David Rosenberg hired African American architect Albert Cassell to design a music hall at 815 V Street. Soon after, Duke Ellington lent his name to a nightclub there. By 1952, WUST Radio occupied the facility, hosting evangelical broadcasts, jazz, and later reggae and go-go concerts. After WUST moved to Virginia, the 9:30 Club relocated there from 930 F Street.

Washington, District of Columbia · United States