Girard Street Elites 11TH and GIRARD STREETS NW
The 1100 and 1200 bl ocks of Girard Street once were home to a “Who’s Who” of African American leaders. This and nearby “double-blocks” are the heart of John Sherman’s Columbia Heights subdivision. By placing houses 30 feet from the street’s center, Sherman created a gracious and inviting street- scape. The elegant rowhouses, built mostly between 1894 and 1912, echoed the social and economic class of their first, white residents. By the 1920s black families began arriving. Many had ties to Howard University. Dr. W. Montague Cobb of 1221 Girard, a foremost physical anthro- pologist, headed Howard Medical School’s Anatomy Department and helped lead the NAACP. Dr. Roland Scott, of 1114 Girard, chaired Pediatrics and led the fight against sickle cell disease. Dorothy Porter Wesley, of 1201 Girard, developed the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, the eminent library of the African Diaspora. Educa- tor Paul Phillips Cooke, former president of D.C. Teachers College and leader of the American Veterans Committee, lived at 1203 Girard from 1928 until 2006. Across Girard Street is Carlos Rosario Public Charter School, originally the white Wilson Normal School (teachers college) and later part of the University of the District of Columbia. One block away is Fairmont Street, where jazz pianist, composer, and educator Billy Taylor grew up at number 1207. Music teacher Henry Grant, mentor to both Taylor and Duke Ellington, once lived at 1114. Home rule activist Rev. Channing Phillips lived at 1232 Fairmont before becoming, in 1968, the first African American nominated for U.S. president at a major party convention.
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