DCNHT: Georgia Avenue Guide

Howard University students post one of their demands during a March 1968 protest.

Waxie Maxie’s Seventh St. record store was destroyed in the violence that followed the assassination of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1968.

The 1960s arrived, bringing the Civil Rights, Feminist, Black Power, and anti-war movements. Howard University students seized the presi- dent’s office, successfully demanding a more socially relevant curriculum and more say on their campus. Disturbances rocked the nation again in 1968, after the assassination of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Seventh Street here was hard hit, and did not recover for decades. Still, the late 1970s saw the arrival near Howard University of African-themed shops. Caribbean businesses also opened, serving a community with roots in this neighborhood since the 1940s. The 1991 opening of Metrorail’s Green line prompted a modest revival of this storied artery. Two decades later the community, and music fans from all over, cheered as workers started to restore the long-empty Howard Theatre and return it to its past glory.

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