THE RISE OF MERIDIAN HILL

THE RISE OF MERIDIAN HILL THE RISE OF

The Washington Meridian

While Meridian Hill today is home to apartment buildings, hotels, churches, foreign embassies, and one of Washington’s most popular parks, the neighborhood’s beginnings reflect a quainter, more idyllic escape from the bustle of city life. Set just outside the original northern border of the District as outlined in Pierre L’Enfant’s Plan, Meridian Hill for many decades was not much more than rolling farmland, interrupted only by dusty roads and grazing livestock. But as the burgeoning city below rose in global importance, it began to look north along the line extending directly from the President’s mansion, toward the hill that would come to be regarded as an elegant gateway to the nation’s capital. Little is known about the origins of Meridian Hill or the native tribes who first settled it. It wasn’t until after the Revolutionary War and establishment of Washington as the new capital that the region’s history began to be documented. The land north of the city’s original border was owned by wealthy Georgetown merchant Robert Peter and was thus known as Peter’s Hill. The neighborhood’s role in the lives of the city dwellers became more vivid in the early 19th century, serving for many years as “the mecca of race course gamblers.” 1 Virginian landowner Col. John Tayloe’s Holmead Farm on Meridian Hill was host to thousands at its Washington horse racecourse and served as headquarters to the once-popular Washington Jockey Club until around 1840, when Tayloe subdivided and sold the property.

Still, the rumble of activity just beyond the city continued to echo along present-day Sixteenth Street, the original center line of D.C. that had come to be known as the “Washington meridian.” In

Preceding spread meridian hill, early days A man gazes out from Meridian Hill Park, under construction, across 16th Street at the White-Meyer House. washington meridian marker Tablet on the west wall of Meridian Hill Park, placed in 1923 by the Daughters of the American Revolution to commemorate the Washington Meridian marker stone, which was formerly located 52 feet 9 inches west of the tablet. The original two-foot stone was made of iron, with a rounded north edge and a brass sun dial and was placed by Thomas Jefferson. the early 1800s, as the newly founded United States sought to establish a distinct national identity, many Americans called for the country to set its own geographic and scientific standards and campaigned to make the White House longitude the prime meridian of the United States. President Thomas Jefferson had placed a geographic marker on the knoll just north of the city’s boundary in 1804 to mark the meridian. 2 But as international authorities debated where the longitude should fall, potential for confusion on the high seas forced Washington to abandon the idea and Greenwich was ultimately chosen. Nevertheless, the ‘White House meridian’ remains central to the geographic and cultural landscape of the capital.

Commodore David Porter Meridian Hill officially got its name when it was purchased in 1816 by Commodore David Porter, who settled in Washington following an impressive naval career. Born in Boston in 1780 into a family with a five-generation history of distinguished naval service, Porter entered the Navy in 1798, rising through the ranks to serve as a lieutenant in the First Barbary War and promoted to captain just as the War of 1812 began to stir the nation. He sailed the USS Essex south from New York, and upon rounding Cape Horn the Essex became the first U.S. naval ship to display American flags in the Pacific. Porter and his crew soon captured the first British warship of the conflict. 3 Porter made his mark on naval history during the war by undermining the British whaling industry in the Pacific, which gave the U.S. a monopoly on the trade that would last until the Civil War. In