While you’re popping bottles tonight, imagine your champagne cork becoming an artifact. 🍾🤩

Just landed: historic panoramic photos at Reagan and Dulles Airports! ✈️ Flying in/out of DCA: 👩✈️ Find a 1930 image of Amelia Earhart shortly after she landed in DC in Reagan’s National Hall.

“For a Thrifty Merry Christmas, Save at Sears.” Happy biggest day of Christmas shopping. 🛍️🎄

Did you know the Washington Hebrew Congregation “is the only Jewish house of worship to operate with an act of the U.S. Congress as its charter?”

It’s your last chance this year to visit the DC History Center!

‘Tis the season! Be sure to schedule your research appointment with the library or pop in to visit the exhibits before we take a break for the holidays! ✨❄️

DC’s tradition of local markets runs deep—from historic hubs like Eastern Market, Union Market’s original Florida Avenue Market, and Center Market (pictured here), our city has always championed makers, small businesses, and community. 🎄

The headlines are coming in – it looks like it will be the coldest and snowiest December we’ve had in almost 10 years. How’re you preparing? ❄️ *please don’t do this at home* 📷 Automobile fording Rock Creek, c. 1920-1925 (Anthony J. Munz photograph collection, MU5.035D)

🎄🎤 IT’S TIMEEEE! Asking for a friend – is your tree already up or are you grabbing it this weekend? 📸 Woman on bicycle with Christmas tree leaving Hechinger Company Store #19, in Woodbridge, Virginia, c. 1976-1985 (Hechinger Company records, CHS 12672.52)

Forget buying something new this #BlackFriday and purchase a frame and upcycle from our special frame sale tomorrow from 12 – 6 pm! ♻️🖼️

If only picking up pies today felt as relaxed as this vintage moment at the Woodward & Lothrop Department bakery counter. 🥧✨ Wishing everyone a cozy, sugar-filled Thanksgiving from the DC History Center!

Celebrate #SmallBusinessSaturday with us! 🎉 🛍️ Shop locally made products in the gift shop and be the first to check out our new merch ✂️ Collage holiday cards and paper ornaments using reproduction images from our collection, festive paper, and sparkly adornments 🔵 Play classic recess games

Sunday plans: add grocery shopping before Wednesday’s annual ‘why did I do this to myself’ rush. Whether you’re celebrating Thanksgiving or just trying to buy your snackies, skip the chaos. 🛒

We're opening a new chapter for Washington History. We've has been sharing research on Washington’s past since 1897, when we published the first volume of Records of the Columbia Historical Society. For nearly a century, the hardcover Records offered an essential forum for documenting DC’s history.

#OTD in 1804 a line engraving of one of the earliest known views of Washington was published in England in Vol. III of the English edition of Marshall's Life of Washington. 📸 “The City of Washington in 1800,” from the Thomas Machen collection of Early Prints Relating to Washington, DC (MA 015)

We’re proud to share a big step forward in expanding access to DC history education. 📚✨ We launched the “Home Rule Curriculum,” a free, four-lesson resource for grades 9-12 that helps teachers and students explore DC’s long, people-powered fight for self-government.

We’re excited to share a delicious new collaboration that celebrates DC’s flavor! We partnered with local artist Carlos Carmonamedina, the creative force behind The Culture Curious, to bring you Snackin’ in the Capital—anl illustration of some of the District’s iconic eats. 🥂🍕🧁🥧🥟🍜

Thank you to all who have served. 💙 At the Little Harbor Salvation Army USO Club, moments like these show how community and camaraderie have always gone hand in hand. Today, we honor that legacy and the veterans who continue to inspire it. #VeteransDay

Come raise a glass to DC history! 🍻 Join us for a gathering of scholars, community members, and readers to celebrate the latest issue of Washington History magazine at Jackie Lee's on Tuesday, November 18th from 6-8pm.

🎙️ Calling all storytellers and history-lovers! Join us on Monday, November 17 at 6pm at the DC History Center for the next meetup of the DC Oral History Collaborative in partnership with HumanitiesDC.

Take your class on a field trip that brings DC history to life! 🚌✨ At the DC History Center, students explore how activists shaped our city—analyzing real objects tied to civic engagement and even creating a piece of wearable art to express their own voices.

You're invited to a one-of-a-kind “processing party” celebrating the remarkable Martha Tabor Photograph Collection—a treasure trove of photographs, ephemera, and personal papers documenting art, labor, and community life in Washington, DC. 👀📸🗃️

ICYMI: The Mt. Pleasant Neighborhood Library Community Archiving Day has been rescheduled to November 8th! Celebrate the Mt. Pleasant Neighborhood Library’s 100th birthday on Saturday, November 8th from 2-5pm!

Until the 1860s, most children did not go to school. In DC, there were just a few “common schools” for white children whose parents could not afford private education, so Black residents opened their own private schools. When Congress established public schools for all, Washingtonians embraced them.

Three spine-chilling local ghost stories for #SpookySeason in DC—all drawn from our own archives. 👻

Just released: the new issue of Washington History Magazine. The fall 2025 issue contains four essays in four time periods—the early 1800s, World War II, the 1950s, and the 1960s and ‘70s—deepening understanding of federal/local relationships, social justice, and commerce.

In Southeast DC, residents are fighting to protect a community-owned green space whose history, identity, and future are under threat. This isn’t just a park, it’s a living symbol of local power, memory, and resistance.

This summer, DC educators joined our Teach the District program—a weeklong experience connecting teachers to the local history and cultures that shape our region. The teacher’s visited Accokeek Foundation at Piscataway Park, where participants experienced their reimagined Land Echoes Field Trip.

Charles Hamilton Houston: “The Man Who Killed Jim Crow” Born and raised in Washington, DC, Charles Hamilton Houston (1895–1950) was a brilliant legal mind whose work laid the foundation for the end of segregation in America.

📣 This Weekend: Walks That Give Back! From October 10 to 13, during Indigenous People’s Weekend take a walk through history—and give back while you do it. Join Washington Walks for a special weekend of guided tours that bring DC’s neighborhoods and stories to life. 🌆

We’re thrilled to unveil two brand-new neighborhood history booklets: Hillcrest and Woodridge! 🏙️ The newly released booklets are more than just simple guides—they’re compact maps with striking illustrations and carefully selected stories.

Just a few spots left for the DC Archives Crawl! Go behind the stacks with us next Wednesday!

📚 “Class Actions Reads! Model Schools in the Model City” on Thursday, October 23 from 6-8pm at the DC History Center. Join the DC History Center & Charles Sumner School Museum and Archives for a book talk about the history of Black public education and school architecture in the nation’s capital.

Tomorrow from 10am - 5pm! Join us for Back to School Day at the DC History Center - and dive into our city’s history! 🎒📚

Celebrate #ArchivesMonth with a DC Archives Crawl! 📜✨ On October 15 from 5:15 - 7:45pm we’ll take you through two local archives where you’ll meet staff, go behind the scenes, and demystify what these spaces hold and how you can use them: ✨ The DC Archives ✨ DC History Center (1/5)

Martha Tabor’s camera captured the soul of DC. 📸✊ A teacher, union organizer, welder, and artist, Martha documented the workers and movements that shaped our city; from Metro construction crews to protests for labor, civil rights, and LGBTQ+ equality.

“Reading the oral history transcripts allowed me to appreciate the overall picture & firsthand accounts of the families’ histories, dynamics, resilience. Each descendant’s narrative discussed early childhood memories, education & career experiences...how they learned about their family’s history...

Take a walking tour that gives back on Indigenous People’s Weekend! 🚶 Join Washington Walks for a series of guided tours that bring DC’s neighborhoods and stories to life to support the DC History Center’s Resilience Fund. 🤝

📚 ✏️ Back-to-School Day at the DC History Center is in ONE WEEK! Join us Saturday, October 4, from 10am to 5pm, at the DC History Center for a fun, hands-on celebration of learning, creativity, and play for young learners and their grownups!

Happy 100th birthday Mt. Pleasant Neighborhood Library! In one week, on Saturday, September 27th from 2-5pm, we’re joining the library for a Community Archiving day. dclibrary.libnet.info/event/14408565

📚 This August, the DC History Center welcomed educators from across the region for NHD in DC: Summer Intensive 2025, a three-day workshop all about bringing National History Day into the classroom. dchistory.org/news-and-ins...

Back-to-School Day at the DC History Center: October 4th from 10am - 5pm 📚✂️ Looking for a fun (and meaningful!) way to spend the day with the kids? Join us for a hands-on celebration of learning, creativity, and play for young learners and their grownups.

For more than 130 years, we’ve safeguarded the stories of everyday Washingtonians. This fall, we open a new chapter: the once-sealed journals of activist and artist Martha Tabor—whose striking photos of welders, librarians, and nurses capture the people who built and sustained this city.

Born to formerly enslaved parents in Memphis, Tennessee, Mary Church Terrell (1863-1954) became a teacher at Washington’s M Street School after studying at Oberlin College. As the first Black woman on DC’s Board of Education, she advocated for full funding of the city’s Black schools.

Collections Intern and Howard University Ph.D. student Saleana Copeland recently shared what it was like to work with the archival material of the Quander family, one of the oldest and best-documented African American families in the U.S.

#LaborDay isn’t just the unofficial end of summer, it’s a tribute to the labor movement and the generations of workers who fought for fair wages, safe conditions, and the eight-hour workday.

For decades, Chinese culture has been celebrated each summer right here in DC—a vibrant tradition that reflects a much deeper history. 🇨🇳🏮

On August 28, 1963, over 250,000 people gathered in Washington, DC, to demand jobs, freedom, and justice. It was here that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his iconic “I Have a Dream” speech.

💪🏽 “Work. Support thyself. To thine own powers appeal.” - Motto of the National Training School for Women and Girls When Nannie Helen Burroughs was denied a teaching job in DC despite her higher education, she didn’t wait for a door to open—she built her own.

#OTD in 1888 the at about 4:30 in the morning, "a peculiar noise...a sound like the distant rumbling of thunder was heard.” Thunder it was not, rather the tower of the newly constructed Church of the Covent at the intersection of Connecticut Ave, 18th St NW and N St NW falling to a “mass of ruins.”