A Tribute to George: The Washington monument

A Plan, But No Way to Make It Happen

In his master plan for the new city of Washington, D.C., architect Pierre L’Enfant left a spot for a large equestrian statue of George Washington to be placed at the intersection of a line running west from the Capitol and south from the White House.

Congress began talking about funding “a suitable memorial” after Washington’s death in 1799 but nothing came of it.

It wasn’t until 1833 that a group of citizens including Eliza Hamilton, Dolley Madison, Louisa Adams and others formed the Washington National Monument Society. By 1836, the group had elected a president — Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall — and launched a competition to design a monument, raising $28,000 for its construction.

In 1845, the society announced the winner: architect Robert Mills, who planned a circular colonnaded building 250 feet in diameter and 100 feet tall, topped by a 500-foot-tall obelisk.

The cost of Mills’ plan was estimated at $1 million, which seemed beyond what the society felt it could raise. By 1848, the plan was cut back to just the obelisk, which would measure 55 feet on each side at the base but would still stretch 500 feet over the city.

Robert Mills' winning design included a "pantheon" around the base of the obelisk, cut to save costs. Image credits belong to the Library of Congress.

Construction was halted in 1854 because of a lack of funds and then for the Civil War. Work resumed in 1877. Image rights belong to the National Park Service.

The next hurdle faced by the project was the unstable land in and around the Potomac River. The spot where they hoped to build the obelisk — just 100 feet from the Potomac, at the time — turned out to be too soft to support the enormous weight of such a structure.

Engineers kept the monument on the east/west axis between the Capitol and what is now the Lincoln Memorial but moved it 350 feet east from the north/south axis with the White House. Excavations began in 1848 and, on July 4 of that year, Freemasons laid a symbolic cornerstone for the monument.

By 1854, the monument was 143 feet tall but money was running short. The Society was finding it difficult to keep up with expenses. Construction came to a halt while fundraising efforts continued — until that, too, ground to a halt when the Civil War began in 1861.

The monument sat there, a little less than a third completed, for 22 years. Local politicians in the District of Columbia began calling for the destruction of the structure until Congress finally stepped up in 1876 by appropriating $200,000 to complete the monument. The Army Corps of Engineers was brought into resume construction in 1879.

That’s when another strange issue arose: The monument was encased in granite, but rock from the quarry used before 1854 was no longer available. An attempt was made to match the coloration for the remainder of the monument’s exterior, but it was off just a bit. To this day, one can see the point where construction had been suspended.

On Dec. 6, 1884 — 36 years after construction had begun — the 3,300-pound aluminum capstone was placed atop the obelisk, making the Washington Monument, at 555 feet, the world’s tallest structure. It would retain that title for five years until the Eiffel Tower surpassed it in 1889.

President Chester A. Arthur spoke at the dedication ceremony on Feb. 21, 1885. Even then, the monument didn’t open to the public for three more years, when a steam elevator was installed. The elevator was considered so dangerous that only men were allowed on board. Women who wanted to visit the small observation room atop the monument had to take the stairs — all 898 of them.

Less than two weeks before the end of his term in office, President Chester A. Arthur spoke at the dedication of the Washington Monument on the day before Washington’s birthday: Feb. 21, 1885. Image rights belong to the U.S. Naval Observatory Library.

The Washington Monument has been renovated several times in the nearly two centuries since then: from 1998 to 2001 and then again from 2004 to 2005. It was closed again in 2011 to repair damage caused by an earthquake. The monument reopened in 2014, but was then closed again from 2016 to 2019 to rebuild its elevators.

The National Park Service says more than 800,000 people visit the Washington Monument annually.

The First of Several Memorials on the National Park

After heavy flooding along the Potomac River in the 1880s, Congress asked the Army Corps of Engineers to dredge the river and use the material it pulled up to raise the marshy lands south and west of the White House. This extended the National Mall and created what became West Potomac Park.

In 1906, a botanist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture imported 75 cherry trees to plant in West Potomac Park. Over time, the number of trees has increased.

This area west and south of the Washington Monument has become a favored spot for various memorials and monuments.