The Franklin School represents one of the last bastions of 19th century architecture left in downtown Washington, and for three years it has sat empty after the city promised to find a developer for the historic building. But that is nothing new for the building, which operated as a school from 1869 until the 1920s.
Don Hawkins, a longtime resident writing a book on D.C. planning history, went to a rally to save the building in 1971 after the city school system’s administrative headquarters had vacated the place.
| Gone by the wayside | ||
| » Circle Theatre | The Art Deco theater at 20th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW was destroyed without notice over a weekend in the early 1980s. | |
| » The Wallach School | The late 19th century school was designed by Adolph Cluss, who also designed the Franklin School. It was demolished in the 1940s to make way for the Hine School. That school is now shuttered and is being redeveloped. | |
| » Convention Hall Market | Built in the 1870s, the original city convention center and indoor market hall at 5th and K streets NW served several purposes in the mid-1900s, including a stint as a wax museum. It was demolished in 1985. | |
| Saved in the nick of time | ||
| » Lafayette Square | First lady Jackie Kennedy reversed a federal plan to destroy the square’s historic buildings across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, and took part in their restoration and conversion to modern uses. | |
| » Sewall-Belmont House | One of the earliest homes on Capitol Hill, this mansion next to a Senate office building was nearly destroyed in the 1950s to build a parking lot for senators. | |
| » Old Post Office Pavilion | Opened in 1900, Washington’s first skyscraper was slated for demolition in the 1920s until the Great Depression put a halt to the work. | |
“The question was what shall we do with this great old building — that was 40 years ago and it really has been a stepchild of the District ever since,” he said.
The Franklin School in Northwest is one of the more extreme examples of why preservation laws in the District exist — it’s tough to find new uses for unique buildings, so many of Franklin School’s 19th century counterparts were just torn down. But today, the ones that are saved may wait years for their revival.
Historic preservation was long left mostly to private groups until 1978, when the District became among the nation’s first jurisdictions
to enact preservation laws. But by then much of 19th century Washington already had been destroyed on K Street and nearby corridors, once home to sprawling Victorian mansions.
But the District’s downtown turnover began as early as the 1900s, when Victorian fashion went out of style and the mansions were replaced by office and retail buildings similar to what is preserved today in the Chinatown historic district.
In the middle of the 20th century, many of those buildings gave way to parking lots as residents left for the suburbs and cars became the central mode of transit. Then came the 1970s and boxy office buildings — SDHpand a time when developers could obtain a raze permit on a Friday afternoon and demolish a building over the weekend, preservationists said.
After preservation laws kicked in, the ’80s marked a short-lived trend in preserving facades by essentially stacking the new building around the historic one, such as with the Mexican Embassy on Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest.
“That was an early example of what we call a facade-ectomy.” Hawkins said. “[That] became the example of what not to do.”
The law hasn’t changed but the enforcement of it is more diligent now, said Steve Callcott, the D.C. Office of Historic Preservation’s deputy historic preservation officer.
Today, Franklin School’s challenges include a protected interior in addition to its exterior and a large footprint, limiting what a developer can do inside.
The city has issued three bid requests in eight years but has not moved forward on any proposals. A spokesman declined to comment on the status of the current proposal for a hotel but said the city maintains the building, which has been closed for three years, and has installed a new heating and cooling system.
Preservationists said developers need more incentive to save the city’s shuttered historic buildings. Rebecca Miller, executive director of the D.C. Preservation League, said that unlike Maryland and Virginia, the District doesn’t offer a tax credit to developers doing preservation projects.
That would help with the city-owned Joseph Gales School, a boarded-up, 12-room schoolhouse near Union Station.
“Money has been a problem,” she said. “It looks horrible and it’s gone through two iterations of projects moving forward and stopping.”
Callcott said the city has been weighing tax abatement legislation for developers but has not finalized anything.
