This was a difficult place to photograph, and not just because of all the cars. There is a vaulted area that houses retailers and offices, but this is now the entrance and the only place where its original name appears. We went back to try for a better picture, but the street conditions were the same, and I didn’t much like all the stores, so this will have to do. In this case I think the history is more interesting than the building itself, anyway.
*****
The Uline Arena (later renamed the Washington Coliseum) opened in January 1941 at 1140 3rd St. NE and was a major indoor arena in Washington until the early 1970s. With a capacity of over 8,000 people, it was the site of many major sports, entertainment and political events, including one of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s inaugural balls in 1953; the first concert by the Beatles in the US in 1964 (less than 48 hours after their appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show); performances by The Ice Capades; home to the Washington Capitols basketball team (1940s until 1970); and a detention center for prisoners arrested during protests against the Vietnam War in 1971. In the early 1970s it was abandoned and used as a parking facility. Like other public accommodations in DC at the time, events were racially segregated until boycotts forced the owner to abandon the policy in 1948.
As the Washington Coliseum it became an important venue for African-American cultural and political events. Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammed and Malcolm X spoke there in 1959 and 1961.It was also notable in the 1980s as a site of Washington’s indigenous Go-Go music concerts. Listed as a DC landmark in 2006 and placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2007, it has been renovated by Douglas Development and currently houses offices as well as the REI flagship store in DC.
*****
For more information on this historic sites, go to the restoration society’s web page for the tour at http://chrs.org/historic-sites-tour-2020/
Best to view in "Original" because other versions resized by Pbase are decidedly unsharp.
The acrobatic fisherman, posted earlier:
