Noted American telephone inventor Alexander Graham Bell
(1847-1922) built his house at 1331 Connecticut Avenue beginning in June of
1891 at an impressive cost of $31,000.
Like many inventors, he integrated new technology and experiments into
the design, including what was one of the earliest experiments in household air
conditioning. It was located on the block just south of Dupont Circle.
Bell had been born in Scotland, but immigrated along with
his parents to Canada in 1870, when he had already been working as a teacher to
deaf mutes through his 1864 “invisible speech” method. Several years later, young Bell began to
teach at Boston University, where he met his future wife, Mabel Hubbard. She had become deaf due to scarlet fever, and
was the daughter of wealthy lawyer Gardiner Green Hubbard (1822-1897), who
owned a house nearby about the time he became the first President of the
National Geographic Society. 
In 1877, after their marriage, Hubbard became Bell’s
business manager and the first President of the Bell Telephone Company. Alexander and Mabel first moved into a newly
purchased house at 1500 Rhode Island Avenue, just a year after becoming
internationally famous for demonstrating the telephone in public at the
Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition with the word “Watson, come here, I want
you” to his lab assistant Thomas Watson.
After 1500 RI Avenue was damaged by fire they sold it to Vice President
Levi P. Morton, after they had it rebuilt, and then began construction of 1331
Connecticut Avenue.
Bell established the Volta Bureau in Georgetown in 1880,
where much of his inventing and experiments were undertaken. He had architects Hornblower and Marshall
design a wing on the Connecticut Avenue house for his famous “Wednesday
Evenings” that entertained scientists and society for decades.
At the house, Bell
also experimented with an early form of air conditioning: on a hot summer day,
he placed a block of ice in the attic covered with salt, to which he connected
a large diameter tube extending to his office; by opening the upper windows, he
reduced the temperature of the room from 90 degrees to 65 degrees.
The house was also designed with a large rear yard that led
to the two houses of his daughters, facing 18th Street. After his death, the house was inherited by
his daughter, Mrs. Gilbert Grosvenor (wife of the founder of the National
Geographic Society), who ran it as an antique shop and tea room. It was razed in 1930 for an office
building.
John Witherspoon Park
Located near where the Bell mansion stood is the John Witherspoon Park, bordered by Connecticut Avenue and N Street, the park is named
after Patriot and signer of the Declaration of Independence John Witherspoon
(1722-1794), who also unified and led the Presbyterian Church in America. His statue was erected at this intersection
by the Church of the Covenant (later renamed the National Presbyterian Church)
when it was located at the intersection of Connecticut and N Street beginning
in 1887.
The statue was sculpted by John Couper. Witherspoon was born in Scotland and served
as a Presbyterian minister in New Jersey.
He was the only clergyman to sign the Declaration of Independence and
said that America “was not only ripe for the measure, but in danger of rotting
for the want of it.” He also served in
the Second Continental Congress. After
the war, he worked to build the academic standing of the College of New Jersey
(now Princeton University). Incidentally, actress Reese Witherspoon is one
of John Witherspoon’s direct descendants.
Copyright Paul K. Williams
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