 |
| Northminster Presbyterian Church, once located at 11th and RI Ave |
Logan Circle residents who find themselves washing their
cars religiously at the car wash and laundromat on the southwest corner of 11th
Street and Rhode Island Avenue may experience a sense of deja vue, as it was
once the site of the elegant Northminster Presbyterian Church.
The building featured a corner entrance
facing the intersection, with a shortened square tower and large balustrades
above. It was built at a cost of $75,000
following a building permit that was issued on October 1, 1907.
With the address of 1100 Rhode Island Avenue, the church was
formally dedicated in the spring of 1908, when it had 209 members. The congregation was organized in 1906 as a
result of a merger of the old North and the Assembly Presbyterian
congregation. The Northminster church
facility would have ties to a home on the same block, at 1120 Rhode Island
Avenue, until the church building suffered a disastrous fire in 1935.
 |
| Site of the Northminster Church Today at 11th and RI Ave |
The home at 1120 RI Ave was built in 1895 for Dr. Frederic Maxcy, an
employee of the Marine Hospital on Capitol Hill, who also had a practice at the
house until his death about 1908. It was
purchased in 1920 by Frank M. and Ella M. Thompson; she having been a teacher
at the Northminster Church Sunday school since its opening in 1908.
Mrs. Thompson had succeeded her husband as the President of
the Iowa Circle Citizen’s Association in 1921 (later known as the Logan Circle
Citizen’s Association). At the time of
her election, she was the first woman in the city to hold such an office,
according to a newspaper account that appeared in The Washington Star on May
30, 1949.
