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Historic Chevy Chase DC

Reimaging Washington, Circa 1900

Register For This Free Event!

This hour-long Zoom event on Wednesday, April 28, featuring author/historian Tom Lewis, is the first in a series of three webinars Historic Chevy Chase DC is hosting to help provide historical perspective and context to the Small Area Planning process going on now. HCCDC hopes to facilitate meaningful discussion by examining our collective past as a way to understand how Chevy Chase DC relates to the rest of the city.

Lewis, emeritus professor at Skidmore College, is author of “Washington: A History of Our National City,” a 2015 book that Ken Burns called a “vivid example of the best kind of history.” Lewis will take us back to the McMillan process that essentially shaped the DC we inhabit today. In a lively conversation with HCCDC’s Carl Lankowski, he will examine how much of the city’s development was created between 1890-1910, an urban landscape defined in part by the increasing force of Jim Crow racism. Despite post-Civil War modernization projects by “Boss” Shepherd, the original L’Enfant federal city plan had lost its charm due to rapid urbanization. A Republican senator from Michigan, James McMillan, initiated an episode of planning in the mid-1890s to address that. We examine the plan and how it fits in with our vision of “community” today.

The other two webinars in the “Planning our Future” series are on May 19 and June 9. The May presentation will feature historian/architect Neil Flanagan who will focus on the mechanisms that produced the segregated racial geography we are living with today. The June event will feature a panel of local activists and professional planners examining proffered solutions to the affordable housing needs in Ward 3 and in Chevy Chase in particular. The panel, being formed now, will represent a broad range of the voices being heard in the contentious discussions of the city’s Comprehensive Plan and how a Chevy Chase DC Small Area Plan will affect our community.

Biographical information on our speaker:

Tom Lewis has written a number of books about American history and culture including, “Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio,” “Divided Highways: The Interstate Highway System and the Transformation of American Life,” “The Hudson: A History,” and Washington: A History of Our National City.”

He has also consulted on, written, and produced a number of documentary films for public television.  His credits include Brooklyn Bridge, Ken Burns and Florentine Films (Director of Research); The Shakers: Hands to Work, and Hearts to God, Ken Burns and  Florentine Films (script writer); The Civil War, Ken Burns and Florentine Films (consultant); Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio, Ken Burns and Florentine Films (co-producer); Divided Highways: The Interstates and American Life, Hott Productions/Florentine Films (writer and producer).  Films he has produced have won numerous awards, including a George Foster Peabody Award for Broadcasting Excellence; an Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for Outstanding Historical Programming; first place, New England Film Festival; Bronze Apple, National Education Association; and honorable mention, San Francisco Film Festival and Chicago Film Festival.

Lewis received his B.A. in English from the University of New Brunswick (Canada).  He earned his MA (with honors) and Ph.D. (with distinction) from Columbia University, where he was a Faculty Fellow, a Paul Klingenstein Fellow, and a Woodrow Wilson Dissertation Fellow.  He is Professor Emeritus of English at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York.