AHS Events Jun2026 Bridges Washington DC YouTube

In the late 1700s, the first bridges, now completely gone, connected the new Federal City to the outside world. Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, more and bigger crossings arose to support industry, allow the expansion of suburbs, commemorate cultural and civic leaders, and enhance the aesthetics of the District’s waterfronts and parks. Although the city abandoned civic-minded, commemorative, and monumental constructions for utilitarian highway monoliths in the mid-twentieth century, a recent renaissance has seen a welcome shift to walkability and beauty instead of brute utility. Using the city’s bridges as an index of the times, our speaker, author Bob Dover tracks how connecting to Virginia impacted both Virginia and DC from the 1750s to today.