This project documents the homes of literary authors who once lived in the greater Washington, DC region. We wanted to honor the widest range of literary authors possible, including authors of different backgrounds, writing styles, and influences. We include novelists, poets, playwrights, and memoirists. We do not include writers who were solely journalists, and, with few exceptions, authors of genre literature. We have tried hard to include authors from a range of time periods, from the city’s founding in 1800 through the present.
Recent Additions
What’s New?
We got a great review in the Washington City Paper in August 2020, calling our project “an online database of more than 300 writers and their D.C. homes [that] offers a glittering who’s who of Washington literary history.”
Our official relaunch celebration took place on November 29, 2018. After a decade of implementing this project independently, co-editors Kim Roberts and Dan Vera were pleased to celebrate the project’s new permanent home. Sponsored by HumanitiesDC, this updated version of the website features a responsive design easily navigable by desktop or smartphone users. They have promised to continue and preserve our research on writers’ homes in perpetuity.
HumanitiesDC is one of 56 state humanities councils and the capital’s local affiliate for the National Endowment for the Humanities.
With our latest additions, we are now documenting the homes of 383 writers who lived and wrote in the greater Washington, DC region!
Featured Author
Charles Sebree
A painter and playwright, Sebree is the author of three plays: “My Mother Came Crying Most Pitifully” (1949), “Mrs. Patterson” (1954), and “Dry August” (1972). “Mrs. Patterson” was a Broadway musical starring Eartha Kitt.
Sebree attended the Art Institute of Chicago, worked for the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s, and served in the army in WWII. He lived in New York City after the war, then moved to in DC, living in the city from 1947 until 1995. He was an active member of May Miller’s salons. His paintings are in the collections of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the University of Chicago, and the National Gallery of Art.
Just some of our many homes...
Chasen Gaver
1801 Clydesdale Pl. NW
Drew Pearson
2820 Dumbarton Ave. NW
Hugh J. Parry
4814 Falstone Ave.
Evangeline Bruce
1405 34th St. NW
Paul Claudel
2460 16th St. NW
Henry Adams
2017 I Street NW
Madeleine Vinton Dahlgren
Commandant's Headquarters, Navy Yard, Washington DC
Paul Jennings
721 Madison Pl. NW, Washington, DC
Paul Jennings
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Mariano Brull
2016 Hillyer Place NW
Charles Melville Pepper
3211 13th St. NW, Washington DC
Atanas Slavov
9011 Lindale Drive
Sam Lacy
1910 13th St. NW, Washington DC
Sam Lacy
775 Hobart Place NW
L. Ron Hubbard
1812 19th St NW, Washington DC
Emma Willard
1305-1315 30th St. NW
Julia Thompson Von Stosch Schayer
1318 30th St NW
Anna Roosevelt Halsted
2131 R Street NW, Washington, DC
Anna Roosevelt Halsted
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Helen Churchill Candee
1621 New Hampshire Ave. NW
Mildred Cram
1227 S St. NW, Washington DC
Catherine Marshall
3100 Cathedral Ave NW
Ananda W. P. Guruge
2503 30th St., NW
O.O. Howard
607 Howard Place NW
Latest from Twitter
A Twitter List by TwitterDevAuthor Birthdays
in April
George Washington Parke Custis (April 30, 1781)
Edward Everett Hale (April 3, 1822)
Ulysses S. Grant (April 27, 1822)
John Willis Menard (April 3, 1838)
Augustus Goodyear Heaton (April 28, 1844)
Thomas Nelson Page (April 23, 1853)
Henry Berenger (April 22, 1867)
Yan Huiqing (April 2, 1877)
Jessie Redmon Fauset (April 27, 1882)
Caresse Crosby (April 20, 1891)
Robert E. Sherwood (April 4, 1896)
Harlan Miller (April 3, 1897)
Duke Ellington (April 29, 1899)
Whittaker Chambers (April 1, 1901)
Clare Booth Luce (April 10, 1903)
Richard Eberhart (April 5, 1904)
Ward Dorrance (April 30, 1904)
Robert Penn Warren (April 24, 1905)
William W. Warner (April 2, 1920)
Charles W. Bailey II (April 28, 1929)
Fletcher Knebel (April 28, 1929)
Octave S. Stevenson (April 28, 1930)
Gil Scott-Heron (April 1, 1949)
Christopher Hitchens (April 13, 1949)
Essex Hemphill (April 16, 1957)
Yvonne Brown (April 18, 1977)