Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge

The Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge is a multiple through arch bridge that carries South Capitol Street over the Anacostia River in Washington, D.C. Completed in 2021, it replaced an older swing bridge that was constructed in 1950 as the South Capitol Street Bridge. In 1965, the original bridge was renamed after abolitionist Frederick Douglass. In 2007, the original swing bridge was used by 77,000 daily commuters.

Original bridge

The original bridge opened on January 14, 1950, as the South Capitol Street Bridge, though it had previously been called the Victory Bridge by Captain H.C. Whitehurst, the District Director of Highways, because it was the first project started after World War II had ended. At the time it was the longest bridge in the District of Columbia and one of the longest swing bridges in the world. Work on the bridge began in 1945, being advertised 2 weeks after World War II ended, but was stalled in 1947 for four months while the District asked Congress for more money. The bridge ultimately opened in 1950.

What to name the bridge had been a question since before it opened, with people all over the world sending in suggestions. The leading ideas in 1950 were FDR, Theodore Roosevelt, George Washington and Herbert Hoover and Frederick Douglass. One idea suggested in 1950 was Walter Johnson, which would have been prescient since the baseball stadium would be built at the foot of the bridge more than 50 years later.