Transcripts For CSPAN3 History Of Union Station 20170708 : c

History. We also hear from historical act tect john boeing about the recent restoration. Aye like to welcome you to Washington Union station. This is a magnificent building located here in washington, d. C. , just a couple of blocks from the u. S. Capitol building. My job is ceo and president of Union Station Redevelopment Corporation, a nonprofit here in washington, d. C. Whos responsibility is stewardship of this magnificent building. It was built in 1907. Not only one of the largest buildings in the world, but the most magnificent train station that had been built to date. This station has understood ggo changes throughout the years. Completed in 1912 and entered into a busy, busy Time Starting with world war i when the uso took over then of course through the 1920s and through the depression, went through many, many changes from being an active station to a place where of course it was not so active. Served over 200,000 people a day. In this magnificent hall to serve the men and women coming through the station each and every day. Of course, then we went through the changes in the 1950s when rail travel was not as popular as it used to be. The station began to suffer and became visible. There was a plan which was implemented to make this a National Visitors center and in the hall were standing in, there were significant alterations that took place. Not alterations for the better and they were changed in the 1980s. When congress and others decided that the station deserved to be b preserved, restored and operated once again in the glory that daniel bernham had intended for it in 1907. This station reopened here as well as a mode of transportation sector. It serves over 8 million a year. It went another cently. The earthquake caused cracking and other problems in ceiling of this magnificent hall. The Union Station Redevelopment Corporations board of directored started to explore the magnificent feeling in this main hall and after three years of renovations, we probably opened the main hall last summer. It is in its true glory. The main hall looks as it looked in 1907 as intended by daniel bernham and we really welcome and enjoy having people come through the station now to really see station as it was swended when it was first filled at the turn of the 20th century. Around 1900, washington, d. C. Was celebrate iing the centenni and of course around the country, many of the cities were developing parklands, such as central park and new york. There was an interesting congress in doing something similar here in d. C. And senator James Mcmillan was appointed chairman of the Senate Park Commission and the purpose was to really look at the laffont plans and to attempt to implement the laffont plan and really make washington, d. C. A premier nations capitol and one of the greatest cities in the country. Of course, part of that plan involved creation of a National Mall with public buildings and monuments and museums along a grassy area ventures south from the Capitol Building. In order to accomplish the plan, the railroad stations which were located too close to the Capitol Building, needed to be removed. If you can imagine not only did you have two train stations, but you had a number of tracks and Railroad Crossings throughout the city in order to get to the stations. Daniel bernham was an architect in chicago at time. He had been the director of a chicago worlds fair. There were a couple of things that he need today accomplish. First, he had to get the owners of the b and o and the Pennsylvania Railroad to agree to combine and work out of one station. No small feat. Then of course, there were facilities that were already heerk townhouses, this was a thriving Blue Collar Community so to speak. Saloon, even a baseball field that was used here by the community. Thats why we call this Union Station. There are many throughout the country. It means that the union of two or more railroads agreeing to operate out of a single building. It was a great spot and one of the other reasons it worked so well is it was north of the cap a Tall Building so the train, the tracks and lines coming in could end here at Union Station before going underground. So it allowed the whole area to be cleaned up and really to rid this part of the city of much of the infrastructure like the tracks that had been here up to this point in time. So the plans of course began to build the station. Just as we have prokts didnt, didnt go as smoothly as planned when construction began in 1903, they hoped to complete this building by 1905 in time for the inauguration. They didnt make that. The building didnt open until 1907 in the fall and it was served by the b and o railroad in september, then a month later by the Pennsylvania Railroad. Construction wasnt completed until 1912 with all the stat chair and Columbus Plaza outside, but the railroad station did begin operation in 1907 and was open fully for the 1909 inauguration. Daniel made it clear that hemted something monumental. He wanted to make this magnificent and used the phrase monumental when talking about his plans. You can see he achieved his goal. When people walk into this building, theyre really taken aback by the space the beauty and i think his goal was truly achieved in terms of having a magnificent billing that would really make people who walk into the building both in 1907 and today really stop and gaze at the beauty of this structure. T trz. This looks very much today like it looked over 100 years ago. There were a few significant differences. There were a number of of large ben fs here in the main hall. Remembering of course this was the waiting area, so if you can pick up a train in 1908 through 1950, this is where you would sit an wait for your train. There were newsstands, coffee shops n. One corner of the building, we had the mens lo d lounge. A barbershop. They could get their boots cleaned, clothes pressed. There was a smoking room for them and then in the opposite corner of the building, we had the ladys lounge. Not so many amenities as were provide nd the mens, but a place where they could sit and wait and be made comfortcomfort. You would enter via this main hall. If you needed to purchase a ticket, you could do that in the west hall. Portion of the station. During world war two, is station was so busy they had to add ticket counters and fill up the main hall with the additional ticket counters, there were a number of patriotic banners and banners to sell the war bounds hanging below the wall. Over 200,000 people could be here on a day. World war ii. Some of the benches needed to be removed to handle the ticket counters, but it was still a primarily, the largest waiting room certainly in the city. And cross road of the wormd it was once dubbed be by someone in the press. Its interesting to go thrust history. The announcers voice was change today a female voice under the theory that a female voice would be sweeter and softer and would be more appropriate during wartime. Also to illustrate how busy the station was, we have a quote from one of the quarters in that day that says he was bribed frequent frequently to take people to the head of the line. The lines were so long they extended through the building. Now, were going into the east hall. One of the nicest restaurants in washington, d. C. It served as a restaurant into the 1950s. It was called the salve ron nor a while and was one of the fanciest in the district of columbia and anyone who was anyone dined here so im told. This is a beautiful room. You see it today as you saw it in 1907 through 1940. This dining room was significant because the trains were not integrated south of washington, d. C. Until somewhere around the 1950s or 60s. So, people coming in from the trains from the north, the trains were integrated, but all trains stopped here at Union Station so that the changes could take place because the trains then were segregated heading into the south. So, again, very significant that you had a place here in the station where everyone could come and eat together. If you couldnt afford to eat at the elegant restaurant here, there was a lunch counter room provided. We now call it the columbus club. But it was a very elegant room as well. You can watch the trains coming in and out from the lunch counter room n. The 1986 restoration, the room was turned into a two tiered room, weve had many events its used as a very advanced space. The dining room has been turned into retail space as the result of a 1986 ration. We hoped it would be returned to its original use one day. Now, a look at the president ial suite. This room was very important. Remembering this was built in 1905 and in 1901, p president mckinley had been assassinated. 20 years prior, president garfield had been assassinateded just down the street in one of the railroad stations, so it was important to have a place where the president could be secluded yet enjoy train travel, which was the primary way of getting in and out of washington, d. C. So, the president ial suite was established here on the east side of the building and the president s carriage could pull up in seclusion. The president his family or guests could get into the president ial suite, rest here, have dinner, entertain and then privately, be taken to the north side to get on their train. The president s of the United States at various times used this for ceremonial gatherings. Prince albert and Queen Elizabeth were greeted here in the 1930s by the roosevelts, so during the war, the president ial suite had a different purpose. Pingtures of uso servicemen and women, enjoying themselves, president truman decided it would be a better use of the space, so he did not use the space, but turn the facility over to the uso to be used through the 1950s. This was used continuously by president s whom as i mentioned turned over uso and president s did use the station to greet dignitary, they no longer used the president ial swooes for that purpose. Were standing in the area now, the train concourse, you see the waiting room, the main hall where people waited for their train and they came through those doors to greet the train. You can see space is quite difsht now from what it was in 1907, however, you can still see a portion of the magnificent ceiling in here as well. We had the skylights. They did not work an were removed in 1920, but you can still see the lighting that we have here. So passengers came from the main waiting area and got on to the trains at this part of the station. Today, of course, this is now a retail facility, but it is important to remember this iconic space was so large that you could have laid the Washington Monument end to end and still had room left over. There were two ends built on to the building and they were removed in order to build a washington metro system in the 1970s. Today, it serves as the primary retail part of the station. I guess run away trains were not tesh bly uncommon, but there was one here at Union Station. It was about five days. A train of about 100 people was coming in from the northeast. Operating the train. Lost control, the brakes failed so much as the best guess and the train came barrelling into the station. Fortunately, the weight of the locomotive when it reached the floor of the station, the floor gave way. Forcing the train to stop. No one was killed. There were a if few dozen people taken to the hospital, but the magnificent was that 400 workers came in, worked around the clock and 36 hours later trk station was functional in time for president eisenhowers inauguration. This was a one story concourse. Those were work areas previously. Remember that the station was busy and did serve as the gateway so this concourse served. Then in 1963, the civil rights march. The beatles arrived here for their First American tour and many diplomatic events also took place creating quite a bit of traffic through this portion of the station. Were back in main hall again and by the 1950s, the main hall suffered quite a bit of use and was in bad condition. The floor here was taken out. There were actually the ceilings were covered with gold paint in some places. Blue paint on some of the walls. Congress and others began to debate the future of washington ewan kwon station. Around the country, many other train stations were being torn down. It didnt happen here, but it took about 20 years of conversation for congress and others to decide what the next best use for this should be. Finally, they decided to turn it into a National Visitors center, so in the 70s, the main hall, if you can believe it, was turned into a Visitors Center and the floor was removed so an 8,000 square foot display area could be built here. It was referred to by one of the critic as the pit and if you can imagine, this floor was removed and there were literally a large hole where there were two movie theatres and a number of visual displays then. You would walk down into this area and see pictures of the capitol and learn b about you know whark you needed to know to visit washington, d. C. As one newspaper critic reported however it opened, one, he referred to it as the pit, a name it still has for that era, and second comment was made, why would anyone come here, go down to the pit and watch films about the u. S. Capitol when they could walk a few feet outside and see the Capitol Building for it. Needless to say, this was did not stay open long. They had the inauguration in 1981 then the entire building was closed and from then on, if you wanted to go to the amtrak station, you literally needed to walk around the billing or walk on wooden planks to get to your train. It was not something we could be proud of in terms of what happened to the station. In congress, a decision was made to decide what to do with the station. Other train stations had been destroyed around the country. The Preservation Movement was strong. Ipg people really began the to understand these buildings were magnificent and needed to be preserved and not torn down, so in 1981, Congress Passed legislation that this building should be turned into an intermobile Transportation Center once again an intermodal Transportation Center, but it should have a commercial interest that would allow it to continue for the next century. So they developed a Public Private partnership. And with the department of transportation, the Union State Development corporation was born. And the corporations responsibility was to be steward of this magnificent facility. So in the mid1980s a major renovation took place. The pit was covered, and this floor which resembles the historic floor was put back. Everything from the cloth to the ceilings were restored. And this building once again opened in 1998. And it was quite an event when it opened. There was a great celebration, many speeches were made. At at tham the rest of the building was also restored much as you see it today. So the west hall area that had once been ticket counters was opened as a retail place. The columbus plodsa opened as an event space. The east plaza was fully restroered. And the train concourse of course became a significant retail space. Although not everything that was done received great acclaim i think everyone understood it was a really very creative way to save the stagds. And nfgt it work. And here we are 30 years later and the station is still going very strong. So the building after its restoration in 1988 was very wellused for these past many years. And then a few years ago, of course, we had the ether quake in washington, d. C. A very unusual event. Some of the other monuments and the cathedral were harmed by the earth quake. And we also discovered here we suffered some cracks in our ceiling as a result of that earthquake. So once again we looked at what could best be done for preservation. And this magnificent ceiling it was determined it needed to be fully restored. For example, in 1985 while much of the ceiling that you see was restored, there was a great deal of work to be done above the coffers in order to preserve the ceiling for the next 100 years. To talk about the particulars, id like to introduce john dewy, historic architect. Ive been working both with amtrak and the Redevelopment Corporation since 2003. And i was heavily involved in the restoration work that took place after the 2011 earth quake. Were here right now at the mezzanine level directly over top and looking out to the hall space. And as you can see off to the side is the concourse area, which in the 1980s was converted into commercial space. He designed it in the bozar style, which means in english the school of the bozars. And pierce anderson had been classically trained and had been in paris and this was the style that was magnificent, the monumental style in the latter part of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century. The bozar style was natural for a train station. Just like it was for big buildings, School Buildings and big public buildings, it provided a sense of structure. It provided a sense of organization from the grand monumental spaces such as the grand hall you see here to the subordinate stations such as the east hall where the restaurant was or the west hall, which is where the ticket area was or the place you would drop off your baggage. There were a number of contractors involved here because it was such a massive undertake. A firm was one the Pennsylvania Railroad had used on a number of lead projects. They provided the over all guidance, construction, man power and control over the constructi