HISTORIC DC

On Saturday, September 17 the Washington Canoe Canoe Club, founded in 1904, will host a Sunset Dinner to fundraise for renovations. Go to Washingtoncanoeclub.org for more information.

Rehabilitating Washington Canoe Club

BY CHRISTOPHER JONES

In a race against nature’s destructive forces, Georgetown’s most prominent architectural feature and historic landmark on the Potomac River – the now-dilapidated Washington Canoe Club (WCC) – is on a path toward historic renovation, despite the inertial drag of interagency oversight.

In the nation’s capital, few river views are as captivating as the sight of Georgetown’s legendary green Victorian shingle-style boathouse at 3700 K St. NW designed in 1904 by 24-year-old architect George P. Hales (1880-1970) and built the following year. With a mission of providing “mutual improvement, the promotion of physical culture, and the art of canoeing,” the founders of the WCC wished to construct a boathouse for its private members similar to those along the Charles River in Boston. Having just arrived from Massachusetts and familiar with New England’s boating culture which had flourished in the Gilded Age as Americans embraced outdoor recreation, Hales – a canoeing enthusiast himself – was fit for the task.

“The Victorian elements of New England boathouses and summer cottages — wood shingles, hipped roofs, gables, and capacious porches and balconies — would be incorporated in the WCC boathouse to achieve a blend of rusticity with comfort,” wrote historian Christopher N. Brown – who has personally paddled in all 50 states – in his book “Images of America: Washington Canoe Club.” For over 100 years, the Canoe Club has seen many additions, renovations and repairs. “Tradition holds that the clubhouse was built by the members, using salvaged timbers and lumber from burned barns,” the WCC website states.

In 1991, the Canoe Club was placed on the National Register of Historic Places, cited as an architectural exemplar, one of only two remaining boat clubs along the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., and the home of the nation’s premier flatwater paddle racing club. According to Brown, “WCC paddlers have succeeded at the highest levels of their sport. Twenty-eight members have been on Olympic teams, and the club has produced hundreds of national and international champions. Two WCC athletes have reached the pinnacle of amateur athletics glory, winning Olympic gold medals; two others have won silver. These WCCers are four of only nine Americans ever to win Olympic medals in flatware paddling events.”

Over the generations, the club has also significantly enhanced the social fabric of Georgetown, hosting ballroom dances, clambakes and grill parties, as well as a myriad of social and sporting clubs, and holding major swimming and boating regattas such as the President’s Cup established in 1925. The WCC has also been a leader in the nation in developing women’s paddling, adding a women’s locker room in 1930 and qualifying the first American woman, Ruth DeForest, for the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.

However, despite the historic significance of the WCC, many familiar with the boathouse’s years of struggles with wear-and-tear, flooding, ice jams, hurricanes, sun exposure, poor drainage, termites, and jerry-rigged repairs are afraid the aging boathouse could collapse or be swept away with the next major weather catastrophe before it can be refurbished to withstand the elements.

Today, the Canoe Club falls under the jurisdiction of the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historic Park under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service (NPS). In 2011, the NPS – shocked by the condition of the club – sealed off the boathouse’s upper floors and balconies and installed internal bracing to prevent structural collapse. Five years ago, the WCC’s Rehabilitation Committee began working with the Georgetown architectural firm Cox, Graae and Spack (CGS) to develop plans for the club’s historic restoration.

The Georgetowner spoke with the head of the WCC’s Rehabilitation Committee, David Cottingham, and the principal CGS architect on the WCC account, Don Gregory, about the status of the Canoe Club’s rehabilitation efforts. What progress has been made and what challenges lie ahead?

VISIT GEORGETOWNER.COM FOR THE FULL ARTICLE.