In 1791, Pierre L’Enfant drew up designs for President George Washington that spearheaded the development of Washington as it stands today. Modified over a century later through Congress’s McMillan Plan, L’Enfant’s architectural genius formed the basis of some of the country’s most recognized landmarks, including the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Jefferson Memorial.

However, those structures, now enjoyed by so many, were only completed after overcoming major hurdles.

The Washington Monument

L’Enfant’s initial framework for Washington was largely ignored for decades, as the district remained in an undeveloped state of chaos at the end of the 19th century. 

It wasn’t until the early 1830s that serious planning commenced for the Washington Monument, Washington’s first major memorial, which owed its origins to L’Enfant’s drawings. After the groundbreaking ceremony in 1848, the endeavor quickly ran into problems that further stalled completion for decades.

Funding was short, as the project was largely reliant on public financing for the bulk of the construction period.

The two major political entities at the time, the Federalists and the Jeffersonian Republicans, bickered over the memorial’s details. Jeffersonian Republicans held animosity toward Alexander Hamilton, one of Washington’s key allies who formed the Federalist Party, and long-standing resentments between the two entities boiled over into the monument debate.

Meanwhile, various groups wrestling for control over the Washington National Monument Society threw a wrench into work on the memorial. Then, between 1856 and 1876, with the Civil War, construction largely ended altogether.

Problems threatened Washington’s monumental legacy even after the war ended.

In the country’s centennial year, 1876, lawmakers were stirred by a wave of patriotism to appropriate desperately needed funds for the completion of the monument. A congressional committee also commissioned engineers to assess whether the foundation would be sturdy enough to support the 555-foot memorial. In 1877, when the memorial had already reached nearly half a football field’s length in its planned height, engineers reported the base couldn’t support the weight of the final structure. Fortunately, workers were able to rectify the problem by replacing the base and the foundation below the monument with concrete.

It was all worth it when the monument was finally dedicated in 1885. That year, the proud country celebrated the awe-inspiring obelisk as the tallest structure in the world. 

The Lincoln Memorial

At the turn of the 20th century, lawmakers got serious about turning Washington into something more than an unseemly swamp on the banks of the Potomac. 

Fueled by the City Beautiful movement, a large-scale “beautification” project that took inspiration from the elegant neoclassical style, then-Sen. James McMillan led the Senate Park Commission and breathed life into L’Enfant’s plans.  

But vital components of the 1901-1902 McMillan Plan hit a wall when Joe Cannon, the speaker of the House, opposed the extension of the National Mall, consequently stalling the construction of the Lincoln Memorial. 

The proposed location for the monument didn’t make sense to Cannon, a practical man who couldn’t envision a magnificent Greek monument in a spot that was, at the time, a remote area. 

Instead, Cannon suggested building a new federal agriculture building on the mall and later battled to place the Lincoln Memorial near Union Station. 

“So long as I live, I’ll never let a memorial to Abraham Lincoln be erected in that goddamned swamp,” Cannon said, according to a 2008 report by the Washington Post. 

Plans to advance the construction of the elegant memorial in its modern-day location on the banks of the Potomac progressed only after Cannon was ousted from his speaker position in 1910. 

The Jefferson Memorial

Serious planning for the Jefferson Memorial didn’t begin until the 1930s, when then-President Franklin Roosevelt, an ardent admirer of the country’s third president, decided it would be fitting to dedicate a national monument to the Founding Father.

But Roosevelt’s dream quickly turned into a nightmare. The Washington press waged an all-out war against the idea, leading Roosevelt eventually to condemn their “complete deception of the public.” The bleak coverage was spearheaded by the Washington Post, a powerful publication that was run by the Republican sympathizing Eugene Meyer, which opposed Roosevelt’s New Deal brand and appeared to spur opposition based on ideological divides. On one side were the Democrats, led by Roosevelt. On the other side were the Republicans, who, as the offspring of the party of Lincoln, feared Jefferson’s memorial might overshadow the Lincoln Memorial.

Critics also ridiculed the government for expending resources to build a monument as millions grappled with poverty during the Great Depression. Others were angered that an architect was tapped to create the monument instead of holding an open design contest. Still, others lambasted the memorial’s classical design. 

But the final roadblock occurred when the “Cherry Tree Rebellion” broke out. The protest broke out in the late 1930s and regarded thousands of cherry trees Japan had gifted to the United States in the early 20th century that crusaders believed would be endangered by the latest memorial. 

“All of Tidal Basin Cherry Trees Doomed By Jefferson Memorial Commission Plans,” a 1937 headline from the Washington Post read. 

While officials pledged to plant more cherry blossom trees, anti-Roosevelt activists who wanted the originals preserved grew angrier. In November of the following year, powerful Washington newspaper owner Eleanor “Cissy” Patterson led a small army of women in protesting at the White House and chaining their bodies to the trees alongside the tidal basin. 

Roosevelt was unmoved. 

“The public has been subjected, by the owner of the newspapers, to the worst case of ‘flimflamming’ Washington has seen in a long time,” he said, according to the Washington Post’s account of the incident. 

With Roosevelt refusing to cave, the ceremonial groundbreaking for the Jefferson Memorial took place in December 1938. It was completed in 1943, just a few years before Roosevelt died.