Fort Reno Park
Fort Reno Park is an urban park in the Tenleytown neighborhood of Northwest Washington, D.C. It is named after Fort Reno, one of the only locations in the District of Columbia to see combat during the American Civil War. The park was established in the 1920s to clear an African American neighborhood called Reno from the site, in what was becoming an affluent white suburban area. Most of the property is owned by the National Park Service, including a community garden, a former community center, and large expanses of grass. The D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation operates a baseball field and several tennis courts at the southwestern corner of the park. Also located within the park are a large reservoir facility operated by DC Water, Alice Deal Middle School, the Reno School, and a former Continuity of Government facility now operated by the Federal Aviation Administration. In addition, the highest natural point in the District of Columbia lies within the park. The bandstand located on the south side of the reservoir has hosted an annual DIY concert series that has been important to the D.C.'s music scene, particularly the D.C. hardcore punk community. History Prior to colonization of the Potomac River piedmont in the 1700s, the area was controlled by a variety of American Indian groups. High points such as the present park, were not as economically important to those societies as valleys, as evidenced by archaeological investigations in the area. However, a travel route along a ridgeline leading to Georgetown, today's Wisconsin Avenue may precede European settlement. Most of the land that became Fort Reno Park was granted as a land patent to Thomas Fletchall as "Fletchall's Chance." The land passed through a variety of owners until a Treasury Department official named Giles Dyer acquired the land for his estate in 1853. Dyer died in 1856, and his wife Jane administered the farm, including five or six enslaved people. Tenleytown was established along the old ridgeline trail, which split into three major roads just south of the Fort Reno site. Civil War The success of Confederate forces during the First Battle of Bull Run just miles from Washington, D.C. shook Union leaders, and indicated the precarity of the Union government and the Washington Navy Yard, mere miles from enemy territory. Engineers began a rushed campaign to fortify and protect the federal city by constructing a ring of forts around the city. In early August 1861, engineers in charge of the defenses of Washington identified the tall hill on the Dyer estate as a critical site for protecting against invasion along the three roads that converged from the northwest in Tenleytown. Construction of earthen ramparts and trenches began in earnest in August 1861 by the Pennsylvania Reserves, so the fort was originally named "Fort Pennsylvania." The Dyer farmhouse north of the fort was used by the Army as a headquarters building. The fortification occupied 20 acres of Dyer land and an additional 50 acres of Dyer's land were used