Park View, D.C.

Dr. Charles W. Gilmore of Smithsonian Institution with dinosaur Diplodochus, 9/25/24

While it is relatively easy to dig into the history of a place and figure out when a house was built or a road paved, it’s often harder to flesh it out with personal histories. While more digging, research, and interviews are needed to uncover other stories of Park View’s residents — past and present — I found this history interesting.

Dr. Charles W. Gilmore moved into 451 Park Road in 1908 and lived there until his death in 1945

Charles W. Gilmore, a prolific scientist, moved to Washington in 1903 when he was hired by the U.S. National Museum (Smithsonian). In the Spring of 1908, he permanently settled in Park View, living at 451 Park Road, NW.

Gilmore was originally hired as a preparator to work on the O.C. Marsh dinosaur collection that was transferred from Yale University to the Smithsonian in the late 19th century. He later became curator of fossil reptiles and was in charge of mounting the world’s first Triceratops skeleton. He published 170 scientific papers including monographic studies on the osteology of Apatosaurus and Camptosaurus and the osteology of the carnivorous and armored dinosaurs.

The Smithsonian Triceratops after its move to the Natural History building in 1910

More about the Smithsonian Institution’s Triceratops and its history can be found at this link.

This entry was posted on September 22, 2010 at 7:01 am and is filed under History, People. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.

Tags: history and culture, Park View