Alexander Robey Shepherd: The Man Who Built the Nations Capital

About this book

With Alexander Robey Shepherd John P. Richardson gives us the first full-length biography of his subject who as Washington D.C.s public works czar (187174) built the infrastructure of the nations capital in a few frenetic years after the Civil War. The story of Shepherd is also the story of his hometown after that cataclysm which left the city with churned-up streets stripped of its trees and exhausted. An intrepid businessman Shepherd became president of Washingtons lower house of delegates at twenty-seven. Garrulous and politically astute he used every lever to persuade Congress to realize Peter LEnfants vision for the capital. His tenure produced paved and graded streets sewer systems trees and gaslights and transformed the fetid Washington Canal into one of the citys most stately avenues. After bankrupting the city a chastened Shepherd left in 1880 to develop silver mines in western Mexico where he lived out his remaining twenty-two years. In Washington Shepherd worked at the confluence of race party region and urban development in a microcosm of the United States. Determined to succeed at all costs he helped force Congress to accept its responsibility for maintenance of its stepchild the nations capital city.