Harbour Square development. Washington, D.C., had undergone rapid population growth during World War II. In 1946, the United States Congress passed the District of Columbia Redevelopment Act, which established the District of Columbia Redevelopment Land Agency (RLA) and provided legal authority to clear land and funds to spur redevelopment in the capital. Congress also gave the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) the authority to designate which land would be redeveloped, and how. The RLA was not funded, however, until passage of the Housing Act of 1949. A 1950 study by the NCPC found that the small Southwest quarter of the city suffered from high concentrations of old and poorly maintained buildings, overcrowding, and threats to public health (such as lack of running indoor water, sewage systems, electricity, central heating, and indoor toilets). Competing visions for the redevelopment ranged from renovation to wholesale leveling of neighborhoods, but the latter view prevailed as more likely to qualify for federal funding. Demolition faced almost all structures in Southwest Washington. However, in December 1954, the Historical Society of Washington, D.C. successfully pressured the RLA into giving consideration to saving Wheat Row and the Duncanson-Cranch House. Then in September 1958, O. Roy Chalk, president of DC Transit, proposed integrating the Edward Simon Lewis House, Wheat Row, and the Duncanson-Cranch House into the new developments then on the drawing board. By January 1959, the RLA was actively pushing for all three properties, plus the Thomas Law House, to be saved and integrated into the new construction, even as housing and other buildings around them were being demolished. The RLA subsequently awarded development of the area around Wheat Row to Shannon and Luchs, a local real estate development firm. On June 3, 1960, Shannon and Luchs announced it would build a $12 million, 447-unit cooperative apartment complex known as Harbour Square on the Wheat Row site. Wheat Row, the Duncanson-Cranch House, and the Lewis House would be incorporated into the new development. Construction on the project, designed by the architectural firm of Satterlee & Smith and now including financial partner John McShain, began in February 1963. Wheat Row was integrated into Harbour Square as four of the 17 townhouses offered for sale by the cooperative. Harbour Square was completed in 1964. Wheat Row remains part of Harbour Square. About Wheat Row The four row houses of Wheat Row were designed in the Late Georgian architectural style. Architectural