Pentagon
Caption: Aerial view of Pentagon
Original Source: Theodor Horydczak, c. 1920 - 1950
Location: LC-H814-T01-W02-005-B DLC
URL: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/thc.5a45398
Description
by Katherine Raney
Construction on the Pentagon began in August 1941 by the War Department and by April 1942, workers were already beginning to occupy the building. Considered the largest office building in the world when it was completed in early 1943, it could house more than 40,000 government, military and civilian employees. The building contains 150 stairwells and seventeen and a half miles of corridors as well as various amenities. Like many wartime expenditures, the actual cost of the Pentagon would go well over budget. Congress allowed $35 million for the building’s construction but its actual cost was somewhere in the realm of $87 million.
World War II Role
The Pentagon allowed for office space within the city to be cleared out as most of the War Department moved to this new location in Arlington. By clearing out offices downtown, the department was more centralized and possibly more efficient. As soon as the building opened, however, the offices it vacated were being reused by other departments. Washington was suffering from a shortage of space in both housing, retail and government offices that it took an enormous building outside of the city limits to partially alleviate the strain.
Now, the Pentagon is central to the Department of Defense and is considered a permanent fixture in Washington. However, the role that the building was thought to play after the war never appeared. Built to be transformed into a military warehouse after the war, the Pentagon remained in Arlington as the new and permanent home to the country’s defense and changes were made to the building to create a more lasting atmosphere. Some areas of the Pentagon remain cramped office space while others have been transformed into retail space. There are wood paneled corridors for high ranking officers and work spaces in the basement. Visitors are even handed a map upon entrance – the mark of a truly established piece of ground.
Sources
- Hart, Scott. Washington at War: 1941-1945. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1970.
- Brinkley, David. Washington Goes to War: The Extraordinary Story of the Transformation of a City and a Nation. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1988.
“Pentagon Moves Make Office Space.” 1943, A3.
- Raney, Timothy. personal interview. November 2006
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