Dumbarton Oaks, formally the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, is a historic estate in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It was the residence and gardens of wealthy U.S. diplomat Robert Woods Bliss and his wife Mildred Barnes Bliss. The estate was founded by the Bliss couple, who gave the home and gardens to Harvard University in 1940.
In 1944, it was the site of the Dumbarton Oaks Conference, which developed plans for the founding of the United Nations following World War II. The part of the landscaped portion of the estate that was designed as an enhanced "natural" area, was given to the National Park Service and is now Dumbarton Oaks Park.
The research institute that has emerged from the bequest to Harvard is dedicated to supporting scholarship in the fields of Byzantine and Pre-Columbian studies, as well as garden design and landscape architecture through its research fellowships, meetings, exhibitions, and publications. It also opens its garden and museum collections to the public, and hosts public lectures and a concert series. Dumbarton Oaks is distinct from Dumbarton House, a Federal Style historic house museum also located in the Georgetown area.
History Early history The land of Dumbarton Oaks was formerly part of the Rock of Dumbarton grant that Queen Anne made in 1702 to Colonel Ninian Beall (ca. 1625-1717). Around 1801, William Hammond Dorsey (1764–1818) built the first house on the property (the central block of the existing structure) and an orangery. Edward Magruder Linthicum (1787–1869) greatly enlarged the residence in the mid-nineteenth century and named it The Oaks. The Oaks also was the Washington residence of Senator and Vice President John C. Calhoun (1782–1850) between 1822 and 1829.
In 1846, Edward Linthicum bought the house and enlarged it. Henry F. Blount bought it in 1891.Goode, p.85
Bliss era
Mildred and Robert Woods Bliss acquired the property in 1920, and in 1933 they gave it the name of Dumbarton Oaks, combining its two historic names. The Blisses engaged the architect Frederick H. Brooke (1876–1960) to renovate and enlarge the house (1921–1923), thereby creating a Colonial Revival residence from the existing Linthicum-era Italianate structure. Over time, the Blisses increased the grounds to approximately and engaged the landscape architect Beatrix Farrand (1872–1959) to design a series of terraced gardens and a wilderness on this acreage, in collaboration with Mildred Bliss (1921–1947). The Blisses' architectural additions to the estate included four service court buildings (1926) and a music room (1928), designed by Lawrence Grant White (1887–1956) of the New York City architectural firm of McKim, Mead and White, the superintendent's dwelling (1933), designed by Farrand. Later renamed the Fellows Building, this building is now known as the Guest House.
After retiring to Dumbarton Oaks in 1933, the Blisses immediately began laying the groundwork for the creation of a research institute. They greatly increased their already considerable collection of artworks and reference books, forming the nucleus of what would become the Research Library and Collection. In 1938 they engaged the architect Thomas Tileston Waterman (1900–1951) to build two pavilions to house their Byzantine Collection and an 8,000-volume library, and in 1940 gave Dumbarton Oaks (which included about of land) to Harvard University, Robert Bliss's alma mater. At the same time they gave a portion of the grounds—some 27 acres—to the National Park Service to establish the Dumbarton Oaks Park.
In 1941, the administrative structure of Dumbarton Oaks, now owned by Harvard University, was modeled according to the following design: the Trustees for Harvard University, composed primarily of the President and Fellows of Harvard College, made all appointments, including those to the Administrative Committee, which in turn would supervise the entire operation and refer to the Trustees such recommendations as may require their action. This committee was first chaired by Paul J. Sachs (1878–1965), Harvard Professor and Associate Director of the Fogg Art Museum, but by 1953 it was chaired by the Dean or Provost and, beginning in 1961 and thereafter, by the President of Harvard University.
In early years the Administrative Committee appointed a Board of Scholars to make recommendations in regard to all scholarly activities. The Board of Scholars was first organized in 1942 (with eleven members, of which seven were from Harvard); its membership was increased to twenty-two members by 1960. In 1952, this board was titled the Board for Scholars in Byzantine Studies. In 1953, a Garden Advisory Committee was created to make recommendations in regard to the garden and, later, to the Garden Library and its Fellows, and in 1963 an Advisory Committee for Pre-Columbian Art was created. The Administrative Committee also historically appointed a Visiting Committee consisting of persons interested in the welfare and broad aims of Dumbarton Oaks. This committee was abolished in 1960 when it was replaced by a Board of Advisors.
Wishing to increase the scholarly mission of Dumbarton Oaks, in the early 1960s the Blisses sponsored the construction of two new wings, one designed by Philip Johnson (1906–2005) to house the Robert Woods Bliss Collection of Pre-Columbian Art and its research library and, the other, a garden library designed by Frederic Rhinelander King (1887–1972), of the New York City architectural firm Wyeth and King, to house the botanical and garden architecture rare books and garden history reference materials that Mildred Bliss had collected.
Dumbarton Oaks Concerto
In 1937, Mildred Bliss commissioned Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) to compose a concerto in the tradition of Bach's Brandenburg concertos to celebrate the Blisses' thirtieth wedding anniversary. Nadia Boulanger (1887–1979) conducted its premiere on May 8, 1938 in the Dumbarton Oaks music room, due to the composer's indisposition from tuberculosis. At Mildred Bliss's request, the Concerto in E-flat was subtitled "Dumbarton Oaks 8-v-1938," and the work is now generally known as The Dumbarton Oaks Concerto. Igor Stravinsky conducted the concerto in the Dumbarton Oaks music room on April 25, 1947 and again for the Bliss's golden wedding anniversary, on May 8, 1958. He also conducted the first performance of his Septet, which is dedicated to the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, in the music room on January 24, 1954.
Dumbarton Oaks Conference In the late summer and early fall of 1944, at the height of the Second World War, a series of important diplomatic meetings took place at Dumbarton Oaks, officially known as the Washington Conversations on International Peace and Security Organization. Delegations from China, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States deliberated over proposals for the establishment of an organization to maintain peace and security in the world. Their meetings resulted in the United Nations Charter that was adopted in San Francisco in 1945.
Post-Bliss era In the preamble to her last will and testament, Mildred Bliss offered the following assessment of what she and her husband had created at Dumbarton Oaks:
In applying the gifts to Harvard, I call upon the present and future President and Fellows of Harvard College and all those who determine its policies, to remember that Dumbarton Oaks is conceived in a new pattern, where quality and not number shall determine the choice of its scholars; that it is the home of the Humanities, not a mere aggregation of books and objects of art; that the house itself and the gardens have their educational importance and that all are of humanistic value.
Those responsible for scholarship at Dumbarton Oaks should remember that the Humanities cannot be fostered by confusing Instruction with Education; that it was my husband's as well as it is my wish that the Mediterranean interpretation of the Humanist disciplines shall predominate; that gardens have their place in the Humanist order of life; and that trees are noble elements to be protected by successive generations and are not to be neglected or lightly destroyed. I charge those responsible for carrying forward the life at Dumbarton Oaks to be guided by the standards set there during the lifetime of my husband and me. The distinction of the scholars themselves as well as of their writings; the interpretation of the texts and the arts; the quality of the music performed; the free discussion within the limits of good deportment, and the whole tempered by the serenity of open spaces and ancient trees; all these are as integral a part of Humanism at Dumbarton Oaks as are the Library and the Collections. The fulfillment of this vision of high intellectual adventure seen through the open gates of Dumbarton Oaks will add lustre to Harvard, to the academic tone of our country and to scholarship throughout the world.
To help the institution better fulfill its mandate, administrative changes were slowly introduced after 1969, the year Mildred Bliss died. The Garden Advisory Committee was abolished in 1974 and replaced in 1975 by the Advisory Committee for Studies in Landscape Architecture. In 1975, the Advisory Committee for Pre-Columbian Art similarly was renamed the Advisory Committee for Pre-Columbian Studies. The Board for Scholars in Byzantine Studies was abolished in 1975 and replaced by the Senior Fellows Committee. In 1981, the three advisory groups were uniformly named the Senior Fellows. Beginning in 1979, the Administrative Committee became composed of four members almost always including the President, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, a senior faculty member of Harvard University, and (until 1994) the Director of Dumbarton Oaks. The Board of Advisors was abolished in 1991.
The institution has continued to be a major sponsor of archaeological excavations and art restoration projects. During the 1970s it funded major fieldwork projects work in Cyprus, Syria, and Turkey, efforts that today span the entire geographical breadth of the former Byzantine commonwealth. Dumbarton Oaks began to fund archaeology in Central and South America in the mid-1990s.
In 2005, Dumbarton Oaks inaugurated a new gardeners' court and a library, both designed by Robert Venturi (1925–2018) of the Philadelphia architectural firm of Venturi, Scott Brown & Associates. In 2008 the institute also completed an extensive renovation of the main house and museum wing, including restoration of its historic period rooms, several of which were created by the Parisian designer, Armand-Albert Rateau (1882–1938).
Research
Dumbarton Oaks is one of three centers for advanced research in the humanities belonging to Harvard but located outside of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The others are the Center for Hellenic Studies, founded in 1962, also in Washington, D.C., and Villa I Tatti, opened in 1961, in Florence, Italy.
Institutional program The mission of Dumbarton Oaks is to support and promote scholarship in three areas of study: Byzantine, Pre-Columbian, and garden and landscape architecture. Through a fellowship program, the institute invites scholars from around the world for an academic year or a summer to pursue individual research. A grants program also supports archaeological research, materials analysis, and photographic surveys of objects and monuments. In addition, each studies program sponsors public lectures, symposia, and colloquia as well as scholarly publications including annual journals, symposium proceedings, and occasional monographs.
Byzantine Studies The program in Byzantine Studies, established in 1940, supports scholarship on the civilization of the Byzantine Empire from the fourth to the fifteenth centuries and its interactions with neighboring cultures and civilizations, including the late Roman, early Christian, western medieval, Slavic, and Near Eastern.