Several weeks ago at the Library of Congress I came across a copy of “For the Glory of Washington,” a self-published book on the development of D.C.’s rapid rail transit system. (The author Stanley N. Allen, FAIA was a participant-observer during his time with the consulting architects Harry Weese & Associates.) In 1966, the architects had embarked on a taxpayer-funded tour of the world’s leading transit systems, returning home with just days to spare before their scheduled design presentation before the capital’s transit officials.

Between July 2 and 4, Harry Weese worked non-stop to distill the group’s collective observations and recommendations into 22-pages of text, plus color illustrations, that would go on to act as “a working document of architectural design principles” for the hundred mile long, several billion dollar Washington Metro system. “Ideas and drawings flowed together spontaneously,” Allen writes. “No erasures or changes belied any doubts. The designs reflected a pristine, fresh originality.” On July 6, the resulting text + illustrations were delivered to the National Capital Transit Agency.

I recall seeing a few of these sketches in Zachary Schrag’s excellent history of Metro, “The Great Society Subway.” I haven’t seen the other illustrations, or the creative brief, made available online before. The works are all in the public domain because of their creation on a government contract, so I included them below in full to save other curious readers a trip to the library.