By Elliot Carter

This ornate mansion on Dupont Circle served as a temporary White House for President Calvin Coolidge.

The Patterson Mansion was commissioned at the turn of the century by the editor of the Chicago Tribune. The house was one of several mansions built in Dupont during the Gilded Age. The growing neighborhood offered privacy and clean air to a group of millionaires and tycoons who wanted to escape the filth of industrial Washington.

The Pattersons occupied the mansion for only ten years. After Robert Patterson's death, his wife Nellie grew morbidly obese and spent most of her time at their Chicago residence. In 1927 President Coolidge ordered renovations to the White House, and he chose the vacant Patterson Mansion as his temporary residence. Charles Lindbergh visited Coolidge during this period and addressed a crowd from mansion's balcony.