According to the restaurant’s history, in 1856, innkeeper William E. Ebbitt purchased a boarding house in Washington, DC, that welcomed high-profile politicians and future presidents. William McKinley is believed to have resided there while in Congress.
The boarding house’s saloon bar was said to be a popular gathering destination for the capital’s elites — US presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Andrew Johnson, Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt, and Warren Harding are believed to have visited the establishment.
The boarding house closed in 1925, and throughout the 20th century, the saloon relocated a few times to buildings on streets neighboring the White House and the Treasury Building. It moved to its current location in a Beaux-Arts building on 15th Street NW in 1983.
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