Unraveling
the Mystery of the Missing 'J'
 One
of the conundrums that has puzzled Americans for
hundreds of years is why the neatly laid out grid of numbered
and lettered streets of our nation's capital is lacking a
'J' street. None of the numbered streets appears out of sequence;
none of the other letters of the alphabet is passed over.
Why, then, the seemingly arbitrary gap between 'I' and 'K'
streets?
After
the fledgling United States of America replaced the Articles
of Confederation with a new Constitution in 1788 to create
a stronger federal government and "form a more perfect
union," one of the tasks that befell its First Federal
Congress and its first President, George Washington, was to
create the national capital called for in Article I of that
Constitution.
 The
task of designing, laying out, and building a national capital
from scratch was a daunting one, and President Washington's
first and only choice for the job was Pierre L'Enfant, a "French-born
artist, architect, and civil engineer" who had served
with the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. L'Enfant
began surveying land in March 1791 and soon completed plans
for a city featuring "a system of radial avenues imposed
on a grid of streets." That grid, when finally built,
would lack a 'J' Street, giving rise to the legend that L'Enfant
deliberately left the street off his plans because he bore
a grudge against someone whose name began with J.
Who could
have been this J-named enemy of the French architect? The
person most frequently mentioned is John Jay, who was named
the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court by President
Washington in 1791. The choice is obvious: Jay was a prominent
member of the new federal government, both his first and last
names began with the letter 'J', and his surname was J(ay)
itself! The claim sounds even more plausible when one considers
that from 1801 (when the Supreme Court relocated from Philadelphia
to the new capital) until 1819 the United States Supreme Court
met in a tiny committee room in the basement of the Capitol
building because the original plans for Washington, DC failed
to include a courthouse - evidence of another snub directed
at Jay by L'Enfant.
Why would
L'Enfant bear such ill will toward Chief Justice Jay? The
reason usually given is that L'Enfant was upset with the controversial
Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation (commonly known
as the Jay Treaty), which Jay negotiated with Great Britain
in 1794 to settle several disputes between the two nations
about matters such as British interference with American shipping,
the presence of British troops in North America, and the settlement
of Revolutionary War debts. The treaty was unpopular with
many Americans who considered its terms far too favorable
for Great Britain, and it was seen as a betrayal by the French,
who had been the United States' ally during the Revolutionary
War and were now engaged in a war of their own with Great
Britain. L'Enfant, a French-born American resident who had
taken part in the Revolutionary War, presumably was doubly
insulted by the Jay Treaty.
Unfortunately,
this intriguing theory falls apart when the chronology of
events is considered. L'Enfant was removed from the capital
project by President Washington in early 1792 for refusing
to submit to the authority of the commission in charge of
the project. L'Enfant could hardly have been upset by a treaty
that was still two years in the future.
So, what
DID happen to J Street?
The truth
is that J Street was omitted because the letters I and J were
often indistinguishable from each other (especially when handwritten),
and in 18th century English they were still largely interchangeable.
(The 1740 "New General English Dictionary" published
in London had a single section for I and J, and the standard
identification Thomas Jefferson used on his personal possessions
was "T.I.") Having both an "I" and a "J"
street would have been redundant at best and confusing at
worst, so "J" ended up as the odd man out.
The moral
of the story? That (though we love a good story as much as
the next guy) the best solution to a problem is very often
the most logical and least complicated.
|
