History
A Brief History of the Knights of Columbus in Washington, DC
& Potomac Council #433
By Edward M. Sullivan, PSD
The Knights of Columbus was first established in the Washington area on April 25,1897 with the institution of Washington Council #224 (one of its charter members would thirty-four years later, become mayor of New York). With the establishment of Keane Councl #353 (June 5, 1898) and Carroll Council #377 (December 15, 1898), DC qualified to have a State Council chartered (March 27, 1899). The following year saw two new councils creater: Spalding (now St. Anthony) Council #417 (April 23) and Potomac Council #433 (June 5). There would be no new councils established in DC for another 55 years.
On Washington’s Birthday in 1900, the Knights established the Fourth Degree in New York City on Washington’s Birthday. There were 11 members from DC in the first exemplification class. In 1901, the five DC Councils purchased a former Baptist church at 606 E. Street NW to serve as a joint home. They sold it three years after World War I and bought the Carroll Institute building at 918 10th St. NW. Twenty years later, two days after the Pearl Harbor attack, Washington Council—the largest in DC—bought its own
building at 1601 R St. NW.
The District of Columbia was a great increase in membership after World War II. In 1954, Washington Council—which alone had over 2000 members—sold its building, met at the Mayflower Hotel for six months, then rejoined the other councils at their 10th St. home. That same year witnessed the establishment of Bishop Byrne Council #3877 which focused on Southeast DC. This was the first new council in DC since 1899 (though in DC environs five councils had been established in Maryland and two in Virginia by this time). Following the dedication of the National Shrine in 1959, men of the CUA campus established Immaculate Conception Shrine Council #4944. A charter member and first chaplain of this council (and still a member) was Father Theodore McCarrick, later to return as Archbishop of Washington.
Carroll Council admitted the first black members in DC in 1961. Three years later Washington Assembly admitted its first black members, half of whom were later ordained in 1971 in the first class of permanent deacons, giving Washington Council the nickname “Council of Deacons”. Washington Council dedicated its present home at 5034 Wisconsin Ave, NW in 1962. Four years later, in 1966, the other councils sold the Tenth Street building and dispersed to different parts of the city. Byrne Council dedicated their own newly-built home on Southern Avenue that same year. Two years later in 1968, the 69-year old Potomac Council merged with Spaulding Council. DC added another new council in 1972—Georgetown University Council #6375—but after a year it became inactive.
By 1979 DC reached a low point with only 1,050 members. This changed in the 1980s. DC added St. Josephat Council #7530 in 1980—the first Ukraninian Council in the U.S. and the first DC council oriented toward one specific parish. Six years later the establishment of St. Martin dePorres Council #9386 in the Eastern part of DC accelerated new council development, followed by CUA Council #9542 (1987), St. Charles Lwanga #9938 (1988) and St. Cyprian #10008 (1988). In 1990, the Knights and students re-instituted Georgetown University #6375. The following year saw the same with Potomac Council #433 in downtown DC the following year. Then came O’Boyle Council #11302 serving Southwest and near Southeast DC in 1994, followed in 1995 by Our Lady of Victory #11487 in Western DC, Fr. Cyprian Tansi #11496 (Nigerian), and St. Thomas More #11578 in southern most DC.
The CUA Council chaired the annual college council conference in 1994, and won the trophy as Outstanding College Council of the entire Order at the following year’s conference. Washington Council celebrated its centennial in 1987, followed by the other four original councils in the next two years. The State Council celebrated its own centennial in 1999. Participating in the celebration was new Supreme Secretary PSD Carl Anderson, who originally transferred to the DC jurisdiction from Virginia in 1991 as the founding Grand Knight of the reinstituted Potomac Council. The following year he was elected to succeed the retiring Virgil Dechant as Supreme Knight. Carl Anderson also served as the Order’s Vice President for Public Policy and Dean of the John Paul II Institute on Marriage and the Family.
Georgetown University Council #6375 chaired the college council conference in 1988, winning the trophy as Outstanding College Council of the Order in 2002. The following year they sponsored the establishment of DC’s third college council at George Washington University (December 8).
Some Notable Local Projects
From their earliest days, DC Knights had a special interest in helping the several Catholic orphanages as well as the Little Sisters of the Poor—which over this past century hasbecome the oldest and largest charity of the DC Knights.
Following World War I, the Order established nationally various job placement, training, and educational program. With the discontinued national funding, the local Knights continued to hold evening educational programs in DC. They drew largely on KC faculty members from Catholic University and were chartered at Columbus University in 1922. A number of men at Catholic University belonged at the time to Washington Council, which over the years included a number of distinguished faculty members.
In 1938, Washington Assembly of the Fourth Degree collaborated with the National Committee of Catholic Societies to sponsor an annual Memorial Mass at Arlington National Cemetery, which achieved some prominence and continued for many years. And in 1941, on the eve of World War II, the Assembly commenced what became the highly successful annual Pan American diplomatic receptions, continuing for over two decades during the war and afterwards bringing together diplomatic representatives from Latin America and their co-religionists, the Knights of Columbus.
In 1939 Washington had become an archdiocese separate from Baltimore, but Archbishop Curley of the latter also served as Archbishop of Washington until his death in 1947, when Archbishop O’Boyle succeeded him. In 1952, the annual charity ball for the Archbishop O’Boyle fund was initiated at the Mayflower Hotel by DC and Maryland councils with the proceedings going to Archbishop Carroll High School. Then just four days after the dedication of the Shrine in 1959, the Kennedy Institute was dedicated, and two years
later the Annual Charity Ball was dedicated to its support and remains so today.
In 1954, the annual K of C Invitational Scholastic Basketball Tournament was established under the DC State Council, lasting for over two decades with great success, and bringing together teams from the local area and a number of other states.
The annual Columbus Day celebrations sponsored by the Knights and Italian organizations were enlarged for 1971 as the “National Columbus Day Celebration” when Columbus Day became for the first time a federal holiday. Then in the bicentennial year, 1976, another very special celebration took place with President Ford among those laying a wreath at the Columbus Monument.
The DC State Council in 1990 was awarded the Caritas Medal by Catholic Charities, the first year the annual award was given, for its leadership in supporting the annual Catholic Charities Gala. Shrine Council member PGK Joe Chase was also given the medal that year. O’Boyle Council, established in 1994, began a strong emphasis on programs for youth (something Cardinal Hickey had especially wanted the Knights to do), as part of which St. Dominic Savio Squires Circle #4215 and a companion group for girls, the Squire Roses, were established in DC. Later, St. Cassian of Tangiers Squires Council #4458 was instituted by St. Thomas More Council.
Potomac Council #433
You may recall that Potomac Council is the council that Carl Anderson founded in his office in 1991 at my invitation when DC State Deputy (hence my deep personal interest in it). It was originally founded as a kind of “commuter council” for people working or associated with downtown DC, most of its initial membership being professionals involved in the practice of law or with various public policy organizations with a pro-life orientation, or with the John Paul II Institute (of which Carl was then dean), or on Capitol Hill. The majority came from Virginia, which was one of the considerations when I proposed to Carl that we re-institute and take the name of Potomac Council, with that nice low number (433).
I always saw a close link between Potomac Council and the two college councils (GU had been reinstituted the year before, while CUA was then four years old). I saw it as the natural place for our college council alumni to graduate to when their former college council was no longer the most appropriate for their continued active involvement. (Indeed, you may not know that when you were GK of the CUA Council and I was recycling as a DD for your council, at my request I was also serving as DD for the Georgetown U and Potomac Councils because I saw them as all closely related.)
Later, about the time Carl moved his office from its Pennsylvania Avenue location to the Theological College, a couple of his successors and the financial secretary all moved away in relatively short order, and without leadership, though with a number of prestigious members on its roster, the council fell into a kind of limbo, not helped when Carl himself moved out of the area entirely to become Assistant Supreme Secretary in New Haven, from which he went on to other things.
In 2000 the council was resurrected from near-oblivion by Gus Gallagher, who had transferred into it just before it had faded, and six months after that resuscitation when it came time for new elections he turned the reins over to Jim Guinivan, a young lawyer and one of the earlier members with great dedication. But with only a handful of active members after some months Jim had to start spending extended periods of time out of town in connection with his work, and was succeeded by his DGK, Jim Sebolka, the current GK.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
1. Lecture Series
Jim Sebolka, a former Air Force Colonel with many years experience First with SAC, and then in assignments at the Pentagon, with the State Department, and in the Far East, made some changes, moving (in January 2003) from the evening meetings at St. Mary’s Church to monthly
lunch-hour meetings at the Catholic Information Center (15th & K, N.E.) preceding the noon Mass, and instituting a lecture series of distinguished speakers following the meeting and Mass, with a complimentary light buffet lunch afterwards. (See list of speakers attached; I think you’ll be impressed.) The Council has attracted a number of new members via these lectures.
Jim is now looking into the possibility of initiating a special series on bio ethics.
2. Professional forum
A second and more recent initiative has been the Potomac Council Professional Forum, a monthly breakfast started last February at the Army-Navy Club (on the first Tuesday of each month) to help Knights working in downtown DC to network to advance the values we hold as well as their own careers or the careers of their brother Knights. This is just
getting underway, but if properly developed has I think great potential in linking Knights from DC, Maryland, and Virginia (and others) in downtown DC for the good of the Church, the values we hold, and their own good as well. This is something that Potomac Council is in a unique position to do.
More narrowly, Bob Destro (of the CUA law faculty and a long-standing member) is looking to the development of a morning seminar series for lawyers (of whom Potomac Council has a number), offering continuing education credits for those who need them. Potomac already joined in
cosponsoring one workday seminar at CUA several weeks ago.
3. Expatriates program
Another proposed initiative, which remains to be more fully developed before being implemented, is to carve out a role for Potomac Council to serve as a “home base” and K of C support organization for expatriate members working out of the area or out of the country for the State Department, or the military, or whatever. (GK Sebolka formerly had
Duty at State, DGK Jim Holdforth works there; new member Robert Palladino of Holy Rosary Parish is in the foreign service, in DC with a focus on Asia; the council has several military members; and there are others we’re in touch with at State like you, Larry Sosnowich, and Brian McGrath, a long-standing member of the GU Council whom you may remember who formerly worked for GU’s Arab Studies program and is now studying Hebrew at State in preparation for an assignment to Jerusalem).
Some other considerations here are the close proximity and relationship between the DC State Council and the Military Archdiocese which as you know has jurisdiction over both civilian and military personnel serving overseas, and the possibility of Potomac Council’s playing a similar
role as a home base or transition for college council alumni from this area who leave the area but do not soon affiliate with a council in their new location, as seems to be the case with most of them.
(While it’s most preferable that a member be involved in a council near where he lives or works, where that is not possible or practical, it’s better that he have some kind of “home base” that can be in some ways supportive of him wherever he may be, which is certainly better than allowing his membership to lapse of become meaningless.)
The ideas indicated above are all possibilities that have some obvious interconnections, but need more work to develop for the good of the Knights of Columbus and that of the individual members who can benefit from them. And Jim Sebolka needs a lot of help–both in effort and in ideas–to put them into effect.
4. Local parishes.
Potomac Council has been assigned responsibility for four D.C. downtown parishes: St. Matthew’s Cathedral, St. Patrick’s, Old St. Mary’s near Chinatown, and, most recently, Holy Rosary, and has done recruiting in each, with some success. There is good support from each of the four
pastors, and the next step is looking at how the council can best serve these parishes as it draws membership from them. For the latter, attention is most focused on St. Matt’s, from which more new members have been drawn than from the others, with the possible exception of St. Mary’s (which seems to exert a special appeal to Virginians).
5. Monthly “pickup social”
For those who can make it, a pickup Dutch treat social has been held on the evening of the fourth Tuesday of each month at the Irish Channel Pub across from Old St. Mary’s (though this past month attendance at an excellent lecture on the art of “The Passion of the Christ” at the CIC, and a viewing of the movie the next night were substituted).
MEMBERSHIP
Potomac Council was founded by professional men and its membership remains so today. Perhaps the largest single occupational group is lawyers, but there is variety among the members, though it remains true that most of the active members are from Virginia and cross the Potomac to get to work. It has, within the past couple of years or so, added to its rolls some members from the parishes named above, as well a number of college council alumni remaining in the area, a matter of special interest to me from the beginning.