Talk:Seven Buildings

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Seven Buildings and Six Buildings confusion

This article included a line that read "The United States Department of State occupied one of the Seven Buildings for a few months in 1800, and the United States Constitution was housed there for 10 months that same year." Though both of these clauses were cited, I think they're wrong because of the same, oft-repeated error arising from a confusion between the Seven Buildings and the Six Buildings located farther north on Pennsylvania. In "Homes of the Department of State" by the State Department's Historical Office, the authors note that "It has frequently been asserted that the Department of State moved in 1800 into one of the so-called "Seven Buildings" rather than one of the Six Buildings. The Seven Buildings were a block of brick houses on the north side of Pennsylvania Avenue commencing at the corner of Nineteenth Street Northwest and extending westward. This assertion is erroneous since contemporary records of the Department of State refer specifically and repeatedly to its occupancy of one of the houses among the Six Buildings." This confusion arises from the fact that a seventh building was added to the original six of the Six Buildings, causing them to sometimes be referred to as the "Seven Buildings" as well. So there were two rows of buildings on Pennsylvania Ave NW that were sometimes called the Seven Buildings.

But the real "Seven Buildings", the ones this article is about, was not the home to the state department (according to the state department's own history) or to the United States Constitution.

Volcycle (talk) 16:09, 5 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

So, generally, instead of engaging in

WP:ORIGINAL, we have to find a source that talks about this confusion, correct the main text, and add a footnote. The footnote should say something like "source X says the State Dept. was housed in the Seven Buildings, but the source is in error -- as source Z points out that there's confusion between the Six Buildings and the Seven Buildings." - Tim1965 (talk) 04:42, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply

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