A note on the block party, by Darrow Montgomery, as told to Mitch Ryals.

The last time I was in historic Anacostia on an assignment was just in November—for the opening of the new go-go museum—and things have already changed. So I wanted to take a look.

There was a gas explosion in January that destroyed a building next door to a day care. The building is completely destroyed, and the rubble is still left sitting in the hole where it stood. It’s amazing no one was hurt.

Signs in the storefront windows along Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE are illustrative. King’s mug shot photo sits in the window of the We Act Radio studio; another window commands “THOU SHALL NOT KILL.” On the back of a “Sidewalk Closed” sign, someone has scribbled a note reminding us that the “the street [is] waiting.”

If you wander off MLK Jr. Avenue, down U Street, old Victorian-era row homes offer some contrast and a bit of respite to the main drag.

As I turn right off of MLK Jr. Avenue onto Good Hope Road, I get a little nostalgic. Good Hope Road SE has been renamed Marion Barry Avenue SE. The Mayor-for-Life should have his own street, but I’ll miss Good Hope Road. It was one of the best street names in D.C.

Photographed May 21 on the block bound by Marion Barry and Martin Luther King Jr. avenues SE, and 13th and U streets SE.