The Trustees of The Institute of World Politics are delighted to announce that we have purchased the campus that we have called home for the last 24 years. This purchase is the result of the success of IWP’s Silver Anniversary Campaign.
IWP’s campus, at 1521-1525 16th Street NW, is located in the heart of Washington, D.C., eight blocks north of the White House. It consists of a headquarters building, which is a historic three-story red brick mansion and two adjacent townhouses which have been totally rebuilt into a single building with the original historic facades.
The headquarters mansion was built in 1908 by Dr. Charles Marlatt, an entomologist with the Department of Agriculture, and later President of the Cosmos Club, during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt. After its sale in 1970, the mansion was owned by the government of the USSR, which used it to house the Soviet Embassy’s Office of the Commercial Counselor, as well as offices of the KGB.
In 1994, the campus was purchased by longtime Institute Board member and benefactor, Mr. Donald E. Bently, whose family gave IWP a very generous annual rental subsidy until the school purchased the campus on September 26, 2016.
Bently Hall, which combines 1523-1525 16th Street currently houses four classrooms, several faculty and staff offices, and a library of approximately 40,000 volumes. Likewise, the headquarters mansion contains administrative and faculty offices and conference rooms, which are used as classrooms and venues for IWP’s guest lecture series.
“I would like to thank all of our supporters who have made this exciting purchase possible,” said IWP President John Lenczowski. “I would also like to thank Executive Vice President Larry Cosgriff and CFO Elaine Pinder, as well as Trustees John Lovewell, Owen Smith, and Ty McCoy for their invaluable contributions to this project. The success of the Silver Anniversary Campaign was made possible by the extraordinary work of Vice President Tom Atwood, development consultant Ben Case, and IWP’s development team.”
Ultimately, the most worthy beneficiaries of this purchase will be IWP students and faculty. Thanks to this permanent campus, made possible by our generous supporters and dedicated leadership, our students and alumni will continue to make major contributions to the security and prosperity of our nation and the cause of peace in the world.
Above: IWP President John Lenczowski and Chairman Owen Smith sign a letter of intent to purchase the campus, January 2016.