St. Dominic Catholic Church (Washington, D.C.) opened on March 19, 1854. It was set in an area of the city known as "The Island" because, at that time, a canal ran where Constitution Ave. is today which connected the Potomac and the Anacostia Rivers. As the congregation grew it was recognized that a new sanctuary was needed to hold all the congregants. This new church was dedicated on June 13, 1875 by Most Rev. James Roosevelt Bayley, Archbishop of Baltimore. After President James A. Garfield was shot by Charles J. Guiteau on July 2, 1881, St. Dominic's joined other local churches in an "Appeal to Heaven"
James G. Blaine Hawaii. His plans for the United States' involvement in the world stretched even beyond the Western Hemisphere, as he sought commercial treaties with Korea and Madagascar. On July 2, 1881, Blaine and Garfield were walking through the Sixth Street Station of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad in Washington when Garfield was shot by an assassin, Charles J. Guiteau. Guiteau, a deranged man who had earlier pestered Blaine and other State Department officials to be appointed to ambassadorships for which he was grossly unqualified, believed that by assassinating the President he could ingratiate himself with Vice President Arthur and receive his