Washington Dulles International Airport of two grass intersecting runways in the shape of an "X". The location of the former Blue Ridge Airport sits where the Dulles Air Freight complex and Washington Dulles Airport Marriott now sit today. The civil engineering firm Ammann and Whitney was named lead contractor. The airport was dedicated by President John F. Kennedy and Eisenhower on November 17, As originally opened, the airport had three runways (current day runways 1C/19C, 1R/19L, and 12/30). Its original name, Dulles International Airport, was changed in 1984 to Washington Dulles International Airport. The main terminal was designed in 1958 by famed Finnish-American architect
Washington Dulles International Airport Prince George's County, Maryland into an airport. The current site was selected by President Eisenhower in 1958; the Dulles name was chosen by Eisenhower's aviation advisor Pete Quesada, who later served as the first head of the Federal Aviation Administration. As a result of the site selection, the unincorporated, largely African-American community of Willard, which once stood in the airport's current footprint, was demolished, and 87 property owners had their holdings condemned. Dulles was also built over a lesser known airport named Blue Ridge Airport, chartered in 1938 by the U.S.. The airport was Loudoun County's first official airport consisting