Washington Dulles International Airport and is on pace to exceed Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport's annual passenger numbers for 2018 after having fewer passengers ever since 2015. However, Dulles Airport still ranks behind Baltimore–Washington International Airport (BWI) in total annual passenger boardings, despite being a larger facility with more gates. Prior to World War II, Hoover Field was the main commercial airport serving Washington, on the site now occupied by The Pentagon and its parking lots. It was replaced by Washington National Airport in 1941, a short distance southeast. After the war, in 1948, the Civil Aeronautics Administration began to consider sites for a
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