House Page History
From the earliest Congresses, Pages have been employed by the House of Representatives
to assist Members in their duties. Over time, their principal tasks—carrying documents,
messages, and letters between various congressional offices—passed from older messengers
to teenage boys and (much later) girls.
The earliest known instance of boys being employed as messengers and errand-runners
was during the
20th Congress (1827–1829). House records indicate that three “Pages”
and eight older “messengers” worked in the Capitol. Members sponsored
boys—many of whom were destitute or orphaned—and took a paternal interest
in them. In 1842, the House tried to cap the number at eight; each was paid
the princely sum of $2 per day. Their ranks expanded as new states entered the Union
and new Members were added. In the years after the Civil War, several dozen
Pages typically served in each Congress. Pages still are appointed and sponsored
by individual Members, though at a ratio that favors the majority party. In
modern Congresses, there have been approximately 70 House Pages.
For their first century of service, congressional Pages were not required to attend
school. That changed with the passage of the 1925 Compulsory School Attendance
Act, which required boys less than 14 years of age to attend school. The Capitol
Page School grew from a one-room private school operating in the Capitol basement
for House Pages to include Pages from the Senate and Supreme Court. By the
mid-1930s, five rooms were required to accommodate the Pages and the curriculum
was accredited by the District of Columbia School Board. The Page School graduated
its first class in 1932. The Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946, created
a tuition-free program for House and Senate Pages funded by Congress—the Capitol
Page School, which moved into the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress
in 1949.
Social change also shaped the face of the House Page Program. On January 3,
1939, Gene Cox, the fourteen-year-old daughter of Representative
Eugene Cox of Georgia, broke long-standing practice when she served in her
father’s office for the opening day of the
76th Congress (1939–1941). Girls permanently joined the Page
ranks in May 1973, when Speaker
Carl Albert of Oklahoma appointed Felda Looper of Heavener, Oklahoma.
African-American boys also were admitted, though haltingly. As early as the Reconstruction Era, the House appointed the first black Page. On April 1, 1871, Alfred Q. Powell of Manchester, Virginia, was appointed by Representative Charles H. Porter of Virginia. No other African Americans are known to have served as Pages until the mid-twentieth century. In January 1959,
five House Members sponsored James A. Johnson, Jr., of Illinois, as a special messenger
for their offices, thus qualifying him for attendance in the Capitol Page School.
In April 1965, Frank Mitchell of Springfield, Illinois, became the first African
American to receive full admittance to the Page program in the modern era.
Before the 1980s, Pages were responsible for arranging their own room and board
and often lived unsupervised in local boarding houses and apartments. Reforms
in 1982–1983 changed this: a Page Board was established with oversight of
the program, an official Page dormitory opened with a professional staff and cafeteria
facilities, the school curriculum was improved, and a comprehensive health care
plan was added. Until 2001 the House Pages lived in the O’Neill Building (formerly
the Old Congressional Hotel).
Since then, they have roomed in a new dormitory facility several blocks from the
Capitol. Beginning in the 1983–1984 academic year, the House and Senate
also initiated separate Page School programs housed on the third floor of the Jefferson
Building at the Library of Congress. Both chambers also issued new age requirements,
mandating that Pages be admitted to the program in their junior year of high school
instead of their senior year.
House Pages in the Speaker’s Lobby (1900) Private Collection
House Pages on the rostrum in the House Chamber (1910)
Image courtesy of Library of Congress
House Pages in the chamber during the 69th Congress (1925–1927)
Image courtesy of the White Family Collection
House Pages attending classes (1948)
Image courtesy of Library of Congress
The House Historian invites former Pages to complete a biographical form as part of an upcoming project on the Page Program’s history.