How Did Washington State and Washington, D.C., Get the Same Name?

Contemporary statesmen would have argued that Washington, D.C., was a city, not a territory or state, so the duplication of the name wouldn't be such a big deal. There were already lots of localities that shared names with states, such as Florida, N.Y., and Georgia, Vt., not to mention cities that have the same name as their own state, like New York City and Delaware City. By the mid-19th century, there were already dozens of place names that included the word Washington, and there are at least 120 today. (The first was Fort Washington?now known as Washington Heights?established in New York during the Revolutionary War.)

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