Biography|Mark Ein — The Kastles First Court Stood Where This Plaza Stands

On 14 February 2008 Mark Ein founded the Washington Kastles as a World TeamTennis franchise.

The team was named for Kastle Systems, the access-control firm in his portfolio.

For the first three summers — 2008, 2009, and 2010 — home matches were played in a temporary stadium on the empty lot of the old Washington Convention Center.

That convention hall had opened in 1982 at 909 H Street NW and was imploded on 18 December 2004.

Until construction began in 2011, the ten-acre block bounded by New York Avenue, 9th Street, H Street, and 11th Street NW was parking, circus tents, and, each July, a tennis stadium.

The Kastles' D.C. debut came on 8 July 2008.

They finished 6–8 that first season.

In 2009 they won the King Trophy, the league championship named for Billie Jean King, after a 7–7 regular season.

Five more titles followed in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015.

The 2011 through 2013 seasons moved to a temporary stadium on the Southwest Waterfront, later cleared for The Wharf.

From 2014 the team played indoors at George Washington University's Charles E. Smith Center, then on the roof of Union Market.

What a visitor finds on the original block now is CityCenterDC, a mixed-use complex whose first phase opened in the mid-2010s.

The plaza is not a tennis court.

The pin marks the demolished site where Ein first put professional team tennis in the middle of downtown, on ground the city had not yet redeveloped.

Photo: Sdkb, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons