Oxon Run Park was created in 1971 when the National Capitol Planning Commission (NCPC) transferred 300 acres of federal parkland from the National Park Service to the District government, which was part of a larger 700 acre transfer that included Watts Branch, Pope Branch and most of the Oxon Run Parkway.

This was added to a smaller plot of land located between 4th and 6th along Mississippi Avenue, transferred in 1942, that served as the Oxon Run Recreation Center.

The final justification of the transfer was that NCPC and city planners thought that a municipal agency would show more concern for local recreational needs than a federal one would.

[4] After a 1937 flood, NCPPC decided to purchase 144 additional acres of land in the valley from the District line to the Camp Simms rifle range north of 14th.

In 1942, prior to creation of the park, the city took control of a small plot of land for a recreation center and built a playground on it.

Four years later, Ward 8 Councilmember Wilhelmina Rolark and the District's Department of Recreation and Environmental Services joined efforts to create a master plan for the park.

[20] In 2000, after several years of planning, fundraising and promotion by Mayor Marion Barry and his wife Cora, the District opened the Southeast Tennis and Learning Center in the park, next to Hart Junior High School.

[22] In 2002, as part of Make a Difference Day, about 300 White House volunteers joined by Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans and then Miss America Erika Harold, built a 4000 square foot playground in the park.

It has baseball fields, basketball courts, an amphitheater, playgrounds, picnic pavilions, the Southeast Tennis and Learning Center and the Oxon Run Pool.