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Since 1970 the US Department of Agriculture Forest Service has provided the Architect of the Capitol with Christmas trees. The source of the trees rotates through nine national forests with this year’s 55’ Engelmann spruce coming from the Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre…

Many of my guests come from overseas and one of the things I love to do with them is to go to a Nationals game. But have you ever tried to explain baseball to someone who has never grown up…

The only references in the constitution to installing a new president address the oath he or she must take and the date and time of the transfer of power. Everything else that takes place on inauguration day is based on the…

The images from the US Capitol following the recent terrorist attack are shocking. So, to try to return to some resemblance on normalcy, I thought I’d share some photos I took last year in the office of the Speaker of the…

The National Archives is more than the place to see the constitution and the Declaration of Independence. It also has a key role managing the Electoral College. The Electoral College is a process, not a place. And the Archives has a key role…

The tours of NPR’s headquarters are on hold because of the pandemic. But when they come back it is a must see for those coming to Washington for more than a few days and want to do something off the beaten…

Washington is full of memorials to people or events. Most are big and impossible to miss. But some are rather small and almost impossible to find, like the memorial to the first scheduled air mail flight. You can find it along the river…

There’s only one radioactive grave at Arlington National Cemetery. It belongs to Richard McKinley who had the misfortune on being one of three soldiers to be the first casualties of a nuclear accident in the United States.McKinley had survived the fighting…

J. Edgar Hoover spent his entire life in Washington. He was born on Capitol Hill and lived there until he was 43. With his mother.When Mother Hoover dies J. Edgar buys the house above in the Forest Hills neighborhood of…

There are lots of myths and urban legends about Washington, DC’s sites. The Lincoln Memorial is the home of the myths I hear most often form visitors (and some misinformed tour guides).The first myth is that Lincoln’s hands make the American…

The presidency is thrust on Harry Truman in the last months of World War II when Franklin Roosevelt dies after being president for twelve years. No one knows who Truman is when he takes over but the country warms to the…

Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was born in DC in 1899 and grew up in a house which used to stand on what is now Ward Place NW in the West End neighborhood.  Both his parents were musicians.   And while he…

Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was born in DC in 1899 and grew up in a house which used to stand on what is now Ward Place NW in the West End neighborhood.  Both his parents were musicians.   And while he…

This statue of James Garfield welcome Capitol Hill visitors arriving by bus.  If anyone remembers Garfield, they know him as the president who was assassinated and died 8 months into his term.  But why would a president with such a…

All the memorials on the National Mall were erected for a reason and the German-American Friendship Garden is no different.  Nothing is here by accident.    In 1988 at the end of his presidency, Ronald Reagan and West German Chancellor…

When Pierre L’Enfant made his plan for the new capital city, he thought of everything, a canal, a house for the president, where Congress would meet, where the streets would be.  Everything except where to put the dead.  His plan…

The Connecticut Avenue gateway to Washington DC is second only to Memorial Bridge in its beauty.  A broad treelined street leads to a large fountain that marks the border between Maryland and the District.   But the beauty of this…

Soon after moving to Capitol Hill, I visited Congressional Cemetery.  It was quite run down back then.  And I came across this gravestone.  It reads, "When I was in the military, they gave me a medal for killing two men…

No one wants to be an unknown soldier. During the Civil War, that was a real fear.   Soldiers worried that if killed their bodies would not be identified. Some would mark their clothing with their names or engrave their name…

OK, I know baseball can be a slow game.  But the one going on here behind the Federal Reserve Bank must be the slowest.   Who’s on first?  I don’t know.  But there is a pitcher, batter, and catcher.  And…

Lavinia Ream, known as Vinnie, knew if she was going to make it as an artist in Washington, she had to play the city’s power game just as the men did.   Ream was born in Wisconsin in 1847, her…

As strange as it seems and as wrong as it is, there are only three outdoor sculptures of women in Washington, DC.  One of them is Eleanor Roosevelt at the Franklin D Roosevelt Memorial.   Eleanor is Franklin’s wife and…

U Street:  It’s the heart of the African American experience in Washington, DC.  Making it a fitting site for the African American Civil War Memorial.   And let us be clear about this – The Civil War was about one…

In a previous episode we explore famous actors buried here at Arlington National Cemetery.  Today, let’s look at some famous authors.   "In an old house in Paris all covered in vines, lived 12 little girls in 2 straight lines." Those…

There is a statue of a young boy, a naked man, and a partially clothed woman.  It is the Boy Scout Memorial.   I guess when this was dedicated in 1964, a naked man with a Boy Scout wasn’t as…

It seems you can’t throw a rock in Washington without hitting a statue of some sort.  There are so many ideas, events, and people (actually mostly white men) that we want to memorialize.   But the work of one person…

The official name of Washington National Cathedral is the Cathedral Church of St Peter and St Paul.   But that name itself begs the question:  What’s the difference between and church and cathedral?    Many folks think that a cathedral…

At the base of Capitol Hill at a site that few visitors come:  the Fountain of Light and Water.  Locals call it the Bartholdi Fountain, named after its creator Frederrik August Bartholdi.  You may know Bart-hole-dee from one of his…

At the end of this crumbling sidewalk near some docked sightseeing boats in SW Washington stands the Titanic Memorial.  It’s dedicated “To the brave men who perished in the Titanic, April 15, 1912. They gave their lives that women and…

In the Capitol Riverfront neighborhood of southwest Washington, and I’ve come across Washington’s most unusual museum:  The Transportation Walk outside the headquarters of the US Department of Transportation.    This is a museum that’s not in a museum.  It traces…

Most of Washington’s memorials are for those making political or military contributions to our national life.  But this is a rare example of the commemoration of an individual associated with technology. Guglielmo Marconi, an Italian, is credited with inventing the…

When you come to a church service, you should expect to hear a sermon.  And the site of sermons given at Washington National Cathedral is imposing.   Sermons are delivered from a pulpit.  Pulpit comes from the Latin word pulpitum, meaning…

Not far from this shore, there was canon fire that marked a changed world.   In November 1776 Captain Isaiah Robinson sailed the Continental navy brigantine Andrew Doria to St Eustatius.    St Eustatius is and was a volcanic rock…

Franklin Roosevelt was the greatest president of the last century.  He led the country through the Great Depression and World War II and elected president four times.   His beautiful memorial along the Tidal Basin in Washington reflects the epic…

Russian aggression against Ukraine is nothing new. In 1932 and 33 million Ukrainians starved to death in a man-made famine called the Holodomor.  Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union’s dictator, wanted to turn his country into an industrialized, Russian-led, communist world power. To…

The early days of computing were cumbersome and slow because data processing systems used a mechanical programing code that was very difficult to write.But this woman changes all that.Grace Hopper attends Vassar and earns a master and PhD in mathematics…

The inscription "His Wife" on the headstone of Marguerite Higgins at Arlington National Cemetery doesn’t begin to do her justice. Her husband William Hall was an Air Force general who is buried with her. And the regulations are such that inscription describes…

Medgar Evers is an American martyr. He grew up in Mississippi.  After high school he joins the army and fought in the battle of Normandy in WWII. He returns home and graduates from Alcorn State College.  Evers was an insurance salesman, but…

This house won’t be on an FBI tour of DC.  Even though it must be the worst kept spy secret in the city.  I first learned about the it in the early 80s when a friend lived in a group house a…

If you are planning a trip to Washington DC, you may have some well-known landmarks on your itinerary, like the White House and the National Mall, but to get a real taste of this city that has served as the…