We are still so beat from yesterday. Still we made it out for 9:30 this morning and hopped on the Metro. We wanted to visit the National Museum of Art, the West building. There are two and it’s difficult to imagine the amount of art in both buildings as the West alone has an awesome collection. We spent several hours browsing three floors of collections of art. We saw Rodin, Rembrandt, Degas, Monet, Leonardo Di Vinci, Raphael, and numerous others. I’ll include some of the pictures that we snapped of various works.
We left he museum for lunch and ate a Gordon Biersch. We both ate a sandwich and indulged in chocolate cake for dessert.
It was early afternoon when we finished our lunch and we were near Fords Theater so we walked a couple of blocks, got in line to tour the theater. It is still a working theater but it is maintained by the Parks Department. We were all seated in the main theater and listened to a ranger speak for 20 minutes or so about the events of that fateful night- FYI- President Lincoln was shot on April 14th (yes, the day we were married.) He died on the 15th. Something I picked up from the talk- John Wilkes Booth was a very well known actor during this time. He was considered to be the most handsome man in America; crazy, but handsome.
The box where the Lincoln’s sat remains the same as it was that day. We took numerous pictures of that area and enjoyed the museum that is located in the basement.
When we exited the theater, the house where he died is across the street but it was raining so we made a run for the Metro. We went to Union Station to do some window shopping and then headed back to the hotel.
We have to be at the Capitol tomorrow morning at 9 for a tour by someone in Charlie Melancon’s office and then we have a tour scheduled at the Library of Congress after 1. It’s going to be a full day so we figured we’d take it easy this evening. Our hotel is having a complimentary wine reception in the lobby shortly so I think we will attend that before finding dinner someplace.
A couple of pieces of trivia I picked up yesterday and forgot to share with you all:
Abe was our tallest President.
Jefferson was the smartest in regards to IQ- his was 200; when you score 180 you are tagged as genius, the guy was bright
The White House was yellow before it was white.
When the American Revolution ended many people wanted the Army/George Washington to overtake the civil government and he be named King. He walked away from that, wanting to spend time at his estate. He later was unanimously elected to two terms and walked away from a possible third term as President.
GW only had one tooth in his mouth at his first inauguration.
George & Martha had no children.
Martha was a young widow with two children from her previous marriage when she met GW; both children died at young ages; GW had no heirs.