LivingOurDream: Washington DC -Day 3

Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Washington DC -Day 3

Hi All,

We slept late and went into town in the afternoon. First stop was the Capitol building.

We could not get tour tickets on-line yesterday but we walked in at 2:49 and got tickets for the 2:50 PM tour. It started with a very well done movie about the concept of a congress and the history of the building. We were then divided into groups of ten, given wireless headsets so we could clearly hear our guide and taken on a 45 minute tour.
Here is our guide describing the eight huge paintings in the rotunda

The overhead painting is the Apotheosis of Washington (look it up or read Dan Brown's book;-)

The building is full of statues. Each state was invited to send two statues of prominent people from their state. One from Arizona is of Father Esubio Francisco Kino the Jesuit missionary who founded many Spanish missions in the southwest including Tumacacori where we volunteered.

After the Capitol tour we followed a long tunnel to the remarkably ornate Library of Congress building. This is the mezzanine of the Great Hall

and this is the "main reading room".

The most interesting exhibit we saw was the Jefferson Library. During the War of 1812 the British burned the Library of Congress. In 1815 Thomas Jefferson sold his 6,500 volume library to the government to restart the Congressional library. He loved books but he was broke and needed the money.

On the way back to the Metro station we passed the Supreme Court building. Several TV crews were on scene, probably to report on the court decision on campaign financing announced today.