Washington DC

The Capitol – it felt a bit like we were on a stage set and, in some ways we were.  As we walked along the National Mall we saw a number of film cameras and crew buses and people with placards warning that filming was taking place

We had both previously visited Washington DC with work and had seen most of the ‘must do’ sights so Phil and Lesley recommended that we take a couple of days to visit some of the Smithsonian museums around the National Mall.  So, on Thursday 31 May and Friday 1 June we took the Metro’s silver line from its outermost station, Wiehle-Reston, into Smithsonian, right on the National Mall. We came up the escalator and straight into that icon filmset view.

Clockwise from left: The Washington Monument; the Smithsonian Castle; the Natural History Museum; the National Archives

We spent some time just wandering along the National Mall enjoying the sights, even if they weren’t set off by the traditional blue May skies; it was rather grey and overcast!

The Washington Monument and the African American History and Culture Museum

Phil had recommended that we try to visit the newly opened African American History and Culture Museum but entry is by timed tickets only and we were unable to get tickets for a time that worked for us so instead we spent the Thursday at the National Museum of American History. THE display to see at this museum is the original Stars and Stripes, the banner that flew over Fort McHenry in Baltimore and which inspired the writing of the American National Anthem, the Star-Spangled Banner. Unfortunately, but understandably, it is forbidden to take photos in the display.  The flag itself is now preserved in a dimly lit, climate-controlled environment in the hope that in this way it will survive another 250+years. It’s a huge flag even if, over the years, sections of it have been cut off to give to souvenir hunters.  It spent a long period hung in a sunlit room so it is rather faded and extremely brittle but it is still impressive.  We went round the exhibit twice as some of the really interesting information about the flag is displayed after the flag itself.  Having read more about how it is constructed, damage it has sustained over the years, etc, Nicky wanted a second look at the artefact itself.

Julia Child’s kitchen

I wasn’t terribly disciplined about taking photos in the museum and so only have pictures of a couple of displays but we saw several other exhibits which helped to provide us a better understanding the American way of life and psyche (for want of a better way of putting it).  One of the more thought-provoking was a temporary exhibit about the internment of Japanese people living in America, including American citizens of Japanese origin, during WWII.  The exhibit on food shown above was also very interesting.  My pictures focus on the kitchen of Julia Child (1912-2004) the famous American TV cook and teacher.  She developed a passion for cooking when she accompanied her husband to Paris on a posting with the US Information Agency.  During their time in the city, she attended the famous Le Cordon Bleu cookery school and was the first woman to receive (belatedly) a graduation certificate from it.  Over 40 years, through books and her TV series, she encouraged Americans to expand their ideas on cookery and in 2001 she donated the kitchen from her home in Cambridge Massachusetts to the Smithsonian. The rest of the display gave a real insight into the development of parts of the American food (eg barbecues from holidays on the Pacific islands) and wine industries and, in concert with the display on transportation (see below), very much helped to put areas of modern American life, that we all ‘know’ and ‘understand’ from films, into context.

Top: San Remo Railway company display. Bottom left:  Depiction of the first successful North American transcontinental car journey. It took 63 days, 12 hours and 30 minutes (23 May – 26 July 1903).  Bottom right: The John Bulllocomotive 1831

Our overriding impression from the transportation display was one a huge country with, until recently (advent of cheap transport, TV, radio, the internet), great isolation away from the main cities.  The John Bullexhibit, highlighted the size of the nation almost by accident.  The blurb informed us that ‘the John Bullwas one of the earliest steam locomotives in the US and was imported from England in 1831 for use on the first rail link between New York and Philadelphia.  The engine tended to derail on the uneven American tracks but a set of guide wheels attached to the front solved the problem……..The John Bulland its cars reduced passengers’ journey time between the nation’s two largest cities from 2 days by road to 5 hours by rail’.  Five hoursin a train between 2 cities which are, in the overall picture of the US, really rather close together!  It’s a huge country and the development of railways across the country was invaluable in bringing the 2 coasts closer together, but also further isolated all those places that the railway didn’t touch.  The display about the San Remo Rail Company highlighted just how important the railways were for towns and cities to develop and for the local population to get their food produce to the new and expanding markets.

Route 66 - do we have time to hire a Harley Davidson for
an Easy Rider style adventure?

And then the exhibit moved on to discuss roads and cars, which introduced trailers (and trailer parks) and motels (an upmarket version of the early roadside cabins).  There was a significant undertone of impoverished, isolated communities, often not even communities, just households, scratching a living in the vast wastelands of the continent.  The American Dream?  Altogether it was a hugely interesting and thought-provoking day and it would be fascinating to revisit the museum and see more.

Back outside the museum, the weather had improved so I took more pictures of tourist Washington DC…….

… and we weren’t alone.  With the brighter weather all sorts of people had appeared to enjoy the vista.  From those, like us, who were obviously tourists….

… to people that just wanted to run around and enjoy the wide expanse of green parkland on the mall.  We, however, were running out of time and we’d not even left ourselves enough for the long walk down to visit the war memorials by the Washington Monument.

Instead, we headed back to Great Falls on the clean, smart and surprisingly quiet (ie not busy) Metro.

It doesn’t only rain in DC; we got some sunshine too!

On the Friday we took Phil’s recommendation and visited the National Archives.  Again, we walked across the National Mall, this time in much better weather, so I took the opportunity to take more photos.  These were the only ones from the day as photography is entirely forbidden in the National Archives.  But it was another fascinating visit.  We saw the Constitution and its Amendments, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence and learned a surprising amount about the treatment of various Native American tribes, the development of the Bill of Rights over the years and the history of immigration to America.

The pool in the National Sculpture Gardens with the National Archives beyond

All museumed out, we had a lazy lunch in the National Sculpture Garden watching school groups relax around the pool – feet cooling off in the water.  It had been a fascinating couple of days and the many Smithsonian musuems will bear many more visits but the next couple of days would all be about living the American High School dream – play-off season!

Washington DC, USA