Lone Star Hoosiers: DC Trip

Got back from a trip to the East Coast. It was part of a grant that we are working with for work to give teachers background knowledge and to see first hand what it is they are teaching about. We visited some neat places and learned many things that we can take back to use with our students. Here are some pictures of some of the places we went.

This is Thomas Jefferson's home. He loved to experiment with crops but in the end died in debt due to investing with friend that made poor economic decisions.

This is James Monroe's home. Simple but very nice. He had one room that was painted green that looked cool but we couldn't take pictures inside.

We also went to Jamestown and Colonial Williamsburg which I recommend to get an idea of what colonial life was like.

We got to see reinactors play different historical figures. From left to right are Benedict Arnold, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Each knew their part and could answer questions as if it was the real person talking.

Here is a view from a recreation of Jamestown. We saw the real site but they were just excavating it for remains. Can you guess the other house? It is Philip Randolph's. Who is that you ask? He was president of the 1st and 2nd Continental Congress that decided to write the Declaration of Independence and gain our freedom from England. Why don't we hear more about him? He died before the war ended so who knows what may have happened in history if he had lived.

Then we went to DC for a few days. We did a tour of the monuments at night. So here are a few.

Washington Monument.

Lincoln (duh)

Jefferson. Second one is from the top of the Washington Monument. You have to get tickets to go to the top. We got in line at 7:00am and got tickets for 7:30pm so we could go with some friends. Great views.

Here are some of me. One is in front of the WWII memorial which was very moving. If you ever get to DC you need to take the time to see it and the others. Of all the memorials/monuments I feel the ones to our men who served in wars are the most moving.

This is one from the Korea War Memorial. I think it is one of the coolest pictures I was able to take because I was able to open the exposure for a longer time and get the red sky in the background.