A Few Memorials

I headed back out the other day to check out a few of memorials close up and personal. There are about a million of them around town but I headed out to see some of the most well known and most visited. Before I get into those however just note that these are all memorials and not monuments because the idea of them came up after the person they were built for were dead. The only monument you will find in the city is the Washington Monument, and although it was built after Washington died, the idea of it was born before his death. Oh and I also did not visit the Washington monument on the this trip but maybe later this week.

Me on the Tidal Basin with the Wasington Monument

The first place I visited was the Thomas Jefferson Memorial. I can actually see this everyday from the highway on my way to work. It is located on the Tidal Basin directly south of the White House. Of course Thomas Jefferson was the 3rd president of the US but he got his own memorial for being the principle author of the Declaration of Independence.

The Tidal Basin is surrounded by hundreds of Japanese cherry trees. I am told thousands of people visit the area in the spring when the cherry trees are in bloom.

I then took a very nice walk along the Tidal basin to visit the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial.

Really this memorial is made up of 4 memorials, four rooms that mark each of FDR’s 4 terms in office. He was president during the Great Depression and World War II. People may recognize him by his wheelchair. He contracted polio in his thirties (while in Canada ironically enough). This memorial is full of waterfalls and the walls are decorated with some of his most famous quotes. I have been told that it is a very popular spot of wedding parties to take pictures.

One of the favourites I read while exploring the FDR Memorial

From there it was over to the Korean War Veterans Memorial. I am pretty sure that this is one of the youngest memorials being dedicated in 1995. It is dedicated not only to the American men and women who were killed in action or missing in action during the Korean War but also to the other countries that were a part of the effort.

I think the centre point of the memorial (although I am sure everyone who visits it will be affected by it differently), are the four words on the wall: “Freedom is Not Free”.

The next stop was at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I’m not sure there is a single person who could not pick out this memorial. There were a lot of people visiting and trying to find names of family members. I was told that the average age of of those serving in Vietnam was 21.

The memorial also includes the Vietnam Women’s Memorial which honours the women of the armed forces who took part in the war (many of the in the role as nurses). Around the statue are 8 yellowwood trees one for each of the eight service-women killed in action.

The final memorial was the Lincoln Memorial of course built for Abraham Lincoln who as the President who led the country through the Civil War and the end of slavery. (One of my favourite stops of the day. The other was at the bottom of the hill at the booths run by Vietnam Vets who sell pins and flags and patches and that kind of thing. Very interesting men I must say)

The memorial sits just off the banks of the Potomac River which separated the north and the south before and during the civil war (Virginia is on the other side which of course was a confederate state). One of the reasons the Lincoln Memorial was built on this spot was to symbolize how the north and south would never be separated again.

Just in case you were thinking about it.

This is the view from the Lincoln Memorial, looking over the reflecting pool, down the National Mall. If the Washington Monument was not in the way you could see right down to the US Capitol. This is the view that many civil rights activists would have had during the March on Washington in 1963. Martin Luther King, Jr gave his famous “I have a dream” speech from these very steps. I am not sure how long I just sat on the steps looking out at the reflecting pool but I know it was a great place for a few moments of quiet refelction.

Julie