Troop 322                 Dickson City          Pennsylvania

Washington Day 2.1 - May 20, 2006

Saturday morning started with a great breakfast in the Galley. There were lots of choices, something for everyone.

After breakfast, we were given our last minute instructions for the day from "Miss TROUBLE" (Oree was our tour guide for the weekend and I think did a marvelous job. THANK YOU OREE!!!)

The Old Post Office Pavilion

The Old Post Office Pavilion is located the intersection of 12th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, in Washington, DC. Its strong arches, squat columns, and 315 ft-high tower make it the third tallest structure and the last major examples of Richardsonian Romanesque architecture in the District of Columbia. Scarcely used as a post office, it has been rehabilitated today into office and retail space shared by the federal government and private businesses. The expansive interior atrium is now home to shops, entertainment space, and a food court. National Park Service rangers from Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site provides tours of the Old Post Office Tower affording one of the most spectacular views of Washington from its 270 foot-high observation deck.

Main entrance to the Old Post Office

View of the Capitol Building from the Old Post Office tower.

The Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial taken from the Old Post Office Tower.

The Boy Scout Memorial

Boy Scout Troop 322 at the Boy Scout Memorial.The bronze statue consists of three figures: a Boy Scout, a woman and a man. Each figure symbolizes the idea of the great and noble forces that are an inspiring background of each Scout as he goes about the business of becoming a man and a citizen. The male figure symbolizes physical, mental and moral fitness, love of country, good citizenship, loyalty, honor, courage and clean living. He carries a helmet, a symbol of masculine attire and a live oak branch, a symbol of peace and of strength. The female figure symbolizes enlightenment with the light of faith, love of God, high ideals, liberty, justice, freedom, democracy and love of fellow man; symbolizing the spiritual qualities of good citizenship. She holds high the eternal flame of God's Holy Spirit. The figure of the Boy Scout represents the hopes of all past, present and future scouts around the world and the hopes of every home, church and school that all that is great and noble in the Nation's past and present will continue to live in them and through them in many generations to come.

The White House

As we were taking pictures outside the White House we noticed some security on the roof of the building. Five minutes later, Srcret Service and the D.C. Police moved everyone away from the fence and cleared the whole area. As we were leaving the area we saw why, one of the President's helicopters (Marine One?) flew over the Ellipse and landed at the White House. I can only assume the President was either being picked up or dropped off.

The Albert Einstein Memorial

At the Albert Einstein Memorial. The Albert Einstein Memorial is a monumental bronze statue depicting Albert Einstein seated with manuscript papers in hand. It is located in central Washington, D.C., United States, in a grove of trees at the southwest corner of the grounds of the National Academy of Sciences on Constitution Avenue, near to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. The statue and bench are at one side of a circular dais, 28 feet (8.5 m) in diameter, made from emerald-pearl granite from Larvik, Norway. Embedded in the dais are more than 2,700 metal studs representing the location of astronomical objects (Sun, Moon, planets, stars, galaxies) at noon on April 22, 1979 when the memorial was dedicated. Different studs denote binary stars, spectroscopic binaries, pulsars, globular clusters, open clusters, and quasars.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a national war memorial located in Washington, D.C. that honors members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War. The Memorial consists of three separate parts — the Three Soldiers statue, the Vietnam Women's Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, which is the most recognized part of the memorial. The memorial is sometimes popularly called the Vietnam Memorial, the Vietnam Wall or simply The Wall.

The Wall. The Memorial Wall is made up of two black granite walls 246 feet 9 inches (75 meters) long, designed by Maya Ying Lin. The walls are sunk into the ground, with the top flush with the earth behind them. At the highest tip (the apex where they meet), they are 10.1 feet (3 m) high, and they taper to a height of eight inches (20cm) at their extremities. Granite for the wall came from Bangalore, India and was deliberately chosen because of its reflective quality. All cutting and fabrication was done in Barre, Vermont. The concept is that, while a visitor looks upon the wall, their reflection can be seen simultaneously with the engraved names, thereby bringing the past and present together.

The Vietnam Womens's Memorial.Also part of the Memorial is the Vietnam Women's memorial. It is located a short distance south of The Wall, north of the Reflecting Pool. It was designed by Glenna Goodacre and dedicated on November 11, 1993 to the women of the United States who served in the Vietnam War, most of whom were nurses.

The Three Soldiers. A short distance away from the wall is another part of the memorial, a bronze statue known as The Three Soldiers (or The Three Servicemen). It was designed to complement the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, by adding a more traditional component. The statue, unveiled in 1984, was designed by Frederick Hart, who placed third in the original competition. The soldiers are purposefully identifiable as White American, African American, and Hispanic. The statue and the Wall appear to interact with each other, with the soldiers looking on in solemn tribute at the names of their dead comrades. It has been suggested that the sculpture was positioned especially for that effect.

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Last modified: June 16, 2006