WASHINGTON, D.C., THE AMERICAN IDIOSYNCRASY

The Beans arriving to the Treasury Building

Yesterday, The Beans said goodbye to Washington, D.C. They chose the last places to visit and they have a closer relationship with the idiosyncrasy of the country. 

For one hand, they visited the Treasury Building, symbol of the economical power in the country which represents better the idea of capitalism. 

For other hand, the family visited Arlington Cemetery, symbol of the politican and military power of the USA.

Finally, The Grandma wanted to visit the Lincoln Memorial to tribute Abraham Lincoln and to remember another important figure of the recent American history: Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Treasury Building in Washington, D.C., is a National Historic Landmark building which is the headquarters of the United States Department of the Treasury. An image of the Treasury Building is featured on the back of the United States ten-dollar bill.

In the spring of the year 1800, the capital of the United States was preparing to move from the well-established city of Philadelphia to a parcel of tidewater land along the Potomac River. President John Adams issued an Executive Order on May 15th instructing the federal government to move to Washington and to be open for business by June 15, 1800. Arriving in Washington, relocated government employees found only one building completed and ready to be occupied: the Treasury Department building. The building was 147 feet long and 57 feet wide, flanking the south-east end of the White House.

More information: U.S.Department of the Treasury

Arlington National Cemetery is a United States military cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., in whose 253 ha the dead of the nation's conflicts have been buried, beginning with the Civil War, as well as reinterred dead from earlier wars. The United States Department of the Army, a component of the United States Department of Defense, controls the cemetery. The national cemetery was established during the Civil War on the grounds of Arlington House, which had been the estate of the family of Confederate general Robert E. Lee's wife Mary Anna (Custis) Lee, a great-granddaughter of Martha Washington.

More information: Arlington Cemetery

The Lincoln Memorial is an American national monument built to honor the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. It is located on the western end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., across from the Washington Monument. Dedicated in 1922, it is one of several monuments built to honor an American president. It has always been a major tourist attraction and since the 1930s has been a symbolic center focused on race relations.

Grandma's memories with Martin Luther King, Jr.

The building is in the form of a Greek Doric temple and contains a large seated sculpture of Abraham Lincoln and inscriptions of two well-known speeches by Lincoln, The Gettysburg Address and his Second Inaugural Address. 

The memorial has been the site of many famous speeches, including Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech, delivered on August 28, 1963, during the rally at the end of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

Like other monuments on the National Mall, the memorial is administered by the National Park Service under its National Mall and Memorial Parks group.

More information: Lincoln Memorial

I got my story, my dream, from America. 

The hero I had is Forrest Gump... I like that guy.
 

Jack Ma