Again as we go forward. The painting became as i wrote in my notes it became an engraving. Edward savage wrote about that and actually told washington he made 10,000 dollars dollars on it. I think that was almost cheeky of savage to say that he was making money on washington. But this picture and washington ordered four engravings, you can see one of them at mount vernon. Ill love to think about that when im at met mount vernon. I going to the breakfast room and there is George Washington and his family looking down on the table where George Washington and his family used to take their breakfast. Its almost like the morton salt girl going down. I do think its a magnificent thing graving. An extremely important in the history of the country. It was popular because this picture represented what the picture was. We will have more to talk about and that painting in a minute. We have to talk about what washington was up against. His chief desire was to put the capital, the seat of governess as it was known on the banks of the potomac. Washington was given that task of citing it in a 10000mile swath of the potomac and she actually was given up to, as the constitution says to create of Federal District up to 10 miles square. He created a diamond district if you will, diamondshaped district and you can see the tops of the diamond going up to maryland as they do but they went down across the potomac to alexandria. That is an important thing to consider. He was taken in both sides but in the residence act which allowed the president , directed the president really to place the seat of government on the potomac, and all of that, it gave him not 1 penny to carry out the job. So it was rather a trendsetting of the congress at the time to vote for something and yet not give it any money. So washington had to contend with that and well talk about little briefly about that. But he also had to contend with Thomas Jefferson on the one hand who had a vision of the city which was very different. In fact it wasnt a city in the city at all, it was a federal town. This is it right here, this this is rock creek coming in here. You see the town, it was to be about 15 acres, 1500 acres, excuse me. 1200 would would be divided into quarter acre lots. The remaining 300 would would do just fine for public buildings. Jeffersons capital would take in about 20 dwelling houses for those who belong to the government and about as many lodging houses and a half a dozen taverns, which im im not sure was enough for the time. [laughter] then, washington didnt think that way and we have to remember that. Washington invited others to come up with the plan. The plan that they came up within this is the older plant done by andrew it was for a city of about 750,000 people. At the time, the largest city in the United States was 40000 people in 1790. Ellicotts plan plan what you see before you is adapted he use the words like empire, american empire, and words like he well. Wealth he thought not of the United States as it was but as the United States would be and could be. Jefferson had designed a town while the other designed a city. Washington of course went with the other. There is another story that that was in the book which i wont get to tonight which tells how jefferson really under mind him at every turn. Because of washington not having any money to build the city he had to resort to ridiculous schemes. Like a lottery. Of course course thats not so ridiculous today and lotteries have been very much a part of the United States history and raising money in the United States. This was a lottery and you will see at the bottom a man named samuel was the man who started it. It it was going to be a great lottery. It completely and utterly failed and actually cost money. Having succeeded, succeeded, it would have been about 5 million he would have gained to build the city. But it actually cost the government money. But he did for others into land schemes. One of those was james greenlee, a man was one of the most remarkable scoundrels in the history of the United States and more should be known about him. But. But we have to return to the picture. We have really taught a lot. I apologize, weve really talked a lot about the federal government and what have chosen to call troubled governments. Now we need think about something else. Im sure you have known that ive left out something. And that is the slave. The slave is wearing washington liberally which interesting enough is near washy is over here. The slave has a collar that is very much like washingtons as well only it is turned up. I think this slave is actually quite important. He has a great code and its salmon red he possesses almost a princely quality. His black hair frames the dark face which is on notable. And a prominent nose that he has. His left hand is concealed in that way. The slave remains in shadow. I want to to Say Something about the slave. The slave is responsible, for i know to doctoral dissertations written on the slave. People are Walking Around with doctorates, one of them claimed that the slave is without question one another one has claim without question that it is james riley who is actually not one of washington slaves but a slave who the artists captured in london where he worked on the painting. Savage captured that slave in london. I said it doesnt matter. I think what is important about it is that the slave is so unknowable. I think thats absolutely important. But it does point out something that is captured in this work and that is that slavery is very much a part of the structure of the United States. Before moving on from this i cant resist telling you that the painting went after savage sold it and his son sold it, it went from various places and it ended up in new york where in 1892 the new york sun reported that it has been given a very vigorous and good cleaning with soap and water and salt. Somehow i dont think the National Gallery was involved. We will go on to another painting which is quite a wonderful one. That is negro life at the south. That was painted by Eastman Johnson in 1859. Johnson was a very fine artist and i think somewhat underrated in this country. But a very fine portrait artists. This is actually a remarkable painting. By the way, it immediately became after it was presented, it immediately became the old kentucky home. I am not sure what that was. Whether it was an uncomfortable factor people thinking about this as washington dc . If you you look at the words of stephen fosters song, his ballad, they, they are pretty rough on the idea of slavery too. Ive not really sorted that out. Lets get back to the things that are important in this painting. He probably captured this from the rear yard of his fathers house. If youre going to just step forward and look at what is going on in slavery at this time, this was an image of a slave it was being driven across in front of the capital of the United States. That is the capital. Remember the remember the british had something to do with the destruction in 1850 in the what you have here is two houses, the senate in the house, the dome of the capitol has yet to be built are the center part of the capital. That dome will will undergo many changes over the years. This was, and we have to understand that when johnson came here and he came from the state of maine by the way, or what was later the state of maine. He was born in massachusetts but in 1858 divided into main. One of the major slave trading emporiums in the United States. There were plenty of slaves, places as you are all aware and washington d. C. The Decatur House was for a time fell in the hands of the slave traders at. There was the old capital and the old capital prison which was also a slaveholding and there were several other situated around the capital. So the abolitionists who were really growing in congress by this time in the 1840s and 50s were also sitting in the center of the slave trade and it was everywhere. Heres another picture, its actually blown up from the one that you just saw which shows the slaves being driven across the capital which has its dome. This is a view of the Patent Office looking across backyards about 1846. And i think its very important to see this picture because it does show the rear of houses and we now can return to the picture itself which i find endlessly fascinating. Its the painting of course has these wonderful vignettes going going i love this man who is having an interesting conversation with this mullato woman. The fact that the color of her skin speaks volumes about what might be going on in the house next door. Interestingly enough there is a ladder up against the house. This is obviously the weight gentrified houses here and across almost virtually next door and virtually next door is the house in appalling repair. The child right here at the window, the roof about to collapse, this terrible disrepair of this particular wall and then coming through here is the white woman coming from obviously the owners, the white owners house into the back , into this house and shes almost startling these people, interrupting, intruding on their space if you will just as obviously there has been other intrusions as the color of the skin suggests, of this woman suggests from the house on the right the white owners house into the black area. I think its an extraordinary painting. Its in the New York Historical society. Its always up and i urge you to go see it. Its worth studying and thinking about. We have to move on quickly to a wonderful image and thats the Washington Monument. Now, robert mills as i think i told you, designed to Washington Monument, designed to Washington Monument in 1836. He won a competition for doing so. In the competition he beat out other people and the competition , and there were people who were unhappy about his winning. Mills at the time was riding high. He had just secured the Patent Office which he also designed but he also had secured the addition to the treasury which destroys pennsylvania avenue and he was not so much responsible for that as perhaps the story. It was Andrew Jackson who put his cane into the road instead this is where the building is going to be and thats supposedly the story. Lets take a look at what mills had created in the Washington Monument or it was an enormous enormous much taller than the present one. I believe it went up to over 700 feet. It was surrounded by this colonnade which would have inside statues of american grades. Now this is one of the stories that i think does not speak well for anybody in washington except for one person thank goodness at the end whom i will get to. To begin with the Washington Monument society which began raising money for this put a structure on the amount that it would accept. No more than 1 dollar from any person. I suspect that is not a good way to raise money. It took them until 1848 when they had the ability to at least start the monument but they didnt have enough money. They thought well if they could get the thing started so they finally did in july 1848. Dolly madison was there, also Alexander Hamiltons widow as well. These two widows were there links to the past at the ceremony and a young congressman who didnt serve long in congress, Abraham Lincoln happened to be there as well. You probably know what happened. It got up to 155 feet which is where you see it in this picture in 1854, in 1854, the Washington Monument started to look for stones by foreign governments. You have all been in the Washington Monument and unfortunately the post has fallen and that didnt sit well with the no Nothing Party. The known Nothing Party was fearlessly anticatholic antipapist and they wouldnt have a papal stone they broke into the lapidary him in the middle of the night smashes down and dumped it into the potomac. People have been dredging and looking for their would nevertheless i think its very important that they also kicked all the workers off. And they said we are going to take over. Its going to be built by americans, not by foreigners. And what happened was kind of funny. They got three courses and that was about it. The civil war came along and even before the civil war by 1857 they had flown away. If we stop and think about this for a moment, theres something severely wrong in this story. Here we are in front of the capitol of the United States and people have taken over the Washington Monument. I mean it just boggles my mind to think that the federal government even at that time would allow it to happen. I think it suggests a certain fecklessness on the part of members of congress and how they regarded the city at that time. The monument had a troubled history. After that it became the great east depot monument during the civil war and thats because of course we had all these troops to go into virginia. George mcclellan was forever a massing them, not doing much with them but he was amassing them and what happened was they had to feed them so there was an enormous, and enormous slaughterhouse. Where are you going to put it . Why not at the Washington Monument and why not do it bear. The abattoirs can slaughter the animals in the blood drains into the potomac and everybody is happy. So anyway, that is essentially what happened in the civil war. The Washington Monument was nothing like an old chimney. Now after that, finally in 1876 in the spirit and fervor of patriotism the United States congress was spurred into action and it actually voted to complete the monument. Of course, and they have devoted 200,000 so as soon as congress got involved guess what happens . Everybody started to attack all of mills proposals and come up with their own. There were many many proposals like this one. There were proposals for a camp annealing. There were proposals for pair mitts. There were a bizarre number of proposals and fortunately at that time it was in the hayes administration, there was a man who was in charge of all of washingtons Civil Engineering and that is this man thomas casey. You can see him here sword if at the end of the story. He is at the top of the Washington Monument in this nonosha approved project. [laughter] and he is doing very well. Casey is the hero of the Washington Monument. Also another man who i was a little embarrassed as i was looking over my notes in my book , he only gets a couple of sentences in my book but thats commander George Perkins marsh. George Perkins Marsh was appointed by lincoln to be basically the ambassador to the Italian Republic or states i should say, kingdom of italy in 1861 and he lasted until 1881 and actually died in italy. But he was also a brilliant classical scholar and he went and figured out what the size of the Washington Monument should be and the dimensions he figured out having studied lots of monuments should be, the dimensions should be 10 times the width of the base so that made her a monument that was 555 feet. Now its really basically good in a way that the first Washington Monument wasnt dealt the Washington Monument that we know was because unfortunately it was already beginning to pitch a little bit. The ground underneath it was not solid. Casey had for years to work underneath the monument shoring it up. Most of his great engineering feats were underground. Marsh figured out the dimensions and casey then that the knownothings had built and you can see the Washington Monument and im sure you all know this is the difference in the coloration about 155 feet up. Thomas casey was a wonderful man he was incorruptible and he was also a bulldog. He had a great ability to simply ignore congress. [laughter] he decided as he sent in a letter to his father the monument has become a football for quarks and its exactly what it was. But he is the one who persevered by december 7, 1884, it was finished and so the monument that we see here in Cherry Blossom time is complete. This is a picture, i chose a couple of days ago because it was so foggy here and i said well thats kind of nice. I also like the photograph for a lot of reasons. First thing theres this lovely woman who was adjusting her camera. There is this artist over here who is sketching and theres another woman here who is also taking a photograph. I think its just a marvelous little picture. So, to move on. What a wonderful moment this is in the history of womens suffrage. What an annoying moment it was for Woodrow Wilson. [laughter] and i must tell you as a personal matter, i came out of this book with even more profound dislike of Woodrow Wilson than i had when i started it and it wasnt too high before. And i came to really like and fall in love with a wonderful woman named alice paul. Alice paul as i think i suggested to you was the woman who started really putting the screws on the federal government about womens suffrage. There have been all sorts of little gentile things happening but nothing like what alice paul did. It makes me