Thank you, emily, and good evening. It is a great pleasure to introduce William Seale. I have known william for a very long time because he married my good friend and college classmate, lucinda smith. I married a brilliant historian, and so did she. [laughter] William Seale is a charming and witty texas gentleman whose interest in history and buildings has fueled a long career in both. He is a native of beaumont, texas, holds a ba from southwestern university, an ma and a ph. D. From duke. He left texas in 1969 and spent two years in columbia, south carolina, restoring the home of wade hampton. He then came to washington in 1972 to write a history of state capitols with Henry Russell hitchcock. He, lucinda and their two sons settled in lucindas native alexandria. At this point in his career, he focused on two things; Historic Restoration and writing. His twovolume history of the white house was published by the White House Historical society in 1986 with the second edition in 1996. He is the editor of the associations journal, white house history. His other books include an architectural history of the white house, history of the National Trust houses, temples of democracy, the state capitols of the usa and american courthouses. A commissioned book, the garden club of hurricane a history, was published earlier in the year. His restoration participations include 11 state capitols. And various houses such as that of george eastman, general marshall and the wisconsin retreat [inaudible] of the broadway actors alfred hunt and lynn fontaine. Tonight he will speak on his new book, a book about washington, the imperial season americas capitol in the time of the first ambassadors. Not surprisingly, his studies led him here to Anderson House to cross paths with lars and isabelle who readily joined the cast of the imperial season. William seale. [applause] well, hannah, thank you, thank you. And its great to see you all here. I dont know what hannah had to pay each of you to come [laughter] but shes very inventive. So it is wonderful to be here and to be in this house. This is so much a part of the story and, certainly, one of the most opulent of all of the superior in history. The imperial season is about washington and a very lahr period. It begins particular period. It begins with a reception by president Grover Cleveland in his second term of the first ambassador ever assigned to the United States by a foreign country. It ends with the conclusion of world war i. It is a period and a story that suggests itself and all the buildings and landscapes that survive from it are its inspiration today. They help define washington as it has come down to us from that time. A small portion of the book takes place here in Anderson House, for lars and Isabelle Anderson were characters in the imperial season. We can feast upon the setting tonight and imagine what it was like in, say, 1907 filled with guests, diplomats, women in court trains that means 9 feet from the shoulder to the end of the to the hem. Black and white evening clothes, some feathered head addresses with women head dresses with women who had been presented in court, three feathers. And in the dining room, a servant fitted out in powdered wig and 18th century attire, flowers, champagne and music. To give some context, it was a 25year or period historically when America First felt the thrill of international importance. Isolated for so long, Holding Europe this contempt for so long, the promise of a world position opened doors of monetary opportunities for some. A bridge across the atlantic at last. And where more obvious for that new American Power to express itself first than in a capital, washington. Here and here alone in this period. Americas strong voice was first heard in 1895 when nononsense president Grover Cleveland threatened a military action against britain and venezuela if they did not settle their south american differences. He condemned them both for the defiance of the monroe doctrine. The Sleeping Giant had stirred, and it shocked the worlds full notice. The second and, of course, most powerful event was that swordswinging spanishamerican war in 1898. John hay, then ambassador to st. James, our splendid little war, and that conflict sent america into possession of the philippines and other parts of the South Pacific and into a land war with spain and cuba. When the smoke cleared, the United States could at last call itself an International Power and world power, even if the latter would not be tested until the great war. President william mckinley, in leading the nation into war, had taken the power of the president is si to the high and independent level it had not known since George Washington held the office. Chief executive, now faded into the past, mckinley changed america, and had he lived, would have crowned the imperial season completely. But he didnt finish his second term. He was assassinated. In the two years before his assassination in 1901, he had supported more or less a redesign of washington by the army corps of engineers that included major improvements, New Buildings and a european sort of appearance. Architecturally, the remake was to be characterized more or less by the new library of congress. The corps, which had wrenched the project from its architect designers and claimed it for its own, had completed the library, dazzled everyone and was set to move from that work to redoing the rest of the city. They wished to begin as soon as possible, but they were abruptly unseated by nongovernmental architects, members of the American Institute of architects. Through the patronage of senator James Mcmillan of michigan whom the corps had insulted by not be including in their plans, he was head of the d. C. Committee, a whole new set of beautiful plans were made for washington by professional architects who were working in private practice. At the time of the presentation of what came to be known as the mcmillan plan, other changes had come. President mckinley was dead, assassinated in buffalo. Theodore roosevelt was his then very unlikely successor, so it was roosevelt who toured the great presentation in 1901 at the corcoran and heard the spiel about how the plan was approved by washington but substantially approved further from the chicago worlds fair held eight years before. Roosevelts support was, of course, key. The architects wooed him further with a stylish renovation of the white house interior turning a fringed and buttoned place into a sleek pseudofrench palace. The east room was patterned on a room in the palace of [inaudible] while the dining room at the opposite end of the hall imitated a georgia began house complete with stuffed animal heads actually bought from a decorator in new york and not bagged by teddy. [laughter] i leaned a little on the house because it was contemporary in taste with the one we enjoy tonight. The white house ghei the new president gave the new president a sort of wright, international, chiclooking stage that he wanted for the Progressive Administration yet to come. The mcmillan plan, ultimately more a sketch than a detailed plan, was never to be adopted by congress but prevails today as the basic plan for washington. Studied and interpreted again and again. It is the hook upon which all washington planning hang, especially in the ceremonial areas of the mall and the avenues. Curious as it may seem, none of the buildings erected during the imperial season were actually parts of the plan. In their unofficial status, the group of architects namely Daniel Burnham and glenn brown proceeded very carefully with brown as the watchdog. Every time a i new building was proposed, they somehow appeared at the Committee Meeting giving their ideas. The only time i know of they failed is with the Washington Cathedral which they wanted to be byzantine. Thus, the architecture, the agricultural building are part of it and the new smithsonian building were reshaped to fit mcmillans neoclassical mow motif. More thrilling is the story of Union Station, a monument in itself to the impossible. The baltimore and Potomac Railroad stations straddle the mall at the foot of capitol hill, so resurrecting the mall just couldnt happen. It was a monster. It was a place where president garfield had been shot, the cats cradle of Railroad Tracks ran through it and elsewhere open sewers, dump yards and more rail tracks ran onto the mall and surrounded the other depots. Burnham, who was famous for his citygate railroad stations the idea being that everyone entered by train really, mainly he asked senator mcmillan about moving it even before the plan was made, moving the railroads. Mcmillan pronounce thed it pronounced it impossible. He was not one who used that word, but that, he said, would never happen. But burnham couldnt get it out of his craw. Finally, he called upon the president of the pennsylvania railroad, alexander casat, whose sister he knew well from the worlds fair. He listened, mcmillan used his prestige with congress, and a new plan was born. There would be one Railway Station to serve all in washington, the eye sores would be removed from the mall, tunnels would be built under the the capital. Burnham made his design a curtain of classical architecture patterned on the arch of constantine, last of the great buildings of the roman empire. Burnham wanted white marble, a coldish, bluish white and finally found the perfect quarry this vermont. However, the quarry was shut down, he was told, forever in memory of the owners son who had died at an early age. No amount of convincing, even the mighty burnham, could convince the man that he wanted to open the quarry until thats the man died and his heirs sold the quarry to the project. For the station. Union station surfaced in that material. Most everyone who entered washington passed through that gate completed in 1908. Its facade involves an interior built to respond by the imperial season. Even the lincoln memorial, i think, Union Station stands at the head of the class. So the town became a hive of building activity. Muledrawn wagons hauling and relocating soil, vast quantities of bricks and concrete block piled about on the building sites. Trees were felled on the mall to open it up again. General grant had planted 18,000 trees in 1873. The forest was to be replaced by a grasscovered, open sweep that ran from the capitol to the river. Meanwhile, elsewhere in town notably on massachusetts avenue and the nearby street a regular parody on the blafds and avenues of paris was rising in big houses designed to serve the purposes of winter residents. Such residential building had been going on in the capitals of europe since the congress of vienna in 1815 establishes a new order for peace among the kingdom. No more napoleon. And they secured this through a network of ambassadors. There were never this many ambassadors before the congress as after. This was how it was to be. They were to be the eyes and ears of their country in the torn capitals. We never got that til much later as you know by the date. To these capitals, as to washington, new wealth had migrated to set itself in houses and eventually achieve titles. Although washington would provide no titles, there were plenty of diplomatic in the diplomatic corps and analogy with europe confirmed the city the world capital. This was a mini boulevard to paris, is what they had in mind. Most of the buildings are french flavor. Most of you are likely to know these houses. Anderson house here, of course, is one of the main ones with large public rooms such as this one tonight. Lars anderson had ambitions to be an important diplomat, preferably an ambassador. His interest went so far as to inspire him to create for himself a diplomatic uniform, even knowing congress forbade diplomatic uniforms. Congress, for a century and more, had stuck to the idea that an american diplomat should follow the style of humblydressed dr. Franklin in homespun at versailles. Franklin wore more than a uniform. Whether lars ever actually wore his uniform except for the photograph on display here is not known for certain. Anderson and isabelle, his wife with, were from very wealthy backgrounds, he in since gnat the city and washington and she in boston. In fact, the newspaper announcement of their marriage in boston just couldnt say enough about money, and finally they go into his virility. [laughter] and she was a girl who would never have taken a count or a duke but got a good, virile american boy. [laughter] they were hot and cold about washington. They were pretty tongue in cheek about the imperial city, imperial season. But considering his ambitions, it was the place to be. The magnificence of this house, which they passed on to the society of cincinnati in years to come, did not eclipse all other houses on the avenues, but most of them. It was designed by the firm of the venerable boston and salem architect, arthur little, an old man at that time. He was most famous for the neocolonial beachhouses and houses in salem that he expanded and restored. Only one of the houses in this area had direct connection with europe. Perry and Jesse Belmont were frequent visitors of jay goulds daughter at her palaise in paris. Look it up on the web, you cant even believe anyone lived in anything like that. It was huge, it was torn down in 1968 for an ugly apartment building. When jesse and perry married and wanted to build, they asked their friends architect, the host famous residential architect in europe in that period, to do the work. He did design the house for New Hampshire avenue, although the supervision went to an american who will be remembered as the architect for Duke University and other places later on. The belmonts were really not to enjoy this exquisite house, and when you go in it, the virtuoso, the arch. S are straight out of [inaudible] he had that in all his houses, but this was very small compare today what he usually did. Washington was still prudish, too prudish to absorb this. So the belmonts resided mostly in paris. The other houses were designed, most all, but local architects who seem to have been very clear on what was wanted; an impressive house for entertaining. The mode was almost always french as is pieces of Anderson House to. The diplomats were entertained in these houses, Anderson House, the townsend house, the wadsworth house and all the others, in fact, not so circumspect. It was they who gave the Winter Society its glamour. The diplomats were strict about public decorum, not so much in private. Indeed, it was a worst crime to misbehave at a dinner party than to sleep with someones wife. Mrs. Roosevelt knew this and could not bear it. Weekly, the cabinet wives met with her to discuss various matters of concern in the administration. Names came up. [laughter] if a man and a woman were misbehaving, the first lady sent ab aide to call an aide to call, first, on the man, advising him that if the affair did not stop, he and the woman would not be allowed at the white house. Well, for a diplomat, rejection at the head of state meant ruin. She seems to have had her way. Except with one man. Charlie [inaudible] was about 30, and he was a direct descendant of lafayette, the Diplomatic Community here always had a lafayette in it. And charlie was born here and from here and was a randy one. He was the Legal Adviser to the french embassy. He was, in fact, a cousin of Lars Anderson distantly, someone in the family had married in cincinnati. Blondheaded and youthful at 30, he was today would be described as a womanizer. To say the least. He pursued women with no shame. Flowers, candy, pressures all were in his repertory. Even Alice Roosevelt was one time the object of his arkansas door, but she confessed in her diary at last, charlie says he no longer has lust for me. [laughter] at last, charlie ran away with the wife of another dip promat. You might be diplomat. You might have been surprised that he didnt meet ruin. He didnt at all. He was sent to russia, did exceptional work. He was, he went up, up, up in france. He became one of the most respected ambassadors in europe, diplomats in europe. He was, in fact, eventually shot by a woman, but it didnt have anything [laughter] it didnt have anything to do with that. It was a fascist who hated him, and she shot him on one of the bridges in paris, and he lived. He lies today in a cemetery in paris beside his wife and among his lafayette ancestors, many of whom had died within a stones throw of the guillotine during the french revolution. Entertaining here in another massachusetts and in other massachusetts avenue houses had public receptions in the private houses. More for lack of space, i think, than anything else. They were crammed and rented houses, just townhouses with a double parlor here in the dining room. And people would come, public receptions, theyd just run em through and run em out the back because they were so crowded. A public reception was literally that, often advertised by notice in the post or evening star. Some hostesses announced weekly, announced themselves weekly during the social season. Most held only one public reception, some advertised the reception would be every tuesday for the season. So it varied. Secretaries, clerks, schoolgirls and boys, visitors to town all assembled on the sidewalks to be admitted promptly at 2 p. M. They were dressed to the nines, and all women guests had to wear hats. They had one hour to enj