Book club friend Gail got us a Groupon to tour Lincoln's summer home a few weeks ago.
Inspired by the recent Lincoln movie we recently read Team of Rivals - a long read for this group- so this was an in-theme excursion.
It was fun. We had an animated guide, shown next to a life-sized statue of Lincoln with his horse. The house, a Victorian cottage, has been restored, kind of, the rooms and colors are authentic, but it's not furnished in the heavy furniture of the day. If you've seen the movie Lincoln then you know that the furnishings and draperies gave the rooms a cluttered dark feel.
The cottage is in the District, several uphill miles from the White House. In Lincoln's day this location, elevated by a few hundred feet above the swampy White House was a cooler spot to spend the summer. Today it's right in the middle of Washington, if the President wants to escape the heat without a full blown vacation he'll helicopter to Camp David in Western Maryland, a few hundred miles from the swamp of DC. Lincoln only had a horse so this is what he could do.
Here she stands next to the life sized statue of Lincoln and his horse. Lincoln was 6'4". He looked smaller to us than we'd imagined. Daniel Day Lewis, who played him in the movie was similarly tall, but likely heavier. She described his typical day, which included a breakfast of an egg and coffee.
That's ONE egg. I can only hope he was served a biscuit with tea at work!
Our tour ended at the gift shop -- what better spot? I bought a children's book of the Gettysburg Address. My father could, until his last days, recite the entire speech. I bought the book for some future child who'll need to hear those words.
After the tour we headed to 14th Street for lunch. I love to go into DC and see the neighborhoods that are changing. When we lived in DC in the early 1980s 14th Street was a bombed out area with empty shells of buildings, or liquor stores with unsavory types milling around. Before the riots in the 60s it'd been a thriving business area. Now, nearly 50 years later it's thriving again, although in a different way. There are still liquor stores -we were offered samples of artesian gin- but also trendy restaurants, expensive home stores and theaters. It's come a long way. Our lunch, at Estadio, consisted of small plates or Tapas.
When I was a girl our pottery was this Spangle pattern. My mother gave the remnants of it to my sister when she moved out. Nowadays it turns out in second hand stores. It's a bit odd when things you remember from your childhood turn vintage.
