I Do Soemnly Swear
I Do Solemnly Swear
1-16-09
The opportunity to witness Barack Obama’s inauguration slipped away from me when I took a tumble onto the roller skating rink floor and fractured my patella. The knee is healing but now is in a brace which makes me much less adventurous and less likely to get up early on January 20 and drive to Washington DC to see the 44th President take the oath of office.
I visited Washington DC last weekend and had a surprise. Barack Obama was taping and interview with George Stephanopolis of ABC News at his studio in the Newseum. We were tipped off by the “men in black” standing guard outside the studio and the photographers lining the atrium hallways. After a mere 20 minute wait, we saw our president-elect leave the studio and pause briefly to wave to us. What a thrill! His daughters were reportedly with him in the museum. They visited the exhibit on Presidential dogs!
Washington DC was in the throes of preparation for the inauguration. Hundreds of tractor trailer trucks lined Constitution Avenue ready to unload thousands of cement barriers. Crews were putting up temporary fencing on the mall area and there were hundreds of portable potties waiting patiently for the crowds.
The Capitol had two enormous flags hanging between stately columns and the stairs were decked out with elaborate scaffolding that allowed bleachers and stands to be constructed. Washington was a city in preparation and this idea can be carried into classrooms all over the country.
There are quality lessons to help students understand the significance of the inauguration from an historic perspective. The Library of Congress has a website dedicated to the American Memory called “I Do Solemnly Swear…” at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/pihome.html which is a collection of over 400 items that relate to the inaugurations of George Washington all the way to George Bush. There are diaries, letters, drafts of inaugural addresses, tickets, programs, photos and even sheet music. What a powerful testament to the enduring power of the written word!
Most fascinating are the details of the presidents’ lives as chronicled by the site. Benjamin Brown French, a New Hampshire politician, writes a letter to his son about a strange event during Abraham Lincoln’s inauguration in which he prevented an angry and fierce man from getting close to him. He theorizes that it was Booth’s intention to sneak up behind the president and assassinate him. Later he realized that man was John Wilkes Booth. There are photographs in which Booth can be identified.
Education World.com offers an inauguration trivia hunt and facts that will help answer questions at www.educationworld.com. The questions ask you
- Who was the first president to ride in a car?
- Who was the first president to be inaugurated at the Capitol?
- Who is the first president to have his inauguration broadcast live on the Internet? And so on.
Another aspect of the inauguration is the role of the poet. Robert Frost read “The Gift Outright” at John F Kennedy’s inauguration. Maya Angelou read “On the Pulse of Morning” at Bill Clinton’s first inauguration and Miller Williams read “Of History and Hope” at his second. These poems can be easily accessed and studied for content and style. It will be interesting to determine what the poems say about the president and more importantly, what do they say about us and our time in history?
With the television and internet news sources, with live coverage of the parade, the inaugural events and the swearing in ceremony on January 20th, much rich learning can come from this historic day.
