Presidents' Day: The Washington Monument in Washington, DC | Drive Thru History with Dave Stotts

Much of our nation's capital echoes the legacy of George Washington and the constitutional republic that he was instrumental in founding buildings, streets, statues, works of art, documents, inscriptions, memorials and

monument

s. I will tell the story of our first president and his special role in establishing our unique country. And when it comes to

monument

s, George Washington definitely has one of the most visible and iconic here in Washington DC, as far back as 1783 the United States Congress decided that a statue honoring George Washington, the great revolutionary war general, should be placed near the site of the new congressional building wherever it was after Washington became president and it was determined that the new federal capital would be built here in Washington D.C.

Architect Pierre Leon Fonte left a place for the Washington statue at the western end of what would be called the National Mall. Robert Mills had the winning idea for the shape of the monument, as it was supposed to have no parallel in the world. The mills were reminiscent of the ancient Egyptians, who were world famous for their enormous monuments. An obelisk is a conical column that in ancient Egyptian mythology represented the place from which the world was created, symbolized the sun and the cycle of rebirth. Obelisks were erected to honor the pharaohs and their gods, so it was thought to be a fitting choice for the father of our country.

Construction began more than 50 years later, on July 4, 1848. Representatives of the private Washington National Monument Society laid the monument's cornerstone, a 24,500-pound block of pure white marble, but funds ran out and the Construction stopped after six years, as can be seen on that line more than a decade later, around the time of the civil war. The war Mark Twain wrote that it is an eyesore to the people, it should be torn down or rebuilt and finally finished in 1876, on the centennial of American independence, the grant of our eighteenth president, Ulysses, authorized the completion of construction made of approximately 36,000 blocks of Marble and granite stacked 555 feet in the air.

The Washington Monument was the tallest structure in the world at the time of its completion in December 1884. It remains the tallest structure in Washington DC to this day and from above dominates everything in our capital. The nation is a metal cornerstone engraved in Latin that reads Laos Deo, the translation praise God, thank you.