April 1: National Archives Research Center, Natural History Museum, and Jefferson Memorial

 Our appointment to conduct research was today so we got checked in for our researcher cards at the archives and then went to the research room. We read through the Revolutionary War Pension Application case for John Cammack (5 time Great-Grandfather) and William Cammack (his brother). We found his signature. The "signature" of his wife and one of their sons (not direct ancestor) were both just an X with "her mark" written beside - suggesting she couldn't read and neither could that son.




It was kind of disappointing that we couldn't actually hold the papers, but we printed everything out which didn't cost anything. We had to put the documents into a special locking bag to remove the paperwork we printed and pass through security again. 


We stopped in for maybe half an hour in the National Natural History Museum and looked around because it had started to rain. It is nice that everything is free so we didn't feel bad that we only saw a few things in there since we didn't pay. The main highlights were the Hope Diamond and getting really close to a few animals like lions (normally they're alive and behind a barrier, whereas these were stuffed and you could get right up to them).






Afterwards we took a bus to the Jefferson Memorial (which directly faces into the backyard of the White House which is a few miles away) and the Lincoln Memorial. We also saw the tail end of more cherry blossoms and a view across the basin to the Washington Monument.






We ate at Union Station at a Chick-Fil-A - was pretty so so. The chicken was good enough, but don't really see what the fuss is about.

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