Bureau of Printing and Engraving, Farmer’s Market, the Capitol, The Postal Museum, and Dinner at Famous Dave’s.

July 10, 2009

So today we went to mall early so that we could get a tour of the Bureau of Printing and Engraving where our paper money is printed. They gave out tickets from 8 to 8:30am and that was it for the day. We got to the ticket office in time to have a tour at 10:30am which was pretty good. The tour was only 30 minutes long, but very interesting in how the paper is embossed and printed with different colors in different layers, and embossed with seals and serial numbers and cut. We got some uncut $5 bills and quite an inflated rate: 4 five uncut dollar bills for $37- for souvenir purposes only. We know were ripped off, but we did it anyways. You can buy up to 32 uncut bills in any denomination that you want to frame or such.

After printing and engraving we headed to the Capitol building… Can you believe in over a week at Washington DC mall we didn’t get to the Capitol? On the way to the capitol, we smelled delicious kettle corn from a farmers market and had to get some as well as lunch. Yummy!

We headed toward Union Station and the Postal Museum. The postal museum was interesting, but we didn’t spend too much time there. We learned that John Butterfield was the owner of the Butterfield Overland Stage company... they were one of the first official companies hired by congress to deliver mail and was paid $1.3 million in a 3-5 year contract to run stage coaches from the east to the west. He was the father of Major General Daniel Adams Butterfield, who fought in the Civil War and also wrote “Taps.” They are both my relatives – great, great uncle and great, great, great uncle. That was fun to see. On July 12th we will visit West Point Military Academy in New York, to see Daniel’s tomb. More of that later.

We took the Metro home from Union Station early. Tonight was the last night at the Misura home and we wanted to take them for dinner. We went to Famous Dave’s where we feasted on a garbage can lid full of BBQ ribs, chicken, pork, corn, fries, coleslaw and beans. We should’ve taken a picture of the plate – enormous and yummy!