Girl Scouts in D.C.

Recently, as you may recall, the girls of Scout Troop #3362 carried out various fund-raising activities which included selling laundry soap and cheesecakes and hosting a clothing drive in order to raise $16,000 (each girl was responsible for raising a minimum of $2,000) for travel expenses to Washington, D.C.

Well, in case you were curious, the girls accomplished their goals and, accompanied by Girl Scouts from Wilbur, left Washington state June 17 by plane for a 10-day whirlwind tour of the “other Washington.”

Leaving their hotel rooms at approximately 7 a.m. every morning (sometimes earlier) and returning sometime in the evening, the Girl Scouts visited as many historical, military and monument sites as their schedule would allow, with each girl writing down their thoughts about each day – what they learned and their favorite thing about it.

Jocelyn Zigan wrote about visiting the Bureau of Printing and Engraving learning the different steps it takes to make money. “We watched millions of dollars being made. When we finished our tour, we went to the Kennedy Center and took a tour there, too. We saw where the President sits when he comes to shows. There were specific rooms for different plays. One for dramatic, one for musicals and one for concerts,” wrote Zigan.

After lunch on the top floor of the Kennedy Center the girls visited the Smithsonian Art Museum, then went on to Union Station for dinner before beginning a night tour of D.C., where they got to ride a double-decker bus to view the White House, the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Cemetery, plus the Iwo Jima and Martin Luther King, Jr. memorials.

“Yesterday we had a great day!” wrote Alyssa Iverson. “We visited the Library of Congress first (super cool!). Then we went to the Supreme Court, then the Air and Space Museum, which had Apollo 11. After that we got to go back to the hotel and swim.”

“We went to Arlington cemetery, where we saw the Changing of the Guard, Robert E. Lee’s house and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier,” Mackenzie Lutz wrote. “We went to the U.S. Capitol, and we saw Cathy McMorris Rogers’ offices, and my group got to go to the Botanical Gardens and saw lots of plants and flowers. The other group went to the American Indian Museum. We had a wonderful time,” said Lutz.

Chloe Winkler has a way of bringing her words to life as she writes them down telling about their visit to the holocaust museum. “There was an exhibit where there was an audio story about a young boy who was a representative for all children who were killed and had to go through concentration camps. It wasn’t just audio. You read his diary pages and went through the rooms; he has memories, some good, some bad. There were many things I had no idea about and learning was enlightening but very saddening.” She goes on to say, “We also visited the African American Museum where there were exhibits on breakthroughs in sports, music and basically every aspect of life. We also visited the smaller of the two Air and Space Museums where there was a moon rock you could touch and the original Wright Brothers airplane and their bicycle. The drum and bugle ceremony was beautiful; it was aesthetically pleasing and the music alone could be wonderful but the addition of the sync movements as the sun set behind the Iwo Jima (monument), it really was quite breathtaking.”

Faith, one of the Wilbur scouts wrote, “Today we went on a boat to go to Mt. Vernon. We saw George Washington’s house, learned how he came up with a way of breaking seeds from straw easier. Inside the house we saw all the bedrooms and living rooms and a bunch of the original stuff from when he lived there.”

Georgia, another Wilbur scout, says her favorite part was their tour of Ford’s Theatre because she loves history. They learned about how President Lincoln died and who did it. Getting to see where he was shot and where he died. “We watched a play about the night it happened and got to go on a walking tour to investigate how they figured out who killed him.”

The Scouts also visited the Library of Congress, Supreme Court, Smithsonian Art Museum, Newseum, Spy Museum, China Town, the Pentagon, the National Archives and viewed the Declaration of Independence.

The girls all worked hard to reach the financial goals that enabled them to take this trip. For some of them, it was their first time ever traveling outside of Washington state. They not only learned about our great nation, they also learned the value of hard work.