United States House of Representatives: History, Art, & Archives
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History, Art & Archives of the U.S. House of Representatives

“A Bevy of Ladies”

by Art on May 31, 2013

Today, Capitol police officers direct some visitors in the House Chamber through a door marked “Ladies’ Gallery.” Men and women sit there, and always have. So why call it the Ladies’ Gallery?

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Categories: House Chamber, Minorities in Congress

The Most Kissed Man in America

by History on May 24, 2013

On June 3, 1898, in the middle of the Spanish-American War, Lieutenant Richmond Pearson Hobson sailed the U.S. collier Merrimac into Santiago Harbor with a hand-picked skeleton crew. Hobson schemed to sink his vessel at the entrance to the Cuban bay, trapping the Spanish fleet.  Though he failed to blockade the harbor, Hobson would soon become a national celebrity for another kind of mission—one ideally suited for the handsome young man.

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Categories: People

The Life and Times of a Campaign Button

by Art on May 16, 2013

Each election cycle, campaign buttons bloom on voters’ lapels like flowers in spring. These bright badges come in all shapes, sizes, and colors, and boast catchy slogans such as “We Love Lindy.” Campaign buttons made their debut on the trail in the late 1890s with the advent of a new material called celluloid.

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Categories: Art & Artifacts, Elections

“His Own Little Club”

by History on May 7, 2013

Before Lyndon Baines Johnson rose through the political ranks as a Member of the House and Senate (and later Vice President and President of the United States), the young, congressional secretary to Congressman Richard Kleberg of Texas set his sights on a smaller, lesser-known organization: the Little Congress.

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Categories: Oral History, People

The Not-So-Lonesome West

by Art on May 1, 2013

For a House committee, commissioning paintings during the post-Civil War era involved more than matching colors with the furniture. When the House Committee on Indian Affairs hired artist and Army officer Seth Eastman in 1867 to produce nine paintings for their hearing room, his task was not only to decorate their space, but to project an ideology through images.

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Categories: Art & Artifacts

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Office of the Historian: history@mail.house.gov
Office of Art & Archives, Office of the Clerk: art@mail.house.gov, archives@mail.house.gov