Places agoalex Wants to Go

When it opened during the final years of the embargo, all the drinks and cigars were free.

There's a crumbling old mansion inside the Smithsonian National Zoo.

The Byzantine, pre-Columbian, and medieval art at this stately mansion are some of the most under-appreciated collections in D.C.

This fertility idol of questionable authenticity inspired an iconic Indiana Jones artifact.

Before Nixon, "watergate" meant canals.

One doctor's retirement plan included opening this award-winning Mexican-Indian eatery on the ground floor of a hospital.

Home to a vast and influential collection of Shakespeareana.

Housing the National Women's Party since 1929, this historic house is now a monument to the fight for gender equality.

A fantastic array of trays and cables once whisked books over to the Capitol at 600 feet per minute.

The 5.5-mile ring of steel posts around the Capitol Building is one of the largest (and most uniform) of its kind in the world.

This stately mansion, built in 1787 by America's first Secretary of the Navy, is rumored to be one of the most haunted buildings in Washington, DC.

Born a slave on the Arlington estate, Parks dug the first graves at Arlington National Cemetery, and was buried there, too.

Soldiers were buried next to Lee's house in the center of Arlington Cemetery to dissuade the general from reclaiming his property after the war.

The remains of a historic plantation nestled in between a parking lot and the rental car return at Reagan National Airport.

Parking garage where Bob Woodward met Watergate source "Deep Throat."

An original apothecary from 1792.

This colonial tavern played host to George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and other famous early Americans.

The narrowest house in America is seven feet of pure spite.

Once forgotten and built over, this historic Black cemetery now houses a poignant memorial.

America's first federal monument.

A massive, majestic mammal watches over pedestrians from his perch atop a former B.P.O.E. lodge.

The final resting place of an unidentified revolutionary soldier sits behind a Virginia church.

This brick-lined pedestrian walkway was once a railway tunnel used during the Civil War.

Standing for over 200 years, the abandoned home of a Revolutionary War hero and later a succession of prison superintendents.