mheathersmith's User Profile - Atlas Obscura
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Washington, D.C.

National Building Museum

Fittingly, America's museum of architecture is itself a magnificently designed old building.
Washington, D.C.

D.C.'s Underground Bald Cypress Fossils

Four bald cypress trees in Lafayette Square, across from the White House, mark the southern edge of a 100,000 year old cypress swamp.
Teec Nos Pos, Utah

Four Corners Monument

The marker offers a rare chance to be in four U.S. states at once, though there's some controversy over its geographic accuracy.
Flagstaff, Arizona

Pluto Discovery Telescope

A planet-hunting astrograph built in the 1920s to seek out the so-called "Planet X" beyond Uranus.
Flagstaff, Arizona

Lowell Mausoleum

The final resting place of the businessman-turned-astronomer who helped discover Pluto stands near his observatory.
Flagstaff, Arizona

Lowell Observatory

This Arizona observatory is famous for investigations into Martian life, and as the place humans first spotted Pluto.
Rimrock, Arizona

Montezuma Well

This sinkhole in the Arizona desert is filled with carbonated, arsenic-rich water
Washington, D.C.

'Ginevra de’ Benci' Portrait

The only Leonardo Da Vinci painting in the Western Hemisphere.
Washington, D.C.

Historic Elevator at Potbelly

This sandwich shop has a century-old elevator behind a sheet of plexiglass.
Port Royal, Virginia

Assassin's End

The Virginia farm where John Wilkes Booth met his grisly end is now largely forgotten.
Greensboro, North Carolina

Elsewhere Collaborative

Art museum based around the collections accumulated over 58 years by one eccentric thrift store owner.
Greensboro, North Carolina

Site of the Woolworth Lunch Counter Sit-in

This North Carolina store preserves a historic moment in America's movement for racial equality.
Washington, D.C.

Bare-Chested George Washington

Perhaps the most scandalous statue of America's first president.
Washington, D.C.

Sergeant Stubby

The most decorated dog of World War I is preserved in the Smithsonian.
Washington, D.C.

Cher Ami

A heroic pigeon that, through a barrage of gunfire, delivered a message that saved over 100 lives in World War I.
Alexandria, Virginia

Alexandria Tide Lock Park

Long buried under the 20th-century landscape, this lift lock of the Alexandria Canal is the lone remnant of an ambitious early American transportation project.
Raleigh, North Carolina

The Daily Planet Theater

This hollow steel globe is the second-largest in the world.
New York, New York

Unicorn Tapestries at the Cloisters

Mysterious 500-year-old tapestries depict a unicorn hunt.
Alexandria, Virginia

Mount Vernon Slave Cemetery

The graveyard holding the remains of George Washington's slaves was forgotten for nearly 200 years.
Fort Washington, Maryland

Fort Washington

This fort down the Potomac from Washington, D.C. was once the only defensive fort protecting the capital.
Leonardtown, Maryland

Moll Dyer Rock

The rock on which Moll Dyer was found frozen to death is said to still bear her handprint.
Washington, D.C.

USNO Master Clock

The most accurate timepiece in the world.
Washington, D.C.

The Preamble in License Plates

The preamble to the U.S. Constitution written entirely from vanity license plates hangs in the Smithsonian museum.
Washington, D.C.

The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millennium General Assembly

Light bulbs, scrap wood, and tinfoil comprise this homemade throne of the gods.