The Wedding
On October 10, 1987, 2,000 same-sex couples pledged their vows in a mass wedding behind the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/55">National Museum of Natural History</a> and in front of the Internal Revenue Service building. The location allowed the group to protest the lack of recognition of same-sex domestic partners in the US tax code. Organizers also admitted that location was the only area where they could secure a permit to gather. Nearly 5,000 protesters filled the streets to watch or participate in the mass wedding presided over by minister Dina Bachelor. "The Wedding" was 1 event in a 6-day demonstration known as the Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
National Native American Veterans’ Memorial
Since the 1770s, American indigenous people have always served in the US military at a higher rate than other groups. In 1994, a bipartisan congressional effort passed the Native American Veterans’ Memorial Establishment Act to authorize the creation of a memorial to all American Indian, Alaska native, and native Hawaiian veterans. The memorial was to be placed inside the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/49">Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian</a>. In 2013, Congress gave the Museum authority to select the final location of the Memorial and to assist with fundraising since no federal funds would pay for its construction. Some advocates wish the Memorial could be on the Mall near other memorials honoring American war veterans.
Congress.gov. <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/103rd-congress/house-bill/2135/text">View original</a>.
10/5/1994 (authorized)
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=2000-present">2000-present</a>
National Peace Garden
In 1985, Elizabeth Ratcliff, a former English teacher from California, proposed a national monument to peace. The monument was approved by Congress within two years and Hains Point was selected as the site. The Peace Garden Project Committee, led by Garret Eckbo, held a design competition in 1989 and selected Eduardo Catalano’s olive branch plan. Catalano's plan was approved by two planning Committees but rejected by the US Fine Arts Commission in 1992. The design firm Royston Hanamoto Alley & Abey was then hired and a year later their design received full approval. Funding for the monument was not secured by 2003, and the Garden was never built.
Environmental Design Archives. <a href="https://instagram.com/edarchives/">View images.</a><a href="http://exhibits.ced.berkeley.edu/items/show/1518"><br /></a>
1987 (approved)
2003 (authorization expired)
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
Benjamin Banneker Memorial
<p>In 1996, the Washington Interdependence Council began planning a memorial to <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/77">Benjamin Banneker</a>, an African American scientist and surveyor who helped map the boundaries of the District of Columbia. Congress authorized the plan, and the Council was responsible for raising money for construction. The initial authorization expired in 2005, but the project was renewed in 2010 through new legislative efforts. The memorial is expected to part of a large-scale renovation near L’Enfant Plaza and Banneker Park. The proposed project includes a 14-foot statue, visitors' center, and a large clock tower.</p>
Image courtesy Bobbie K. Carlyle and the Washington Interdependence Council.
3/18/1998 (first authorization)
9/29/2010 (second authorization)
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=2000-present">2000-present</a>
Black Revolutionary War Patriots Memorial
<p>In 1986, Maurice Barboza and Lena Santos Ferguson won Congressional authorization to honor African Americans who fought in the Revolutionary War with a monument on the Mall. Congress authorized the memorial, but followed precedent by not allocating any funds. Barboza and Ferguson raised enough money to fund a design by Edward Dwight that represented African American men, women, and children emerging from a granite vortex led by black soldiers. Barboza and Ferguson were unable to raise enough money before the authorization expired. The memorial was never built, but they revised their plan in 2005 and proposed the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/admin/items/edit/516">National Liberty Memorial.</a></p>
National Park Service, Ethnography Program. <a href="http://www.nps.gov/ethnography/aah/aaheritage/histcontextsf.htm">View Original.</a>
March 25, 1988 (authorized)
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
Deaf President Now Protest
On March 11, 1988, deaf students from Gallaudet University in Washington, DC marched to the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/59">steps of the Capitol</a> protesting the selection of Elisabeth A. Zinser, a hearing person, as the University's 7th president. Student leaders directed the crowd in a chant that demanded a "Deaf President Now.” Protesters carried a banner that read “We still have a dream!” Faculty, students, and deaf community members attracted national press attention and closed the campus for a week-long protest. Due to the outcry, Zinser resigned and I. King Jordan became the first deaf president of Gallaudet, the world’s only university designed specifically for deaf and hard of hearing students.
Courtesy of Gallaudet University Archives. <a href="http://www.gallaudet.edu/dpn_home/issues.html">View Source.</a>
03/11/1988
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
John Stevens Shop
The John Stevens Shop is a stone carving workshop based in Rhode Island and currently co-owned by the father and son team of John E. and Nicholas Benson. They have been involved in the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/506">design and execution of lettering for inscriptions</a> for four memorials on the Mall. The Bensons designed and executed special typefaces, or lettering styles, for the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/27">Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial</a>, the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/61">World War II Memorial</a>, and the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/156">Martin Luther King Memorial</a>. Additionally, John Benson designed the lettering for the date stones in the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/63">Vietnam Veterans' Memorial</a>.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=John+Stevens+Shop">John Stevens Shop</a>
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. <a href="http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2011635591/">View original photograph</a>.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1950-1979">1950-1979</a>
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=2000-present">2000-present</a>
Carving an inscription at the FDR Memorial
The <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/507">artist</a> in this photograph is carving one of the many inscriptions found in the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/27">Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial</a>. Calligrapher and stone carver John Benson, designed the layout and typeface of the inscriptions. Each letter was carved and sandblasted into the granite of the memorial.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=Carol+Highsmith">Carol Highsmith</a>
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. <a href="http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2011633114/">View original</a>.
1997 ca.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
Allosaurus Arrives on the Mall
In April 1987 a one-ton fiberglass Allosaurus sculpture was moved into the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/55">National Museum of Natural History</a>. <span> A crowd formed on the Mall at the steps of the museum to watch the dinosaur lifted into the building with a winch. </span>The 20-foot-long model was featured in the "Dinosaurs, Past and Present," a temporary exhibit displaying artistic representations of dinosaurs constructed in the 1800 and 1900s. After three months, the Allosaurus and other works traveled to museums across North America.
Smithsonian Institution Archives. <a href="http://siarchives.si.edu/collections/siris_sic_5712?back=%2Fsearch%2Fsia_search_collections%2Fdinosaur">View Original</a>.
04/28/1987 (Allosaurus Arrival)
06/04/1987 ( "Dinosaurs, Past and Present" Opens)
08/31/1987 ( "Dinosaurs, Past and Present" Closes)
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>
Disability Rights Protests at the Capitol
In March 1990, disability rights activists gathered at the west front of the <a href="http://mallhistory.org/items/show/59">Capitol</a> to pressure the House of Representatives to pass a disability rights bill. The bill passed in the Senate the year before, but it stalled in the House. Nearly 1,000 people attended the rally. To protest the lack of accessibility inside the building, 60 people discarded their mobility devices and crawled up the 83 stone steps to the Capitol. Some Congressmen responded negatively to the protest, but it was successful: President George H. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act into law on July 26, 1990.
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=William+Eaton">William Eaton</a>
"Disabled Persons Rally, Crawl Up Capitol Steps," <em>Los Angeles Times, </em>March 13, 1990.
3/12/1990
<a href="/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=38&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=1980-1999">1980-1999</a>