(Thank you to the handsome fella for writing this post ❤️)
We began our day with a walk down to the Septa train stop and as much as we enjoyed everyone staring at us yesterday in our Sunday go-to-church finest, today we dressed in our civilian clothes.
We took the train down to the 2nd Street station and headed over to the Museum of the American Revolution. We knew that we wanted to see a whole bunch of the historic sites, and we’d heard that the Museum was a good, comprehensive overview of the whole thing.
On our way over to the entrance, we saw a couple of places where we could eat and because we’ve been doing this nomading thing for a while, we took note (FORESHADOWING!) We also took great delight in the fact that North Third street looks like “N3RD” street. And seeing as how I am a nerd, it brought great joy to my heart.
We arrived at the Museum proper and after check-in, we watched the opening film that framed the Revolution. We’ve seen a lot of orientation films in our travels, so I feel pretty confident when I say that this was one of the best we’ve seen. It did a really good job of explaining the War of Independence, its causes and outcomes as well as some of the key players.
We then headed upstairs and watched the “George Washington’s Tent” video. We’d heard form several people that we should for sure see the “Tent Video” but we were all surprised when at the end of the video, the screen lifted and there was George Washington’s actual tent! Like. The original tent. (Unfortunately, you aren’t allowed to take pictures of it. But you can watch the video here –though it doesn’t have the reveal at the end.)
It turns out that when Washington returned home from the war, he packed up all his gear and stored it at his home. He’d been living in that tent for most of eight years, so I would imagine that he was eager to never see its insides again!. At any rate, the tent was handed down until it came into the possession of Mary Anna Curtis Lee, Washington’s great grand-daughter and the wife of Robert E. Lee. During the Civil War, Union soldiers captured it when they seized and ransacked Arlington. Eventually, it came back into the possession of the Lee’s descendants who eventually donated it to the museum.
(Of course, the full context of the tent and its history are FAR more complex, but that’s the gist).
At any rate, it was a very moving experience to see the tent where Washington spent so much of his time during the war. Jonas especially was delighted by the fact that the actual tent was there.
After the tent, we decided that we should go get some lunch before attempting the rest of the galleries, so with our re-entry pins firmly affixed, we left to go find some food. We thought the tags themselves were pretty neat; they are little metal tabs with a six-pointed star on them. The six pointed star was the one that Washington used on his flag and they were featured prominently throughout the museum.
We had seen a place called “Big Ass Slices” on our way from the station, so OF COURSE, we decided to go there.
Along the way, Jill and Clara dropped into a stationery store (a dangerous thing to do) and got some much needed writing and bullet journal supplies.
But once we were all reunited at the restaurant and after ordering, we found out that they indeed have very ‘Big Ass’ Slices.
The server was very nice and the restaurant was very accommodating to our horde. And for some reason, the music they were playing was all pop-punk from when Jill and Jonathan were angsty teenagers (Simple Plan! Yellow Card! Sum-41! Eve 6!) and that made us happy. Note to future visitors, the garlic knots were incredible and make sure you get the garlic pizza.
The rest of the museum was fantastic. It’s organized into a horseshoe shaped series of galleries that move chronologically through the war.
(The twins lasted until the Stamp Act and then started losing their minds. So for the rest of the museum visit, one parent stayed in the atrium and supervised them while they watched Creature Cases.)
Instead of going into an exhaustive description of everything in the museum, here is was what I really liked, interspersed with pictures:
1. It was really easy to go into as much (or as little) detail as you wanted
Each area had big, bold words on the walls describing what was being depicted and some reference back to the original orientation film. If you let your eye move downward, you’d start to see more detail and eye-witness accounts. Finally, you could walk up to each artifact and learn much more information about where it came from and who owned it. It made it really easy to zoom in and out as you moved through the space.
2. There were so many experiences to learn about
I really appreciated how the experiences of women, native Americans, enslaved people, civilians, and common soldiers were woven throughout the entire experience. Those stories have always been there, but it was really neat to see more than just George Washington’s letters. I especially like the touch-screen-based choose your own adventure where you learned about enslaved individual and the choices they had to make during the war (go to Nova Scotia? Join the British? Join the Continental Army?). And it was really cool that there was a “How do we know?” button where you could see primary source documents and things.
3. The War for Independence is over; the American Revolution has just begun
In all of the exhibits, there was a lot of focus placed on how the ideals set forth by the Founders are still in conflict with our realities today. Yes, we believe that all Men are created equal, but are we living up to that today? In short, it all felt very timely without being preachy, if that makes sense. I walked away feeling like the questions raised by the Revolution are still very much applicable to us today.
4. Multimedia!
All the videos and experiences were top notch. The music, the effects, the voice acting, the graphics were all awesome. It was also really cool that the museum had things you could touch and feel interspersed with the artifacts. We got to sit in a replica of the Rising Sun chair! The original is in Independence Hall, but it was neat that they one to try out, so when we saw it the next day, we knew what it was!
After the Museum, we hit the gift shop and then headed out for a couple more sights.
We’re suckers for cute old streets, so we walked over to Elfreth’s Alley, which has been continually occupied since 1703. On our way, we passed Betsy Ross’s house! It’s like they say, you can’t swing a cat without hitting history in Philadelphia. (Do they say that? If they don’t they should)
The twins both fell asleep in the stroller during the walk to the Alley. Which was definitely in everyone’s best interests.
The Alley itself was lovely. The kids were not impressed, but they are jaded and we don’t listen to their opinions 🙂 When we told them that we were going to visit “a cool old street,” Logan gave us the dirtiest look you can imagine.
Besides being a ‘cool old street’ Elfreth’s Alley is the oldest continually inhabited street in America. 29 of the 32 houses are privately owned. And two of the others have been converted into a museum about the street. Plus, it’s totes presh.
After looking at the “Boring Street” we got back on the train and headed to Reading Terminal Market. We’d heard it had some cool food options (including some particularly awesome donuts) and we promised the kids donuts if they feigned enthusiasm for the historical streets we dragged them through.
On our way to the CORRECT side of the train tracks, we unfortunately had to ride several incredibly smelly elevators. Seriously, they were rank. Ever since then, when we get in an elevator, the children will say “Wow, this elevator doesn’t smell bad at all!” (Seriously, at the time of writing this five days later, they’re still saying it.)
Reading Terminal Market reminded us so much of Pike Place market in Seattle, crossed with a wet market (palengke) from the Philippines. It was a really cool vibe with lots of food stalls, fish sellers, and various other goods and sundries.
We got donuts from Beiler’s Doughnuts (which had been specifically recommended to us at church) because our children had done a remarkably good job feigning interest through the “Boring Street.”
After that, we headed home and got dinner for everyone except Jonathan and Jill (FORESHADOWING). One of the fun things about our airbnb is that it’s super close to a grocery store and a Dollar General. So, we’ve been sending Clara out by herself to go buy stuff and she’s really enjoyed it. So we sent her to buy some more Mac and Cheese while we were getting other stuff going and it was GREAT.
After the children had eaten, we chucked them all in bed and Jill and I went around the corner to eat! It’s lovely having an older child that can get ahold of us if there’s a need at home. But seriously, if we had been needed, it would have been a 30 second jog back from where we were eating.
We ended up going to a place called El Camino Real. We both love Mexican food, and so we decided to try it out. It turns out that El Camino Real is both a Mexican place AND a Texas style barbecue place! So, we got a taco salad, brisket, pulled pork, and Fajitas. And it was all delicious. Even the super loud group of drunk volleyball players couldn’t dampen our enthusiasm 🙂
After eating, we took a stroll around our neighborhood, picked up a package from a local Amazon Locker, then went home and crashed hard.
