Kennedy Center Wall Sconces Anomaly

Kennedy Center Wall Sconces

[Full Disclosure: I am a current employee of the Kennedy Center. Any opinions expressed in this piece are my own personal views and do not represent that of the Center, its management, or its staff.]

I walk along the Kennedy Center's Grand Foyer a lot. It's a very scenic way to get from place to place. At one point or another, I discovered an anomaly in the wall sconces.

From 1971 to 2004, all the wall sconces in the Grand Foyer had four strings of lights in each of their columns. This is still the case on the river side of the hall.

River-side wall sconces in the Grand Foyer.

In 2004, accessibility ramps were added along the theater side of the hall. With this, the wall sconces along that wall were shortened. With their decreasing length as the ramp gets higher, this choice seems to have been decided to avoid people reaching the sconces. When the Kennedy Center first opened up, the public went Kennedy-crazy and stole many things (from pieces of carpet to an entire wall sconce), so the reasoning is not unfounded.

One of the Opera House ramps with wall sconces of
decreasing lengths.

Which brings us to the anomaly. On the Eisenhower Theater side of the grand foyer, the sconce's lengths are 4 and 3.

Eisenhower theater wall sconces

On the Concert Hall side, the sconce's lengths are 3 & 2.

Concert Hall wall sconces

This anomaly is not very apparent because the Concert Hall and Eisenhower Theater are on opposite sides of the long Grand Foyer.

Why is it like this and not matching? I do not know. I'll try to learn why, but until then --

- fin - 

Sources:

"Miracle on the Potomac: The Kennedy Center from the Beginning" by Ralph Elihu Becker

Stronger Oversight of Fire Safety Issues, Construction Projects, and Financial Management Needed (Page 13)

DIG! during the Great American Solar Eclipse of 2017

An artifact marble eclipse during the 2017 solar eclipse!

My latest trip to Williamsburg coincided with the 2017 solar eclipse over North America. While Williamsburg did not get a total eclipse, a partial was still exciting! I decided the best way to avoid looking at the sun was to actively look in the opposite direction -- by searching for artifacts at DIG! Kids, Dirt, & Discovery!

DIG! Progress Report August 2017: The hole grows deeper!

This brick fireplace I photographed last time. Still buried,
but there's been lots of progress!

Another brick formation starting to appear!

These new stairs are already too short! Time to replace them
for next year's DIG!

The small, plastic sand box tubs are now replaced by a large,
permanent sandbox!

For the last program of the day, when the eclipse was to occur, no one had shown up to dig. There was a program on the Palace Green regarding 18th century science and solar eclipses, so everyone was avidly heading in that direction.

For that last hour, some digging happened, of course. Other parts were trying to look at the eclipse -- safely. None of us had any eclipse glasses, so rudimentary pinhole cameras were made.

Pinhole!

Pinhole!

Mini-partial eclipse!

Using the pit to create a bigger eclipse shot
through the pinhole

It was pretty fun. At the peak eclipse, the sun's light got noticeably dimmer. It was a spooky effect. Shadows through the trees became crescent-shaped. 

I tried to get a shot of the eclipse through my camera, but the sun was too bright.

One of the (many) shots of me trying to get a picture of the
eclipse through my camera. It didn't work.

Some people that were passing by would let us borrow their eclipse glasses from time to time. I got a pretty good shot putting the glass over my camera lens:

THE GREAT WILLIAMSBURG PARTIAL SOLAR
ECLIPSE 2017!!!

We finished off the dig session eating Moon Pies, of course. It was a good day, and no one lost their eyesight!

DIG! is done for the year, but it will be back again next year!

Visit Also:

Discovery! Archaeology CW Blog: Eclipsed!