Mount Vernon, Virginia

Mount Vernon is a wonderful place to go and travel to while touring the Washington DC Area.  

Here is a link to plan your visit with your kids 

#mountvernon #letsgokids #virginia #summer2019

American Civil War Museum

The mission of The American Civil War Museum is to be the preeminent center
for the exploration of the American Civil War and its legacies
from multiple perspectives: Union and Confederate,
enslaved and free African Americans, soldiers and civilians.

To learn more go to: www.acwm.org

Virginia Holocaust Museum

The VHM first opened in 1997, founded by Mark Fetter, Jay Ipson, and Al Rosenbaum. Housed in the former Education building at Temple Beth El, the museum became an attraction for school field trips. Within a few years, the museum outgrew the space at Temple Beth El, and required additional room to handle the growing number of visitors and school groups.

The Virginia General Assembly offered the American Tobacco Company Warehouse for the relocation of the museum. After restoration and reconfiguration of the building, the expanded Virginia Holocaust Museum was dedicated on Yom HaShoah, the Holocaust Day of Remembrance, 2003.

The Virginia Holocaust Museum has grown steadily since 2003, and now has an average of over 42,000 visitors each year. The VHM remains an important location for Virginia field trips, with students from over 100 middle and high schools visiting yearly.

The museum began an extensive ongoing exhibition renovation project in 2015. Much of the permanent exhibition had never been updated since opening in 2003, and the renovations serve to both update the information contained with newly uncovered facts and figures, as well as update the core exhibition space to professional standards. The VHM hopes these renovations will be completed by 2020.

To learn more go to: www.vaholocaust.org

Virginia Museum of the Fine Arts

History of the Museum

Serving Virginia, looking out to the world: The development of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
In the midst of the Great Depression, on January 16, 1936, Virginia’s political and business leaders bravely demonstrated their faith in the future and their belief in the value of art by opening the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond. The English Renaissance-style headquarters building designed by Peebles and Ferguson Architects of Norfolk barely hinted at the innovative mandate given to the fledgling institution: the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts was to serve as the state’s flagship art museum and as the headquarters for an educational network that would bring the best of world art, past and present, to every corner of the commonwealth.
The idea of a state-operated art museum in Richmond, and the beginnings of an unusual partnership between private donors and state legislators, actually surfaced long before the new museum was built. In 1919, Judge John Barton Payne, a prominent Virginian who held high offices in law and national politics, donated his entire collection of 50 paintings to the commonwealth. Gifts of art to the state from other donors soon followed, and in 1932 Judge Payne proposed a $100,000 challenge grant to build a museum for this burgeoning public art collection.
The challenge was accepted by Virginia Governor John Garland Pollard. He not only helped to raise funds from private donors, but also promoted the use of state revenues to support the new museum’s operating expenses. Virginia’s General Assembly approved legislation authorizing the museum on March 27, 1934. With additional funds from the Federal Works Projects Administration, Judge Payne’s dream became a reality.

To learn more go to: https://www.vmfa.museum/about/museum-history/

April - Virginia Things to Do

During the month of April, Let's Go Kids, LLC will be looking into places, people and things to do in and around the State of Virginia.

Share with us places you've been, or you would love to go?

The Kennedy Center

History of the Living Memorial

The Kennedy Center, located on the banks of the Potomac River near the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., opened to the public in September 1971. But its roots date back to 1958, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed bipartisan legislation creating a National Cultural Center. To honor Eisenhower's vision for such a facility, one of the Kennedy Center's theaters is named for him.

The National Cultural Center Act included four basic components: it authorized the Center's construction, spelled out an artistic mandate to present a wide variety of both classical and contemporary performances, specified an educational mission for the Center, and stated that the Center was to be an independent facility, self-sustaining, and privately funded. As a result of this last stipulation, a mammoth fundraising campaign began immediately following the Act's passage into law.

President John F. Kennedy was a lifelong supporter and advocate of the arts, and frequently steered the public discourse toward what he called "our contribution to the human spirit." Kennedy took the lead in raising funds for the new National Cultural Center, holding special White House luncheons and receptions, appointing his wife Jacqueline and Mrs. Eisenhower as honorary co-chairwomen, and in other ways placing the prestige of his office firmly behind the endeavor. [The John Fitzgerald Kennedy Library and Museum, Boston, Massachusetts]

President Kennedy also attracted to the project the man who would become the Center's guiding light for nearly three decades. By the time Kennedy appointed him as chairman of the Center in 1961, Roger L. Stevens had already achieved spectacular success in real estate (i.e. negotiating the sale of the Empire State Building in 1951), politics, fundraising, and the arts; as a theatrical producer, he had brought West Side Story, A Man for All Seasons, and Bus Stop to the stage. Over the next 30 years, Stevens would oversee the Center's construction, then would shepherd it to prominence as a crucible for the best in music, dance, and theater.

Two months after President Kennedy's assassination in November 1963, Congress designated the National Cultural Center (designed by Edward Durell Stone) as a "living memorial" to Kennedy, and authorized $23 million to help build what was now known as the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Fundraising continued at a swift pace—with much help coming from the Friends of the Kennedy Center volunteers, who fanned out across the nation to attract private support [View profiles of Friends/Volunteers Founding members]—and nations around the world began donating funds, building materials, and artworks to assist in the project's completion. In December 1964, President Lyndon Johnson turned the first shovelful of earth at the Center's construction site, using the same gold-plated spade that had been used in the groundbreaking ceremonies for both the Lincoln Memorial in 1914 and the Jefferson Memorial in 1938.

From its very beginnings, the Kennedy Center has represented a unique public/private partnership. As the nation's living memorial to President Kennedy, the Center receives federal funding each year to pay for maintenance and operation of the building, a federal facility. However, the Center's artistic programs and education initiatives are paid for almost entirely through ticket sales and gifts from individuals, corporations, and private foundations.

The Center made its public debut on September 8, 1971, with a gala opening performance featuring the world premiere of a Requiem mass honoring President Kennedy, a work commissioned from the legendary composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein.

[ View the opening night's program for Mass.]

The occasion enabled Washington to begin earning a reputation as a cultural hub as well as a political one; as The New York Times wrote in a front-page article the next morning, "The capital of this nation finally strode into the cultural age tonight with the spectacular opening of the $70 million [Kennedy Center]...a gigantic marble temple to music, dance, and drama on the Potomac's edge."

[ Read the dedication statements by the original honorary chairmen.]

Under Roger Stevens's continued direction, the Kennedy Center presented season after season of the finest and most exciting in the performing arts: new plays by Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, and Tom Stoppard; new ballets by Antony Tudor, Agnes DeMille, and Jerome Robbins; new orchestral scores by Aaron Copland, Dmitri Shostakovich, and John Cage. The Center co-produced musicals including Annie and Pippin in its early years, and later co-produced the American premiere of Les Misérables and co-commissioned the preeminent American opera of recent times, John Adams's Nixon in China. Stevens also initiated the American National Theater (ANT) company, which pushed the boundaries of traditional drama during a brief and controversial, but influential reign during the mid-1980s. [In Memory of Roger L. Stevens, February 1998]

The Center's presence also enabled Washington to become an international stage, hosting the American debuts of the Bolshoi Opera and the Ballet Nacional de Cuba, as well as the first-ever U.S. performances by Italy's legendary La Scala opera company. [See our Performance Highlights for a more thorough review of the Center's artistic achievements.]

Ralph P. Davidson replaced Stevens as Kennedy Center Chairman in 1988, and helped secure an ongoing Japanese endowment that brings that nation's arts to Washington each year. (Another of Japan's gifts to the Center, the Terrace Theater, had opened in 1979.) James D. Wolfensohn was elected the Center's third Chairman in 1990; under the leadership of Wolfensohn and President Lawrence J. Wilker, the Center solidified its fundraising, strengthened its relations with Congress, and extended the nationwide reach of its education programs to serve millions of young people in every state. The Center renewed its commitment to the creation of new works, and became a national leader in arts education and community outreach as well as a friendlier and more accessible home for the arts in Washington.

James A. Johnson, former Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer at Fannie Mae, began his tenure as the Kennedy Center's fourth Chairman in May 1996. Johnson's vision of the Center as a performing arts center attractive to people of all levels of income and artistic taste led him to create the Performing Arts for Everyone initiative, increasing the visibility of the Center's frequent low-priced and free events. He created and endowed the Millennium Stage, which presents a free event every day of the year at 6 p.m., and are also streamed live, online, and also via Facebook. By 2001, Johnson, whose stewardship had greatly enlarged the Center's artistic endowment, was joined by the Center's new president Michael M. Kaiser, former head of the Royal Opera House and earlier of American Ballet Theatre. Kaiser, who stepped down as Kennedy Center President in August 2014, oversaw all the artistic activities at the Kennedy Center, increased the Center's already broad educational efforts, established cross-disciplinary programming with opera, symphony and dance, established Kennedy Center Arts Management Program, created unprecedented theater festivals celebrating the works of Stephen Sondheim and Tennessee Williams, and arranged for continuing visits by St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theater Opera, Ballet, and Orchestra, and the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Stephen A. Schwarzman, Chairman and CEO of The Blackstone Group, a global investment and advisory firm headquartered in New York, began his service as the fifth Chairman of the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees in May 2004. His commitment and interest in the arts, and particularly theater, was highlighted by a gift of $10 million to the Center's theater program, which has since produced new productions of such classics as Mame and Carnival!, August Wilson's 20th Century—the playwright's complete 10-play cycle performed as fully staged readings, a major revival production of Ragtime that transferred to Broadway in October 2009, and Terrence McNally's Nights at the Opera in which three of the playwright's works were performed concurrently in three Kennedy Center theaters.

David M. Rubenstein, co-founder and managing director of The Carlyle Group, one of the world's largest private equity firms, was named Chairman of the Kennedy Center in May 2010. Since then, Rubenstein has pledged more than $25 million to the Kennedy Center in support of the National Symphony Orchestra, the Center's artistic and educational programming, major annual events, and the Rubenstein Arts Access Program, which seeks to increase access to the arts to the underserved, the underprivileged, young people, and members of our armed services. Mr. Rubenstein pledged an additional $50 million as the lead gift for the Kennedy Center's Expansion Project, which will be located south of the existing building. Designed by American architect Steven Holl, the expansion will add dedication and much-needed classroom and open rehearsal spaces, as well as public gardens and an outdoor video wall. Construction is expected to be completed in the 2018–2019 season. Mr. Rubenstein's accomplishments at the Kennedy Center include the appointment of the renowned Deborah F. Rutter as the third-ever Kennedy Center President. An accomplished arts leader known for emphasizing collaboration, innovation, and community engagement, Ms. Rutter began her tenure at the Kennedy Center September 1, 2014.

In May of 2016, the Center kicked off the JFK centennial year, celebrating the 100th birthday of America's 35th President and honoring his legacy. Leading up to the centennial Open House and celebration in May 2017, the Center's programming is inspired by five ideals commonly attributed to President Kennedy: Courage, Freedom, Justice, Service, and Gratitude. Continuing to serve as a thought-leader in the performing arts community and to reflect Kennedy's ideals as a living memorial in the 21st century, the Center is engaged in a process to re-imagine itself as a more dynamic creative campus that actively engages with its communities to inspire citizen artists and reflect the contemporary spirit of exploration and expression of America. Guided by JFK's legacy of idealism, hope, and empowerment, the Kennedy Center will launch new initiatives, serve as a catalyst and a meeting place, and invite members of the public to engage with artists and ideas, and to participate in the civic and cultural life of their country.

"I am certain that after the dust of centuries has passed over our cities," President Kennedy once said, "we, too, will be remembered not for our victories or defeats in battle or in politics, but for our contribution to the human spirit."

to learn more go to www.kennedy-center.org

Smithsonian American Art Museum

The Smithsonian American Art Museum, the nation’s first collection of American art, is an unparalleled record of the American experience. The collection captures the aspirations, character, and imagination of the American people throughout three centuries. The museum is the home to one of the largest and most inclusive collections of American art in the world. Its artworks reveal key aspects of America’s s rich artistic and cultural history from the colonial period to today.

The museum has been a leader in identifying and collecting significant aspects of American visual culture, including photography, modern folk and self-taught art, African American art, Latino art, and video games. The museum has the largest collection of New Deal art and exceptional collections of contemporary craft, American impressionist paintings and masterpieces from the Gilded Age. In recent years, the museum has focused on strengthening its contemporary art collection, and in particular media arts, through acquisitions, awards, curatorial appointments, endowments, and by commissioning new artworks.

To learn more go to: https://americanart.si.edu