History at play

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MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Thursday, September 17th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: part two of WORLD reporter Maria Baer’s travel diary. She and her husband, along with their best friends, took their four kids on an ambitious road trip to celebrate America’s 250th birthday.

Today, the rest of the story about their efforts to inspire their kids with the nation’s history, some more successful than others.

MARIA BAER: We’ve been in the car for over sixteen hours. Ok, not consecutively. We toured Boston, then Ellis Island. But it’s getting cramped in here.

AUDIO: Before he was president…

To pass the time, my second grader is reading from a book about America’s presidents.

We’re discovering that pop culture—illustrated books, movies, and musicals — are a kind of secret sauce. Dramatizing history has a way of igniting our imaginations for stranger times. We just didn’t know it would be so effective for our kids, too.

AUDIO: Who represented the federalists? The federalists? Alexander Hamilton!

Our first stop in Philadelphia is Independence Hall, where the founders signed the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. As the eight of us meander up the brick sidewalk to the entrance, I’m thrilled to hear a little voice behind me whisper “this is the spot!”

AUDIO: Guys! We’re standing probably where Riley and Abigail stand. Because they ran through this part, they probably…

She’s referencing a crucial scene from the 2004 movie National Treasure. Showing that movie to the kids a month before the trip, was a stroke of brilliance that made them American history enthusiasts.

Inside Independence Hall, we get a glimpse at the very chair in which George Washington sat. We’re in the very room depicted in so many familiar Revolutionary-era paintings. The kids reach for yet another apt cultural reference.

AUDIO: [Singing] I wanna be in the room where it happens, the room where it happens, the room where it happens…

That was “The Room Where it Happens,” from Hamilton… and it was, frankly, too cute for me to shush them. This is the room where it happened!

We leave Independence Hall for a quick glimpse of that big, beautiful, broken Liberty Bell — another very important set piece in National Treasure, if you didn’t know. And then it’s back to the car. We’re headed now to the nation’s permanent capitol.

We reach Washington, D.C. on the first day of a sunny heat wave.

AUDIO: [Bell, music]

Our first morning, we corral the kids for the long walk from the U.S. Supreme Court steps to the Lincoln Memorial. We compromise on a quick break on the mall for a short, expensive ride on an old carousel.

The kids started a game in Boston: do a handstand at every major site and memorial we visit.

AUDIO: Three, two, one, GO!

The girls throw themselves upside down at the Washington Monument, dizzy and laughing.

But we tell them no handstands at the World War Two Memorial. This is personal for my family, as it is for so many.

AUDIO: Our debt to the heroic men and the val.. Valiant wounded in the service of our country can never be repaid… President Harry S. Truman.

At the Lincoln Memorial, my eldest is wide-eyed at the towering sculpture of her favorite president.

AUDIO: So cool fact is, his hands, so his initials is “AL” for Abraham Lincoln. On one hand he’s doing A in sign language and on the other L in sign language.

Our Apple Watches tell us we’ve now walked close to 7,000 steps. Our intrepid leader, my husband Aaron, agrees to take an Uber to our afternoon outings.

AUDIO: Who’s ready for lunch?

Then the National Archives.

By the time we tip-toe into the dimness of the museum’s domed ceiling, the kids are buzzing with excitement. So are we.

AUDIO: Welcome in, just make sure your flash is off.

Inside the archives, we use our best not-kidding-around voices to warn them: no jokes about stealing the Declaration of Independence.

AUDIO: [Giggling] We want to see if we can get the declaration, one of the declaration replicas like they did in the movie…

The next day, we tour the U.S. Capitol and the West Wing of the White House. The kids seem genuinely awed by the history and the power here; the grand buildings and the stern-faced security officers impress them.

Without trying too hard, we seem to have struck the right balance of learning and playing. Of being shushed in museums and doing handstands on the lawn. Of walking 10,000 steps and riding a carousel.

Perhaps that playful spirit is not unlike that of our unique 47th President, whose desk, we see, holds a special red button. That’s his Diet Coke button, our guide says.

My youngest would recommend a few tweaks.

AUDIO: What I’d do, is I’d make it a milkshake one. So every Wednesday… if I did something really good or passed a law, I’d order one… What flavor would you get? Chocolate.

The next morning we head for home: tired, but vastly more grateful for the road that got us here.

AUDIO: Down up, down down up…

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Maria Baer.

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