Tag Archives: Capitol

Overlooked Albany

The New York State Capitol Building in Albany

The New York State Capitol Building in Albany

Who knew this stuff was here? Certainly not me, even though I’d seen it all before. Growing up just outside of Albany, New York, I’m confident I toured these buildings and museums on any number of school field trips. I’m equally certain that all of those trips were unmitigated disasters. I remember absolutely nothing about them.

So powerful is my amnesia that I seemed to have forgotten that Albany had anything at all worth seeing. Even as we traveled thousands of miles seeking out similar locations across the country, touring them in my home state never entered my mind.

Not even laying eyes on New York’s State Capitol building could shake the cobwebs. Upon seeing it we still weren’t quite sure we had arrived at the correct address. It looked nothing at all like the kind of building we had come to expect from such places. It had no dome, or Doric columns. It didn’t mimic the U.S. Capitol in D.C., like so many state capitols do. Instead, it resembled an Italian palace.

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Salt Lake City Capitol

Salt Lake City Capitol Murals

Murals inside the Salt Lake City Capitol building rotunda

The U.S. may not have Europe’s 17th century palaces to house our government offices but we’ve still managed to create some amazing spaces for our bureaucrats. Each state capitol we’ve visited (18 in all so far) is unique. Notwithstanding its stereotypically domed neoclassical architecture, the Capitol in Salt Lake City is one of the most impressive we’ve seen.

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