An enormous, inside-out glass globe built in 1935.

The bank that helped fund the Mexican-American War and the purchase of Alaska met its downfall after helping Augusto Pinochet launder money.

One critic described it as "middle Mussolini, early Ramses, and late Neiman-Marcus." Another called it an architectural "natural disaster."

Look closely and you’ll notice that the color changes a third of the way up the tower.

A diminutive memorial marks the site of a successful assassination by a right-wing death squad in America's capital.

A derelict bit of infrastructure from the canal that once ran through D.C. is landlocked in the heart of the city.

An overlooked memorial honoring the local Washington residents who died in World War I.

One of the most influential presidents in U.S. history wanted only this plain, elegant monument as his lasting memorial.

Home to a vast and influential collection of Shakespeareana.

Before founding the American Red Cross, Clara Barton had a tremendous humanitarian impact by locating thousands of missing soldiers.

Helen Keller once broke ground on this historic center for the study of technologies to benefit the hearing impaired.

Legend has it that President Grant’s frequent drinking in the lobby gave rise to the term “lobbyist.”

A much-maligned monument to teetotalism.

A three-story tower of books about Abraham Lincoln is one of the more unusual monuments to the president.

A little marble compass above George Washington's (empty) tomb in the Capitol marks where D.C.'s four quadrants intersect.

Members of Congress have traveled between the buildings on Capitol Hill for a century hidden from tourists, press, and storm clouds.

A celebrity from the late Cretaceous period.

Decades before the scandal, this staircase on the river was a literal "water gate."

An unassuming, powerful monument north of the U.S. Capitol bears witness to the resilience of Japanese Americans during a time of grave injustice.

The remains of Martha, the last known passenger pigeon, serve as a tool to educate about conservation.

The most accurate timepiece in the world.

This stunning blue and gold room changed cities twice before becoming part of the Smithsonian.

A traveling postal dog covered 48 states and more than 140,000 miles, and he lives on as taxidermy, patched up with a rabbit's foot and a pig's ear.

The national park was once a plantation estate.