Washington Didn't Want It
1833-1884 AD
1833 1833
77.02W38.55N
ARC

WASHINGTON, D.C.
	While he was alive, George Washington managed to ward off attempts to create a monument to himself.  It would be too expensive, he said.
	But like it or not, in 1833 a private organization called the Washington National Monument Society decided to go ahead and build a monument to the United States' first president, so it started soliciting funds and reviewing plans.
	Eventually a plan based on a design by Robert Mills was accepted and the cornerstone was laid on July 4, 1848.  Then, finding the ground was too soft, the monument was moved to its present location.
	In 1876, seeing the project would need more than private support, Congress voted to pay for the project.  Work began in 1880 and the monument was finished on Dec. 6, 1884 at a cost of about $1.2 million.
	The Washington Monument is patterned after ancient Egyptian obelisks, though several times larger.  It is about 555-and-a-half feet tall and covered with white Maryland marble, topped with a small cast-aluminum pyramid.