Walking Tour with Smithsonian Associates: Monuments and Memory

Washington, D.C., has been the stage for pivotal events in our nation’s history for more than two centuries. It has also become the repository of an entire nation’s memories through the creation of monuments and memorials.

Join staff members of the new Capital Jewish Museum on a walking tour that explores the connection between the city’s monuments and collective memory. Begin at the home of the museum—where the historic 1876 Adas Israel synagogue, the District’s first purpose-built synagogue, is the focal point of the site—then move through the heart of the historic downtown Jewish community. Along the way, visit monuments and memorials connected to local and international Jewish history, viewed through the lens of the Jewish value Zachor, or memory. Highlights include memorials dedicated to the victims of Communism, the Ukrainian famine known as the Holodomor, and Japanese American citizens during World War II.