SAHARA Highlights: Presidential Monuments

With the American holiday Presidents’ Day on the horizon, this month’s SAHARA Highlights include photographs of presidential shrines. SAHARA’s supporters have contributed an abundance of images of sites that participate in the mythology of the American presidents, from the Washington Monument to the recent Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum.

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Mount Vernon, Fairfax County, Virginia, begun 1734, enlarged and improved 1758-1759 and 1775-1787. Jeffrey E. Klee, photographer, 2016.

Thomas Jefferson, Monticello, Albemarle County, Virginia, begun 1769-1794, substantially enlarged 1769-1809. Damie Stillman, photographer.

Robert Mills, Washington National Monument, Washington, D.C., 1845-1854. Richard Longstreth, photographer.

Jens Jensen, landscape architect, Lincoln Memorial Garden, Springfield, Illinois, 1936. Dianne Harris, photographer.

 The site is an important icon in landscape architecture for its overall design and for its extensive use of Jensen's circular stone benches, called council rings. It is also important for its articulation of a regional approach to landscape design, known as the Prairie School.

Msgr. Martin Cody Keating and George Adams, St. Robert Bellarmine Church and Rectory, Burbank, California, 1967. Dell Upton, photographer, 2014.

Keating was an ultra-nationalist Catholic priest who had served as a chaplain in WWI.  All of the buildings on the campus, which includes elementary and high schools and which were assembled between 1939 and 1967, draw on familiar early American structures, including the rectory, which is derived from the river front of Mount Vernon.

Rick Farver Associates, Citibank, former Pacific Savings Bank, Mount Vernon Office, Los Angeles, California, 1960. Dell Upton, photographer, 2012.

Hugh Stubbins and Associates, Ronald Reagan Foundation and Library, Simi Valley, California, 1988-1991, enlarged 2005. Air Force One Pavilion. Jackie Spafford, photographer, 2018.

HOK, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, Springfield, Illinois, 2004-2005, view of reconstructed log cabin exhibit. Dell Upton, photographer, 2013.