When tickets went on sale last month for this summer’s D.C. performances of “Hamilton,” the line wrapped halfway around the Kennedy Center. Tens of thousands of people flooded the venue’s website to get a crack at seats. The city is ready and waiting for “Hamilton’s” arrival — now there’s a good way to pass the time. The American Revolution Institute of the Society of the Cincinnati is presenting a new exhibit, “Alexander Hamilton’s American Revolution,” at the society’s headquarters on Embassy Row. And, yes, they timed it to capitalize on the Founding Father’s surge in popularity. “Unashamedly,” says Emily Schulz Parsons, deputy director and curator of the institute run by the society, which is made up of male descendants of officers who fought in the Revolutionary War. “We could do an exhibition on Alexander Hamilton at any time. He was an original member of the society and its second president. But, of course, the musical really motivated us.” So while the items in the exhibit may not pop up in the Broadway smash, they still provide insight into Hamilton’s remarkable life (and death).
The Society of The Cincinnati’s Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave. NW; Thu. through Sept. 16, free.
Mourning ring
This gold ring belonged to Eliza Hamilton, Alexander’s widow. “It has a little lock of his hair on the front, and an inscription on the inside of the band with his name, his death date and how old he was,” Parsons says. “She went on to live for 50 more years, and actually settled in D.C. and died here. She spent half a century mourning him.”
Bar bill
No one can say the first secretary of the Treasury couldn’t party. After the Society of the Cincinnati’s meeting at which Hamilton was elected the group’s vice president, he, Pierre L’Enfant, Revolutionary War hero Baron von Steuben and others went out for dinner. And what’s dinner without drinks? “It’s a list of port and brandy and grog and punch,” Parsons says. “It’s a really fascinating look at what their social lives were like.” Their social lives on that night in 1789 amounted to 78 pounds and 4 shillings, which in today’s money is a lot.
Officers list
Hamilton had opinions and wasn’t afraid to share them. This list of candidates for officer positions in the Army includes Hamilton’s remarks, in which he sums up each man with a blunt appraisal like “unknown … probably bad.” “It’s really candid, really eye-opening and entertaining to read,” Parsons says. Hamilton dismissed some as drunkards or undisciplined — and disdained others for being members of the opposing party.
Funeral coverage
Hamilton’s 1804 funeral was “one of the most elaborate and moving funerals that had ever been held in New York City to date,” Parsons says. The New-York Herald memorialized Hamilton’s death in print. “All of the columns and the pages are bordered in black,” Parsons says. “It has a listing of everyone who participated in the funeral procession and the order of the procession, so you can see who was marching immediately in front of and behind the casket, in those places of honor.” Members of the Society of the Cincinnati were charged with planning the memorial.
