Here is the story of Washington, D.C.

Once it was a little village on the Potomac River. About two hundred years ago, when the United States was a young country, people began to talk about where the capital should be and where the president should live.

While Congress debated what to build and where to build it, the first American President George Washington picked a patch of land on the Potomac River. The land was on the border of Maryland and Virginia.

George Washington named the land the District of Columbia (D.C.) after Christopher Columbus.

Washington, D.C. is one of the only cities in the world that was designed before it was built.

The city is well planned. The heart of the city is the Capitol.

George Washington decided to put the Capitol Build­ing on a hill at one end of the city, and the president’s house on a hill at the other end.

Nowadays the Capitol is the best starting point for sightseeing about the city.

In Washington, D.C. there are memorials to the most famous American Presidents. The Washington Monu­ment, the 555-foot-high obelisk honours the first U.S. President. It is called the “Pencil” because of its shape.

The Lincoln Memorial is just opposite the Washing­ton Monument. Inside the Lincoln Memorial there is the Statue of Abraham Lincoln, the nation’s 16th President. The Jefferson Memorial is located at the Tidal Basin in Washington, D.C. It commemorates Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States.

Outside the city there is the Arlington National Cemetery. One can see the eternal flame on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier here.

John F.Kennedy, the 35th American President, whose death shocked everyone in America, was buried in the Arlington National Cemetery. Americans remember and honour their national heroes.

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Vocabulary

a patch — зд. кусок (земли)

the Tidal Basin — бухта

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