Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

We did a day trip up to Harrisburg to see the state capitol and do a tour of the main building.  Owen's favorite part was seeing a group of people dressed as Santa riding bikes in front of the building.  He was talking about seeing Santa on a bike for weeks.

The Pennsylvania State Capitol is the seat of government for Pennsylvania in downtown Harrisburg. It was designed by architect, Joseph Miller Huston in 1902 and completed 1906 in a Beaux-Arts style with decorative Renaissance themes throughout. The capitol houses the legislative chambers for the Pennsylvania General Assembly, made up of the House of Representatives and the Senate, and the Harrisburg chambers for the Supreme and Superior Courts of Pennsylvania, as well as the offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant Governor. The seat of government for the state was originally in Philadelphia, then was relocated to Lancaster in 1799 and finally to Harrisburg in 1812. The current capitol, known as the Huston Capitol, is the third state capitol building to be built in Harrisburg. The first, the Hills Capitol, was destroyed in 1897 by a fire and the second, the Cobb Capitol, was left unfinished when funding was discontinued in 1899. President Theodore Roosevelt attended the building's dedication in 1906. The Pennsylvania State Capitol is often referred to as a "palace of art" because of its many sculptures, murals and stained-glass windows, most of which are Pennsylvania themed or were made by Pennsylvanians. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. Starting in 1982, the restoration of the capitol has been ongoing. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2006.