The Difference between Capital and Capitol…

Ahhh, which to use where?  What exactly is the difference between capital and capitol anyway?  Well, I have to say I never gave it too much thought in recent years because in Massachusetts we call it the Statehouse.   But on our recent trip to Texas, our route took us through six different state capitals. And when I decided to write something about it, I decided the best thing to do was to make sure I knew the difference.

Here’s what About.com has to say on the subject:  The word capitol is used to refer to the building where a legislature (such as the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives) meets while the word capital refers to the city which serves as the seat of government.

You can remember the difference by thinking of the "o" in the word capitol as a dome, like the dome of the U.S. Capitol in the capital Washington D.C.

That’s good advice unless you think of the capitol building of Tennessee that really doesn’t really have a dome.  It has more of a big, round column that sticks up.  But it’s still the capitol.

Capital, on the other hand, has many meanings.  As a noun, it means:

1a. a town or city that is the official seat of government; 

b. a city that is the center of a specific activity or industry, e.g. the financial capital of the world.

2a. wealth in the form of money or property; 

b. material wealth used or available for use in the production of more wealth; 

c. human resources considered in terms of their contributions to an economy

3. an asset or advantage

4. a capital letter, meaning C but not c.

As an adjective it means:

1. first and foremost; principal, which means main or key (as opposed to principle, which means rule, belief, tenet and theory)

2. first-rate; excellent

3. relating to or being a seat of government.

4. involving death or calling for the death penalty, e.g. a capital offense

5. of or relating to financial assets.

Phew!  Capital really runs the gamut from a pile of bricks to a pile of money, from being the most important and the greatest to being the absolute. Capital is one capital word.

So now that I’ve got it straightened out, here are the capitols of the capitals we passed through on our trip to and from Texas.

Montgomery, Alabama

Austin, Texas

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Little Rock, Arkansas

Nashville, Tennessee

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

The Things You See Along the Way: Going more than a mile in...

 We were sitting conversing with some friends before we left on our road trip and talking about the route we planned to take. Greg said, “We're going to stop in Montgomery, Alabama and check out the Civil Rights Memorial. It's a mile in.” I looked at him askance and said, “A mile in?? I thought it was, like, right on the street.” Greg gave me one of his patented “Greg” looks and said, “A Maya Lin...NOT a mile in.” And he is right, of course. The Memorial was designed by Maya Lin, the woman who created the Vietnam Memorial in Washington D.C. and it is accessible and right on the street, not a mile in.

The Memorial is a striking design. It consists of a conical piece of black marble with a round smooth top engraved with important events in the Civil Rights Movement and the names of 40 people who died in the Civil Rights struggle between 1954, the year the U.S. Supreme Court ruled racial segregation in schools unlawful and 1968, the year of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination. Water flows from the center of the circle in ripples over the edge of the cone. Behind this is a curved wall, inscribed with the words from King's I Have a Dream speech, “...we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

The day we were there, it was still pretty cold out although it was beginning to warm up. We were disappointed to see that the Memorial was roped off because of the possibility of ice on the ground surrounding the Memorial. It didn't look all that icy to me so I went around the barrier and Greg followed. Out of nowhere a guard showed up to remind us that we were not supposed to be in there. But he was very polite about it and didn't hurry us up too much.

We then went on to the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church where Martin Luther King, Jr. was pastor from 1954 to 1960 and where he helped to organize the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In our inevitable way, we were too early and the church wasn't opened yet. Since we had to get on the road, we just admired the outside and went on our way.

But before we left Montgomery, we had to drive by Riverwalk Stadium, the home of the Montgomery Biscuits AA baseball team affiliated with the Tampa Bay Rays. Low and behold, it was open. So we parked and went in. Being inside a ballpark in the middle of the winter is a special treat even when no one is playing.

We traced the route of the Selma to Montgomery Marches of 1965 only we did it backwards and ended up in Selma. We drove into Selma over the Edmund Pettis Bridge where the marches began. Selma is a charming southern town and we enjoyed our short time there. And we appreciated being able to visit the sites where such profound events took place that we both so clearly remember from our youths.

The things you see along the way…

I went searching through my Florida pics from January to find some photos of my nephew Neil and his wife Winona.  While on the search, I got stuck looking at some road pictures.  It occurred to me that I hadn’t really looked at these at all and I decided to post some today.  Here are some of the things we saw along the way on our drive to and from Apalachicola, Florida.

I think we may have seen the world’s largest peanut at a rest area in the state of Alabama.

Going through the town of Dothan, Alabama, a charming and interesting place indeed, we saw many murals.  This one reminds me that violence among men is nothing new.

Seen on the back of a truck.  We never did figure out what they support…

but then I’m not really sure I care.

We saw a cat with a deep interest in antiques.

Road Work Ahead…Really???

Have you ever wondered what birds on a wire talk about all day?  Here’s what I think.