nib nos vtg 1996 white house historic asso president fillmore christmas ornament

Description: the ornament i can find no issues. it is new in box. this is a depiction of the white house façade at the time of president millard fillmore's administration. it also depicts the first presidential seal, that came into being also during his administration. you can read more about both below. it is three-dimensional, really depicting the very handsome seal as the central focus of the ornament. it is sold brass with colored enamel. it comes with a very detailed brochure and a box with a read foil presidential seal. very pretty ornament. from the top of the metal look for the ribbon to hang the ornament to the bottom of the lowest part of the scroll a the base of the ornament is 3". the is alot of information that comes with this. (see last image.) the front has the fillmore presidential seal the seal of the president of the united states the front is otherwise engraved with the white house christmas 1996 the reverse is engraved ©1996 whha made in usa the original seal of millard fillmore 1850-1853 about the white house historical association [from: enclosed brochure] the white house is an important symbol of our national heritage and a significant part of that heritage. it is the only residence of a chief of state in the world that is open to the public without charge on a regular basis, and it is visited by more than one and one quarter of a million people each year. the white house historical association was organized in 1961 to enhance public understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of the white house. this objective is being met by the publication of books and other materials about the white house. the income from sales of ornaments, video tapes, books, and other published materials about the white hosue is used to fund the purchase of historical furnishings and art works which become a part of the permanent white house collection. further information about the association's publications is available at either the association's offce or by mail. about president millard fillmore [from: enclosed brochure] millard fillmore is the least celebrated of all presidents. more often than not, is is rememebred with a smile. journalist h.l. menkin claimed that fillmore's greatness lay in his installing the first bathtub in the white house, and in truth, the thirteenth president is perhaps remembered more in our time for menkin's spoof than anything else. the name itself has a pomous, old fashioned sound to the modern ear. nor was the man in appearance george washington or abe or teddy. his full-length portrait by george p.a. healy hanging in the white house shows a heavy-set, dignified, silver-haired man in middle age, looking penseively out a window over the city of washington to some distant horizon. in designing the 1996 christmas ornament, the white house historical association has takena a closer look at fillmore and has found an interesting and able man in a time of relative calm. we owe our capital dome to him. he was not a bad politician. he had an immovably strong sense of ethics. «this president of ours», wrote his attorney general after three years, «is a very remarkable man». when fillmore moved to the white house, the columns were still wrapped in black crepe for president zacahry taylor, who had died july 9, 1850. fillmore had been the vice president. when word came that the president was dead, the chief justice administered the oath of office to the new president in the senate chamber, amid confusion, upset, and a pervasive odor from the gas lamps. taylor's funeral had been over about a week when fillmore and his wife abigail powers fillmore decided not to move to the white house before cooler weather. yet the president set up office on the second-floor. after the requisite thirty days' mourning, he ordered the black crepe pulled down inside and out. millard and abigail were both natives of upstate new york. she, a year older than he, had been his teacher in school, and a thirst for knowledge drew them together. after a long courtship they married and settled in east aurora, new york, where he opened a law practice and she returned to her beloved teaching. they occupied a cottage filled with books, which they both collected, and his ever growing collection of maps, an interest that dated from his boyhood years as a chain man on a survey crew. two children were born to them. millard powers and mary abigail. fillmore's entry into politics was at the beginning of the jacksonian period, when a large number of small, special interest parties sprang up, including the anti-masonic party, which he joined and which sent him to the new york assembly. among his achievements in the assembly was to sponsor a bill that ended imprisonment for debt in new york. in 1832, during the presidency of andrew jackson, fillmore was elected as a whig to teh united states house of representatives. he served an actrive decade as a lawmarker, ever courting national politics, while he built a strong base in his home state. during this time he moved to buffalo, where he made his home for the rest of his life. an unsuccessful bid for the vice presidency in 1844, in the election that took james k. polk to the white house, sent fillmore back to new york state. called to the whig convention in philadelphia in 1848 he was offered the vice presidency on the ticket with general zachary taylor. taylor being home at his plantation in louisiana, and that being before the days of campaigning on one's own behalf, fillmore had no occasion to meet general taylor until after the election victory, when the two arrived in washington. taylor's death came as a great shock nationwide. fillmore took office, an obscure man compared to the hero of the mexican war; he was better known among politicians than the general citizenry. he had a strong cabinet notably daniel webster, his secretary of state. the mantle of the presidency nevertheless fell upon him at a very tense time in american history. sectional differences centered in the expansion of slavery had inflamed the opposing factions in the congress. an aged henry henry clay, with an ardent group of younger men, was pulling toegther his last and grandest compromise, hoping to stave off the civil war be believed would come. president taylor had opposed the compromise plan, influenced considerably by william h. seward, an anti-slavery man from upstate new york and a longtime rival and enemy of fillmore. clay suddenly had a friend in the white house. the new president gave full support to the compromise effort. wrote an angry seward, «the government is in the hands of mr. webster, and mr. clay is its organ in congress». the compromise, a series of bills under one heading, known at first as clay's carry-all or «omnibus» bill (after the horsedrawn city busses of washington) began to unfold in the first months of fillmore's presidency. while the general bill was stopped, its parts began to pass one by one, in a context of furious debate. clay's drama and eloquence carried the day. the msot important results were achieved by the end of september, in what history knows as the compromise of 1850. a major achievement thus came early to fillmore's administration. it was the talk of the day when the president and his wife moved to the white house october 1. during the several months they remained at the hotel, they made changes in the residence. a library was built in the upstairs oval room, furnished with custom-made bookcases that ringed the curving walls. this room now boasted a suite of neat, small-scale walnut furniture that expressed the first lady's delight in the new «cottage» style espused by the landscape architect andrew jackson downing, an acquaintance from new york state. abigail fillmore used her influence with visiting congressmen and senators to get funding for books. she and the president made a list of some five hundred titles and mixed their own books in as well. they took carriage drives in the cool of evening around washington and loved the city. the grand 18th century plan was as yet unfullfiled, with broad expanses of high grass, watery marshes, and whole streets of vacant lots. at that time also, discussions were being made about enlarging the capitol, by now, thirty years after its completion, too small. the historic capitol, with its associations with washington and jefferson, was being subjected to remodeling plans that alarmed fillmore. the fillmore soon made their marks on the city. fillmore invited the celebrated philadelphia architect thomas u. walter to washington to take control of rthe capitol project. pouring over the rolls of drawing through the months of 1851, the architect came up with a plan that pleased the president: wings were added to the old capitol, with only small connectors that barely altered the existing building at all: to rstore the veritcal quality of the building, which, with the wings, would become wide and horizontal, a giant dome would be built, not of masonry, but of light cast-iron, so as not to weigh down too heavily upon the old walls that must support it. for developing a landscape design for the city, mrs. fillmore received the celebrated landscape designer and author, andrew jackson downing , at the white house. every inch the artiste, downing demanded his own terms, even down to the fancy, if obscure title «rural architect», to which the president accdnted, doubtless thinking it harmless. nor did the rural architect waste a second. within a month he was unrolling drawings of his own. fillmore, the former surveyor, could be a formidable critic, follwing this line and that, questioning porportion, practicality. downing envisionwed major change. forests were to be planted over the mall, with curving drives through them, illuminated at night by soft gas light. l'enfant's vistas were to be closed—too stiff and formal, too old-fashioned. the capital city was to be an arboretum of native american trees. the president's hand was seen in other areas. not three weeks after taking office, he sketched out his idea for a new presidental seal. the seal was impressed into hot wax as a means of embellishing and endorsing official presidential papers, and there had been presidential seals from time to time since washington's fillmore sent his sketch to edward stabler in sandy springs, maryland, a seal-maker and engraver odf reputation. stabler engraved an improved version of fillmore's design on a «hard composition of metal known as bell metal». the president approved, and stabler began producing the seals at $20 each. it is this seal, differing from today's that is the feature of the 1996 white house christmas ornament that honors the administration of millard fillmore. the president was a nationalist in every sense. when commodore matthew c. perry wrote the secretary of the navy suggesting an expedition to japan—which stood beyond a bamboo curtain—and the subject came up at a cabinet meeting, the president was enthusiastic. he summoned perry to the white house and convinced him to lead the expedition. the two become close friends, spending long hours over the globe in the white house library imagining the possibilities of opening up trade with japan. meanwhile, in shipyards at annapolis and baltimore, maryland, the work of preparation was underway. when the ships left in november 1852, led by the commodore's flagship mississippi, president fillmore was there, all cheers, even though he knew it would be his successor who would welcome perry back home. mourning black eventually returned. there was no mourning hung up for downing, who was killed in steamboat explosion in 1852, but he was sorely missed and the fillmores contributed to his memorial. even though work on the mall and the grounds inside and south of the white house enclosure had already started, and the landscaping of lafayette park, was hurried along for the arrival fo the equistrian statue of andrew jackson. downing's creative leadership and planning were lost forever. in the unhappy summer of 1852, when fillmore was denied renomination by the wwhigs, he had occasion to write this memorandum to his cabinet in june: «the tolling of bells announces the death of henry clay...» clay had lay dying for months. at the white house the chandeliers and mirrors were wrapped in black crepe and the sutters pulled shit. no sooner had this been removed in the fall than dnaiel webster died, and the steward and his staff upacked the crepe once more. march 3, 1853, the house was once more in mourning, for the only son of the president-elect, franklin pierce, who, with his wife jane means appleton pierce, were entertained in the gloom on the night before his inauguration. the dinner was remembered for its long silences. the next day millard and abigail moved to the willard hotel, where she, chilled in teh open air at pierce's inauguration, fell ill and after suffering for three weeks, died in their hotel room march 30. fillmore returned to buffalo. a year after his wife's death, his daughter died at 22, a loss that, on the heels of his wife's passing, proved almost too much for him. at first there were journeys to fill his time and divert his grief. he visited the south; saw the midwest, and considered a tour overland to california by stage. back home for a while, he became restless and set sail for europe, where he traveled for over a year, sometimes in company with former president martin van buren, then resident in england. the two were presented together before parliament. queen victoria received them often, and they toured extensively the houses and ghardens of the english copuntryside. while in europe, fillmore was advised that he had been nominated by president by a new party, the know-nothings, a nativist party determined to purify an ailing nation. shades of the antri-masons and the others of andrew jackson's time. fillmore willingly accepted and sailed back to america. he ran an emotional campaign, but lostr. back in buffalo, he determined not to court national politics again, but to devote his energies to local matters. in 1858, he married a rich widow, caroline carmichael mcintosh of albany. they purchased a gothic style mansion in buffalo, where fillmore spent the balance of his life until his death in 1874. here he received lincoln, on lincoln's election in 1860, and here he refused, even over the threats of the mob, to hang black mourning for lincoln's death in 1865, believing it inappropriate for a retired president. he had already had his share of black crepe. the seal designed by fillmore, with its thirty-one stars, is shown on the white house christmas ornament juxtaposed over the north prtico of the white house. the mansion president to filllmore in 1850, when he took office, is exactly the same image that greets us today from pennsylkvania avenue. ~ william seale maker's and/or other marks the is alot of information that comes with this. (see last image.) the front has the fillmore presidental seal the seal of the president of the united states the front is otherwised engraved with the white house christmas 1996 the reverse is engraved ©1996 whha made in usa the original seal of millard fillmore 1850-1853 dimensions from the top of the metal look for the ribbon to hang the ornament to the bottom of the lowest part of the scroll a the base of the ornament is 3". condition i can find no issues. it is new in box. the fine print the images serve as the majority of the listing description, so take a look at them closely. shipping costs have really increased—this is calculated into the buy-it-now price. i really add a large amount of packaging to protect what i ship, so that will inherently add alot of weight already. and shipping prices increase greatly with minor increments in weight. i am not able to sell individual items from items i have listed as a group. i just don't have the stamina to create new listings for those. i apologize for that. i haven't initially individually listed items because i don't have enough listing slots to so. trying to downsize some, though extremely melancholically. shipping time: i otherwise work more than full time and my health isn't great, so kindly excuse the longer handling time. if i am able to ship sooner, i absolutely will do that. i appreciate you taking the time to view my listing.

Price: 35 USD

Location: Atlanta, Georgia

End Time: 2025-01-16T22:34:11.000Z

Shipping Cost: 0 USD