Officers’ Club
19th Century Comes Alive on Capitol Hill
After Ken Burns’ PBS documentary “The Civil War” debuted in 1989, Civil War fever swept the country. These Americans went so far as to don realistic Union war uniforms to meet with lawmakers on Capitol Hill. This September 1990 photo shows (left to right) Civil War re-enactors Ted Ballard, Bruce Stocking and Ned Bedessem, who were portraying major, colonel and captain, respectively, of Company D of Delaware’s 1st Regiment. The late September D.C. temperature was 75 degrees, but it was probably pretty hot underneath the wool uniforms.