Skip to content
RollCall logo

Heard on the Hill

Photos of the day: One year since the first mask sighting

By Tom Williams and Bill Clark
Posted March 9, 2021 at 2:09pm
One year ago on Monday, March 9, 2020. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

March 9, 2020, was the first day CQ Roll Call photojournalists captured images of a thing that has become salient in daily life — masks. Tourists one year ago arrived at the Capitol for a tour and were seen wearing masts in the above image in the Capitol Rotunda just days before states and municipalities began locking down due to the coronavirus.

Nearly one year later, National Guardsmen are some of the only people aside from members, reporters and staff who get to take in the beauty of the Rotunda and sit underneath the large painting of our country’s forefathers.

Below, three military personnel take a break in February from their duties guarding the Capitol after the Jan. 6 attack on the building. Troops remain deployed to this day.

New York National Guard troops hang out under a painting of the Declaration of Independence by John Trumbull in the Capitol Rotunda on the third day of the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump on Feb. 11, 2021. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

Another image from March 9, 2020, shows the tourists in masks from another angle of the Rotunda.

(Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

Our photojournalists once again captured troops in that same spot, this time from January 2021.

Jan. 25, 2021 (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

[jwp-video n=”1″]

Recent Stories

Senate Majority Leader John Thune talks with reporters on Monday.

Major spending package planned for Senate floor faces doubts

A mid-decade redistricting effort in Indiana that could target Democratic Rep. Frank J. Mrvan has hit a roadblock in the state Senate.

Republican efforts to redraw Indiana’s congressional map stall again

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., was among the Democrats who forged a deal to re-open the government.

In shutdown deal, bipartisan legislating trumped party unity

A chair with a “broken” sign sits in a hallway in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Oct. 30. As the federal government emerges from a shutdown, members of Congress have some thoughts on lessons learned.

After a shutdown, no ‘A’s for effort

The Capitol dome is lit on Wednesday night as the House prepared to pass the funding bill to end the partial government shutdown. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

Photos of the week | November 7-13, 2025

A worker stocks Angus beef top-sirloin filets in the meat section of a grocery store in Washington.

US drops reciprocal tariff on Argentine beef, plans to boost quota