Image: National Portrait Gallery's "Great Hall"

Description: Once the largest room in America, the Great Hall was originally conceived to display miniature models required of inventors when the building housed the United States Patent Office. The space also served as the first national museum, and it was here that the Declaration of Independence was publically displayed between 1841 and 1871. The guests of Abraham Lincoln's second inaugural ball passed thru this room to join the receiving line in what is now called the Lincoln Gallery. Following a disastrous fire in 1877, which severely damaged other portions of the third floor of the building, this area was redone in the American Victorian Renaissance style to which it has now been restored.
Title: National Portrait Gallery's "Great Hall"
Credit: Flickr: National Portrait Gallery's "Great Hall"
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Permission: This image, which was originally posted to Flickr, was uploaded to Commons using Flickr upload bot on 23 December 2011, 16:29 by Doug Coldwell. On that date, it was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the license indicated. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license. You are free: to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work to remix – to adapt the work Under the following conditions: attribution – You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 CC BY 2.0 Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 truetrue
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