On Tuesday March 4, 2025, the English 3 and U.S.History classes took a trip together to The Old State House museum in Hartford, CT to learn about the history of voting rights.
Two tour guides led us through the Senate Chamber, featuring a famous portrait of George Washington, the Hall of Representatives, and the famous courtroom where the Amistad Trial took place.
While touring the building and learning about how different groups’ voting rights changed throughout history, students were asked to think about whether or not 16/17 year olds should be allowed to vote.
Jordyn Rock explains, “I think they shouldn’t be able to vote because they play around too much and might pick something as a joke or have false knowledge about who’s running for president.”
However, some students, like Jamie Vargas believe 16/17 year olds should be able to vote, “I thought that 16/17 year olds should be able to vote because I think that a lot of them have strong opinions on this.”
When asked about something memorable, Jamie said “The speaker said some things about how people older than 40 are still able to vote even though some are not educated well.”
He explains, “This was a counterclaim response to someone saying that 16/17 year olds should not vote because they are uneducated or have less experience. Leading to a discussion about how before voting they should have a maturity test done. I thought that was very interesting.”
Inside the Hall of Representatives, students sat in the seats and at the desks of former officials and we were able to see artifacts such as PT Barnum’s hat and cane.
Javen Scott said “It was very cool seeing and thinking that someone who was important was sitting where I was but a very long time ago.” He adds that something memorable is wearing PT Barnum’s hat, and he recommends others visit the Old State House as well.
Just outside of the Hall of Representatives we learned about The Statue of Justice that stood atop the building for 149 years before being brought inside where it now stands at the top of the stairs in The Great Hall.
Everyone was fascinated by the Museum of Curiosities. It displays many strange and unusual animal artifacts such as a two headed cow, a two headed pig fermenting in a jar, and other interesting hunting trophies of preserved animals in addition to artwork.
In the end, we took a quick food trip to McDonalds for lunch where everyone was discussing how cool it was to sit in real furniture instead of a fake replica. Overall this trip was a good learning experience.
