//
Photo: Rfinkels, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
First opened in 1835, many Presidents have come to see performances, with many famous performers back in is heyday. National Theatre is now the city's most likely host for Broadway shows and musicals, and other big-name visiting acts.
National Theatre is a public theatre in downtown Washington, D.C., just east of the White House. The theatre functions as a venue for live stage productions and has a seating capacity of 1,676. Despite its name, it is not a government-funded national theatre, and instead operates as a private, non-profit organization.
© OpenStreetMap contributors
Named in honor of Martin Luther King Jr, who penned his I have a Dream speech at the Willard Hotel on this plaza, the stone center has a huge map of Pierre L'Enfant's original plan for the City of Washington. At the west end is an equestrian statue of Kazimierz Pułaski, an American Revolutionary War general from Poland, who once saved George Washington's life, and who is known as the Father of American cavalry.
The Warner Theatre is a gorgeous old building. A former 1920s movie palace, having long languished in disrepair, was finally reopened in 1992 following extensive restoration. The Warner Theatre hosts Broadway shows, concerts, dance, and stand-up, etc.
It's not clear whether the small-government Republican would enjoy having one of the biggest, most expensive recent federal buildings ($768 million), filled with agencies like USAID and U.S. Customs, named in his honor. But it is an impressive sight inside and out (especially inside). The building has several restaurants fast-food and otherwise, public artworks, shops, and enormous conference and party space, popular for political galas, business conferences, and expensive wedding receptions. Free WiFi.
At the top of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel Washington DC. One of the best views of the city.
A great museum detailing the life of Abraham Lincoln and the place where he was assassinated.
Petersen House
1865 was perhaps the most consequential year in presidential history, when, on the 14th of April, John Wilkes Booth, a prominent actor at Ford's Theatre and Confederate sympathizer shot President Lincoln in his balcony seat. Attendants carried Lincoln across the street to a small bedroom in the small row-house across the street, but the doctors were unable to save the president. He died early morning the next day. This isn't so much a museum—it's just a small room with a few plaques, recreated to look as it did on that day. The house is operated by the National Park Service, and visited via tours from Ford's Theatre.