Pennsylvania Avenue lighthearted celebrations, including a series of day- and nighttime Shriner's parades in the 1920s and 1930s. Thomas and Concepcion Picciotto are the founders of the White House Peace Vigil, the longest running anti-nuclear peace vigil in the US, at Lafayette Square on the 1600 block of Pennsylvania Avenue. After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, the Secret Service closed the portion of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House to all vehicular traffic. Pedestrian and bicycle traffic, however, was still permitted on the sidewalk. After 9/11 this policy was made permanent. Near the White House traffic is redirected to
The Avenue in the Rain The Avenue in the Rain The Avenue in the Rain is a 1917 oil painting by the American Impressionist painter Childe Hassam. It depicts Fifth Avenue in New York City in the rain, draped with US flags. The painting is one of six works by Hassam in the permanent art collection of the White House in Washington DC. Between 1916 and 1919, Hassam completed around 30 paintings of streets decorated with flags. This work dates to February 1917, shortly before the US joined the First World War, at a time when patriotic fervour was rising in the US. The previous