Ah, yes. The hallways are buzzing once again under the Golden Dome. Suddenly, each and every January the Statehouse halls fill with traffic and buzz and gobs of chat. Yet the present tense is only warmed and enhanced by the past-tense feeling provided by the magnificent reminders of yesterdays long gone.

Thank you, Governor Edward Curtis Smith (1898-1900), who also served in the United States Senate. Excellent railroad connections had he.

The son of Governor J. Gregory Smith, nephew of Congressman Worthington Smith, and grandson of Congressman John Smith, he graduated from Yale in 1875, studied law at Columbia University, and became an attorney in St Albans. He succeeded his father as President of the Central Vermont Railroad, was President of Welden National Bank, and was a founder of People's Trust Bank of St. Albans and New York City's Sherman National Bank.  More here.

And with Gov. Smith are distinguished daily lobbyists of the present Legislature: Rebecca McCarty and Gerry Morris, aka "Morris the Cat", of Morris Demag McCarty, Inc. More here.