A few years ago, when I was moving from Austin to Washington, DC, I wanted to come up with a route that would not go through Tennessee (state capitol shown right). I had driven all the way through the state several times and had no desire to do so again.

Around the same time, I had taken up photography. I didn't know yet in which direction that hobby would lead me. Shortly before I moved from Austin, I visited my brother in Baton Rouge. Practicing my skills, I photographed the sights of the city, which consisted solely of the state capitol, a monument to Huey Long's massive ego. When I picked up my slides and discovered the photograph below, depicting a statue of Long gazing lovingly at his creation, I had an inspiration: I would attempt to photograph as many state capitol buildings as I could on my way from Austin to DC.

I photographed ten capitols on that most convoluted of trips, driving all the way up to Minnesota before veering back southeast to DC. And with those capitols visited I decided that I would photograph each state capitol building.

Eventually, since visiting 50 state capitols wasn't enough of a challenge, I added the ten Canadian provincial legislative buildings (Canadians don't call them capitol buildings) to the list. As of today, I have visited and photographed 49 state capitols (all but Alaska!) and six provincial legislative buildings. I even managed to visit an Australian state parliament building while Down Under. Just follow the links one the left to view my photographs of these buildings.