People. Blankets, Frisbees, banners. Oversize green and blue balloons. Painted faces. Dozens of wooden stalls hosting environmental action groups and coalitions from all over the country. Over by the National Museum of the American Indian, a green-bearded Uncle Sam on ten-foot stilts marched about stiffly, chanting through a megaphone, “Washington hot air feeds global warming!” Nearby, a small fleet of solar-powered wheelchairs bumped silently over the grass, their riders passing out pamphlets made from recycled hemp. A flatbed truck had pulled up before sunrise in the area behind the Air and Space Museum, bearing a massive ice sculpture of the earth. The ice was now in the process of melting, the runoff collecting via aluminum troughs into cups and handed out to passersby. The main stage had been set up near the Smithsonian Castle, on the south side of the Mall. A pair of towers situated on either side of the stage held gigantic video screens that made the onstage activities visible from nearly every part of the north end of the Mall.
