POTUS historical sites: November 2016

I did a post like this 4 years ago during the 2012 election. In 2012 I was lucky enough to see both major party candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney as well as Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan. This year I hoped to do the same. I've attended 4 campaign events 3 on the Republican side and 1 on the Democrat side. I've gotten to see both Donald Trump and Mike Pence on the Republican ticket. But unfortunately it seems that every time Hillary Clinton or her running mate Tim Kaine have passed through my area for one reason or the other I wasn't able to go. Even now the Saturday before the election I know that Hillary will be in Cleveland tomorrow. But because of work obligations I'm not able to go. If you've looked at Hillary Clinton's campaign schedule this year you might notice that she personally hasn't been out a whole lot. But she's had a lot of help. Among them both Barack and Michelle Obama have both been out campaigning for her as well as her daughter Chelsea. But when I saw that former President Bill Clinton was campaigning for her in Toledo I really wanted to attend that one. Living in a swing state of Ohio I'm surprised that I didn't take advantage of this along time ago. These rallies on both sides are pretty exciting events. They are truly, uniquely American experiences.

These first few pictures are from early last May leading up to the Indiana primary Donald Trump had a rally in Fort Wayne, Indiana. About two hours away from where I live. After church one Sunday my nephew and I headed over to Fort Wayne for our first campaign event of the season. The event was at the War Memorial Arena, which looked a lot like a hockey rink. The place was packed! We got relatively close but the bright lights and the poor quality pictures that my iPhone 5 made left me with some disappointing pictures from the event. This would lead me to want to attend another Trump event later on and hopefully getting better pictures with my newer phone.

We got a pretty good look at him as he walked towards us to start work in the crowd.

Fast forward to September 27. Just a couple days before I saw that Bill Clinton was going to be in Toledo, Ohio. Which is just a little bit over an hour away from where I live. Usually one of the big reasons to attend these events is to see the person who may become the next President. This was a win-win because Bill Clinton had already been President. I had seen Bill Clinton once before at my sisters 2007 Ohio State University graduation, he was the speaker. But he was a long ways away and I had no pictures from that time and so I jumped at the opportunity of seeing him in person, a little closer, maybe even get to take his hand. Luckily at the last minute I was able to get the day off of work. I decided to take my seven-year-old daughter Khloe with me to share the experience. But when she got sick I decided to take my five-year-old son Nicky with me instead. Doors open at 11 and we got there around 830. We found a few people standing by the door. We got up there and they confirmed that this is in fact the line to get in, making us about fifth and six in line. After the doors opened we got really close to the front. The event was at a small upstairs old high school gymnasium. I was very surprised that it wasn't bigger in a bigger place. Around noon the former President took the stage.

My son Nicky pics out his first button at a campaign event. I think he chose wisely.

Former President Clinton takes the stage

Nicky and I both got to shake Clintons hand as he walked along the crowd. But I was only able to snap some fuzzy pictures of him shaking Nick's hand.

It was a long wait for a five-year-old but it paid off

On October 7 Vice Presidential candidate Mike Pence also hit the Toledo area with only about one day notice. I was able to leave work a little early to get up there to attend. This event was in a community rec center gymnasium. About the same size as the Clinton event.

Congressman Jim Jordan. Before the redistricting after the 2010 senses Jim Jordan was my congressman

Congressman Bob Latta. He is my current congressmen and he introduced Governor Pence.

Mike Pence's daughter accompanying him on the campaign trail

Pence takes the stage

Secret Service rushed Governor Pence along the crowd as I got to shake his hand and tell him good luck as he said thank you and moved onto the next person before I could get a picture

Leading up to Saturday October 22 I was considering driving to Pittsburgh to attend a Hillary Clinton Tim Kaine rally. My biggest problem was that my car was being worked on and I didn't know if I would get it back in time. As it turned out I got my car back on Saturday morning. But not enough time to drive all the way to Pittsburgh for a 2:00 pm rally. I did however have enough time to drive to Cleveland for an evening rally. The rally started at 7 PM, doors opened at 4 PM, it was my goal to try to be there by noon in hopes of getting close enough for some good pictures. I talked with 2 of my nephews who wanted to go. And since my daughter Khloe had missed out on the Clinton rally, she came along to. We left home around 9 AM we filled up on food at a Chinese buffet and we ended up getting up there around 1 PM. They hadn't let anybody in the parking lot yet but we were about 10 cars back from the entrance. It sounded like they weren't going to let us into the parking lot until 4. But by around 145 the police made them open up the parking lot since it was becoming a traffic concern. While waiting in line I was approached by an MSNBC news crew who asked me a few questions. Nobody I know was watching MSNBC at the time and I can't find myself on YouTube, so it must not of been that interesting.

MSNBC cameraman showing Khloe their camera.

I was glad I got this nice picture of my nephews, daughter and I as we waited for the rally. As it turned out the creepy dude directly behind me was an anti-Trump protester and waited patiently until Trump was speaking and then proceeded to start yelling all kinds of obscenities at him and got himself kicked out.