You're listening to an I-Heart podcast.

In the big rock candy mountains, the jails are made of tin, and you can walk right out again as soon as you are in.

There ain't no short-handle shovels, no axes, saws or picks.

I'm a going to stay where you sleep all day, where they hung the Turk that invented work

in the big rock candy mountains.

This is our American stories, and now Jesse Edwards brings us the story of a desk, unlike

any story of a desk that you've ever heard before.

August 24th, 1814 marks one of the darkest episodes in the war of 1812.

On that day, British troops marched on Washington, burning public buildings, including the U.S. Capitol.

Among the losses in the Capitol were the Senate chamber in all its contents.

Reconstruction took until 1819, and when senators again took their seats in the rebuilt chamber,

they occupied 48 new desks and chairs custom made by Thomas Constantine, a New York cabinet maker.

Constantine was paid $34 for each Senate desk and 46 for each chair.

Today, all of Constantine's desks remain in use in the current Senate Chamber, although his chairs have been replaced.

As new states entered the Union,

desks of similar design were ordered from other captain makers, although the four newest desks,

those constructed for Alaska and Hawaii, were built in the Senate Cabinet Shop.

There are noticeable differences in shape and dimension among the 100 desks. These result from the original

semicircular arrangement in the old Senate chamber. A desk's shape reflected its position in the room.

Ailed desks were narrow and angled, while the center was wider and square. If the oldest were

arranged in the original layout, it is believed they would have formed

a perfect semicircle.

...