'America has kept her word..... Now I have hope in America'

(This article is part of President Obama: A Commemorative Section of the Winston-Salem Journal)

WASHINGTON

Tuesday was Barack Obama's day, and it was theirs, too: the people who elected him -- who had waited for hours, days, years, generations to take their spot on a cold morning to witness the swearing-in of the nation's first black president.

And when Barack Hussein Obama took the oath of office at 12:06 p.m., standing alongside his wife and two young daughters and placing his hand on the Lincoln Bible, the assembled throngs erupted in a prolonged, unfettered celebration that echoed off the marble walls of the Capitol and the grand monuments and memorials that stand sentry on America's front lawn.

"On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over the politics of discord," Obama said in his inaugural address. " ... The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit, to choose our better history."

All morning, the sun's rising glow illuminated a mass of humanity -- a singing, shivering and at times solemn sea of people wrapped in layers head to toe, determined to claim a piece of history. Crowds poured through security checkpoints to lay down sleeping bags and blankets, huddling together in fur coats and down parkas, standing shoulder to shoulder and assuring each other that just being present was more important than having a great view.

The waves of people began to make their way while skies were still dark, creating a singular rush hour whose commuting crowds shared a common destination: hundreds of thousands of people filling the grass all the way to the Washington Monument, then stretching further west to the Lincoln Memorial, the landmarks that draw a line back to Obama's predecessors.

About 300,000 small American flags distributed by Boy Scout and Girl Scout troops, rose above countless wool stocking caps to create a sea of red, white and blue. It did not matter that most people had no ticket and watched Obama recite the 37-word oath of office on a Jumbotron. It was enough to simply be on or close to the Mall on this day, no matter how difficult it was to get here. They endured crowded commutes on the subway, uncomfortable bus rides from the hinterlands, endless campaign days of walking door to door, generational struggles for acceptance and equality.

Once the oath was uttered, Patricia Washington-McGraw, 71, stood and slowly turned around, her arms in the air, one of them holding her cane. "Oh, my God," she yelled over and over, sobbing at the same time. "We are in heaven, and I lived to see the day."

Washington-McGraw, who is black, said she grew up in Little Rock, and now lives across the street from its Central High School, a legendary front in the civil-rights battle.

"The things that I have cried about all my life are no more," she said. "America has kept her word to those who had no hope. Now I have hope for America."

At the Capital City Brewing Co. along the parade route on Pennsylvania Avenue NW, hundreds packed around the circular bar to see Obama become the leader of the free world. Strangers in big bulky coats hugged.

Tears wet the cheeks of a black man with gray hair, a young white woman whose hands shook as she reached for a friend, and a waiter who stood outside the open kitchen awaiting his food pickup.

In the hours before the ceremony, the mood was overwhelmingly -- but not uniformly -- festive: for every mass of revelers chanting "Yes We Can!" or "O-ba-ma!" there was a parent quietly teaching a child, or a grown son or daughter remembering those who are gone.

"This is an auspicious occasion, and I wanted my son to experience it. Plus, my father just passed away," said Erika Edwards, 40, who came to Washington just a day after her father's funeral with her son, 5-year-old Michael, in tow.

"He would want you to be here," said 39-year-old Caroline Jones of Philadelphia, a stranger until that moment.

Some in the crowd said they had been drawn to bear witness to other moments of recent history -- the inaugurations of former presidents George W. Bush or Bill Clinton, for example, or the lying in state of Ronald Reagan in 2004. But for many, many others -- black, white, Hispanic and Asian; old and young; immigrant and native born -- this moment resonated in a unique way.

Outside a checkpoint for ceremony ticket-holders at 5th and C streets NW, Irma Brown-Williams, 66, a retired high school teacher from Tuskegee, Ala., stood apart from about 300 revelers. She had pinned black-and-white photos of her mother, father and siblings, all deceased, to her ankle-length coat.

"I'm here for them," Brown-Williams said. "They could not be here, so I brought them with me."

Nearby, a small group of Howard University students started singing to pass the time. As the music eventually segued to the "Star-Spangled Banner" and the spiritual "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," others joined in, thrusting black, brown and white fists into the air.