A new Legislature took office Monday, including 25 rookie Assembly members.
They will need months to learn exactly how things get done in the Capitol, but in just five minutes, we can give them a few fun facts that some of their longtime colleagues may not even know about their new workplace.
Terry Cook, a supervisor at the California State Capitol Museum, helped us round up this list. The museum also offers individual tours to any new legislator. Of course, that tour will likely highlight the importance of preserving the Capitol Museum budget.
Here's the fun stuff:
• The historic old governor's office – not the place where Arnold Schwarzenegger works – has a tiny Medfly painted among the flowers on the office ceiling, a reminder of the 1970s when the building was renovated. Today, a cheeky artist could paint in a West Nile mosquito or that other state pest, the multibillion-dollar deficit.
• High up amid the plasterwork in the Assembly and Senate chambers are hidden a pair of gargoyles who appear to be poking their tongues out in the direction of the two houses' leaders.
• Also in the chambers, legislators can find the antique walnut desks where they will sit. Those were crafted by John Breuner when the Capitol opened in 1869. Today's legislators have laptops instead of ink pots on their desks.
Breuner, by the way, got his start in 1849 making cradles – for gold mining, not babies. Breuner's company declared bankruptcy 155 years later.
• There are 58 counties in California, and there are an equal number of display cases in the Capitol where you can learn a lot about each one. About half the counties (27) feature grapes and wine in their displays.
This doesn't even count two counties that we know make wine, Sacramento (which has the moon in its display case!) and Marin.
Legislators don't need to worry about this because lobbyists take care of wining and dining, and constituents take care of whining.
• Grapes (and wheat) are featured in the Great Seal of the State of California, but not in the lighted stained-glass version of the seal on the ceiling outside the offices of the speaker of the Assembly and the Senate president pro tem.
The fixtures do, however, show 31 stars on the seal. This has nothing to do with Baskin-Robbins. California was the 31st state admitted to the union.
More information is at www.capitolmuseum.ca.gov, where you can take a virtual tour of the building, or get information on hours and public tours. You can also call the museum at (916) 324-0333.
Call The Bee's Carlos Alcalá, (916) 321-1987.
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