Washington, DC — While taking a break after his appearances at Wolf Trap and wandering through the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, Garrison Keillor was approached by two visitors who were in DC celebrating the 100th anniversary of the visit of the creator of the international auxilary language Esperanto: Dr. L. L. Zamenhof was the distinguished guest at the World Esperanto Congress in 1910.

In memory of that event, Esperanto-USA chose Bethesda for this year’s annual meeting. Mary Hammersmith and Ellen Eddy were pleasantly surprised that Keillor knew about Esperanto, but he didn’t believe that any living person spoke it. They suggested that he mention on the next episode of Prairie Home Companion that he’d actually heard the language spoken and can now attest to the fact that it’s still alive. (Apparently there are no Esperanto speakers in Lake Wobegon). Washington is full of pleasant surprises and famous people.