Presidential vacations: Before there was Camp David, there was Camp Hoover

Crickets are chirping in Washington during August’s annual summer exodus. Supreme Court justices have scattered, offices are empty on Capitol Hill, and President Trump has vacated to both his New Jersey luxury golf resort and his Trump Tower penthouse. It was never expected he’d spend this month at Camp David, a place he once called interesting for “about 30 minutes.”

Every president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt has visited the presidential retreat tucked away on Maryland’s Catoctin Mountain. Yet 13 years before Camp David was created, another presidential property was built in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.