Lucky Ones Will Soon Clutch Coveted Tickets

As a teenager, Katie K. Davenport washed dishes in the basement of a whites-only restaurant in downtown Baltimore, where as an African American she did not venture to the world upstairs.

The work was hard, and it wrecked her hands, and in those times, she said, "You knew, as a black person, where you went and where you didn't go."

On Jan. 20, Davenport, now 57, plans to go to the foot of the U.S. Capitol to be admitted to exclusive and majestic confines for the swearing-in of the country's first African American president. She is one of the members of the general public being allocated a ticket to the historic ceremony, now a little over a week away.

For the former dishwasher, and millions of others, it will be the moment of a lifetime, an event few thought could ever happen: a black man, against the white stone edifice that slaves helped build, pledging to lead the nation, with the help of God.

Davenport said she will bring her ticket, a camera and her prayers.

Tomorrow, with the inauguration fast approaching, the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies will start handing over the color-coded free tickets to members of Congress and the Presidential Inaugural Committee for distribution this week.

The handover climaxes months of ticket madness that started even before the jubilation surrounding Barack Obama's election. Tens of thousands of people, who were told that Congress would allocate tickets, deluged legislators with requests.

Many, like Davenport, wound up eligible for lotteries or got on waiting lists.

The Internet lit up with ticket offers, although no tickets were available. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) sought to block online sales of the tickets, and eBay, the online auction site, said it would comply.

In the end, a little less than half of the 240,000 tickets were allotted to the Presidential Inaugural Committee, for staff and campaign workers, and to many other VIPs and dignitaries, officials said.

The remainder, about 125,000, went to Congress: 198 to each member of the House and 393 to each member of the Senate. Many of those tickets had to go to state dignitaries, local officials or community individuals deserving of an honor, legislators' offices said.

Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), for one, had just 75 tickets left for the general public, a spokesman said, although that number might grow if others decline their tickets.