Surprising facts about the vice president's official residence, where Kamala Harris and Doug Emhoff live

Established in 1830, the US Naval Observatory is one of the oldest scientific agencies in the US where scientists collect astronomical data for accurate navigation, according to the official website of the Commander, Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command.

The movements of planets and stars are used to accurately provide positioning, navigation, and timing for the Navy and Department of Defense.

The home features six bedrooms, a dining room, a garden room, a study, and an attic.

Vice presidents used to live in their own homes until Congress devoted funds to refurbishing the home for vice presidential use in 1974, according to the White House.

President Gerald Ford's vice president, Nelson Rockefeller, hosted events at the home but didn't live there.

In 1977, Vice President Walter Mondale, who served under President Jimmy Carter, became the first vice president to live in the residence full-time.

Eleanor Mondale wrote in a 1998 issue of Swing magazine that the Secret Service was less than pleased when they found out she had reported a ghost sighting, not an actual intruder.

"I was so scared, I fainted," she wrote, according to Deseret News. "Upon coming to, I phoned the Secret Service Command Post. I whispered that there was a man in my room and hung up. Minutes later, two agents busted into the room, guns drawn. When I told them the 'man' was actually a ghost, they requested that I NEVER DO THAT AGAIN!"

Money for maintaining the home, as well as for additions or renovations, comes from private funds or donations to the Vice President's Residence Foundation, which was founded in 1991.

They enlisted interior designer Frank Babb Randolph to help with the transformation, The Washington Post reported.

President George H.W. Bush installed a quarter-mile jogging track at the residence, and he liked it so much that he continued running there even after he became president.

Biden told reporters in 2010 that "no one can say a negative thing about Dan Quayle" because he added the pool to the vice president's residence, USA Today reported.

"He's my favorite vice president," Biden said. "And my granddaughters love it."

The commemorative plaque reads "Joe loves Jill. Valentine's Day 2010."

The garden also features a bronze sculpture of the Bidens' dog Champ, who died at age 13.

"I love to go in that room and sit on the couch and grade papers or have meetings," Jill Biden told The Washington Post in 2017. "Often, they put a round table in there and we would have dinner or lunch."

Karen Pence previously kept bees at the Indiana governor's residence, unveiling a hive there in 2014. The hive she added to the vice presidential residence in 2017 held 20,000 bees.

"All types of pollinators, such as bees, butterflies, birds, and bats, are critical to providing our nation's food, fiber, fuel, and medicine," Pence said at the unveiling.

When loud blasts and construction noises were heard at Number One Observatory Circle in 2002, neighbors complained and received letters that read, "Due to its sensitive nature in support of national security and homeland defense, project specific information is classified and cannot be released."

The letter sparked rumors that a secure bunker was being built after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

A spokesperson for the US Navy told the BBC in 2002 that the construction was "an infrastructure and utility upgrade."

Newsweek's Eleanor Clift reported in 2009 that Biden revealed the existence of the bunker at an annual Gridiron Club dinner, but Biden's spokeswoman told Fox News that his comments were not reported accurately.

"What the vice president described in his comments was not — as some press reports have suggested — an underground facility, but rather, an upstairs workspace in the residence, which he understood was frequently used by Vice President Cheney and his aides," the spokeswoman said. "That workspace was converted into an upstairs guestroom when the Bidens moved into the residence. There was no disclosure of classified information."

Presidents can't just walk out of the White House whenever they want. At One Observatory Circle, though, vice presidents have more space and privacy to live normal lives.

At a CNN town hall in 2021, Biden likened the White House to a "gilded cage."

"The vice president's residence was totally different," he said. "You're on 80 acres, overlooking the rest of the city. And you can walk out, and there's a swimming pool. You can walk off a porch in the summer and jump in a pool, and go into work. You can ride a bicycle around and never leave the property and work out. But the White House is very different."

In November 2021, the second couple put a white mezuzah — a small scroll of Hebrew text from the Torah in a decorative case — on the right side of the doorway of their residence.

When they affixed the object, which marks the space as sacred and holy, Emhoff's parents came to the ceremony, Harris told Vanity Fair.

"My mother-in-law, Barbara, is very pleased and proud of her son," she said.