The Top 10 visits by Queen Elizabeth II to America

Queen Elizabeth II visited New York last week for a brief stop. It was her first trip to the Big Apple in three decades and her first trip stateside in three years. The 84-year-old British monarch has made numerous trips over the years to her nation’s most famed former colony. We list the top 10 trips.

• 2010 — July 6th — Back in the Big Apple after 34 years. In a brief six-hour stopover, Queen Elizabeth II lays a wreath at Ground Zero and visits the United Nations.
• 2007 — “You helped our nation celebrate its bicentennial in 177 — uh, in 1976,” says President Bush at the White House. He then gives the Queen a friendly wink.
• 1991 — Washington, D.C., resident Alice Frazier, 67, breaks centuries of protocol when she gives the English monarch a big hug. 
• 1986 — Searching for a horse to win the English Derby, Her Majesty checks out Will and Sarah Farish’s ranch in Kentucky, where she houses two mares. 
• 1984 — The Queen inspects some of America’s top thoroughbreds during a Kentucky vacation.
• 1983 — Tea at the ranch with the Reagans on the West Coast. The royal couple then hosts a surprise party on their 412-foot yacht in honor of the Reagans’ 31st wedding anniversary.
• 1976 — At the state dinner with President Gerald Ford, the Marine Band strikes up “The Lady is a Tramp,” just as Her Royal Highness takes the dance floor.
• 1959 — Takes the royal yacht Britannia to Chicago to commemorate the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway. 
• 1957 — The Queen’s first state visit to the U.S. She takes in a Terps football game at Byrd Stadium.
• 1951 — Not yet Queen, the young Princess Elizabeth, with Prince Philip in tow, drop by Washington, D.C., as guests of President Harry Truman.

— Complied by John Haydon

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