Button Gwinnett (robot)

Button Gwinnett is a protectron robot who, for lack of any other authority, runs the National Archives in 2277. Due to a memory malfunction, he believes himself to be the real Button Gwinnett.

Background
The powdered wig, the blue coat, the metal mandible appendages- this must be Button Gwinnett, second governor of Georgia! Look closely, and you may spot some tiny discrepancies in this fellow: the pulsing brain module, the clanking sound Button makes, and the fact that this is actually a protectron!

Relationships
Button is the leader of the security robots in the National Archives basement levels.

Quests

 * Stealing Independence: Button Gwinnett has total control over all the robots in the National Archives and addresses them with motivational messages as the player progresses through the basement levels and gets closer to his quarters. When initiating dialogue with him, he will call you a redcoat, and claim that they are surrounded by redcoats. For details on how to deal with him, please refer to the quest article.

Bugs

 * Telling Button to "Relinquish his post", or "Do whatever you want" and if you have Sergeant RL-3 as a companion, RL-3 will shut down with the rest of the robots in the archives.

Appearances
Button Gwinnett only appears in Fallout 3.

Behind the scenes
Whilst the protectron identified as Jefferson is offline for maintenance (due to someone replacing its voice software with a radio broadcast as described in the maintenance logs), the personality can be transferred over to the backup. If activated, it will wander around and start broadcasting Galaxy News Radio, though it cannot be interacted with. The broadcast is due to a pre-war prank mentioned on some of the terminals in the building, which included swapping the voice software of the Protectron with a radio uplink and frequency scanning software. The recall signal does not function, but activating the Shutdown causes it to explode.

Unusually, the activation of this robot doesn't seem to bother Gwinnett and doesn't open any additional dialogue options. Considering the admiration Gwinnett holds for Jefferson, the designers likely intended the robot to serve as an alternative solution for convincing Gwinnett into handing over the declaration; obviously, it was never fully implemented.


 * The maintenance terminal near button's pod mentions previous problems with memory malfunctions, referred to as memory leaks. This causes his tour guide and reenactment subroutines to meld together and caused him to believe he is the real, human, Button Gwinnet who lives in the late 1700's. If you try to tell him it is 2277 and that he is a robot, he will adamantly deny it and get somewhat frustrated with the PC. Additionaly, if you choose to help him make a copy of the declaration of independence and got to Arlington Library to retrieve ink, the directions he will give you if asked are completely irrelevant, citing nonexistent landmarks such as a bell-tower and a fish market (most likely because his reenactment software included going to Arlington)