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Jefferson was not only a politician and writer, he was an inventor, a scientist, a linguist, a book collector. A self-taught architect, he started building Monticello when he was 26, on a 5,000 acre plot his father had given him. He planned, made blueprints, and
supervised building, even during his presidency. He wanted Monticello to be an “essay in architecture”. It was the first house in America to have an exterior dome. He added a special feature he had admired in France: indoor privies!
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Floor to ceiling triple hung windows were another French influence. Jefferson also had them double paned, flooding the room with sunlight while keeping out the Virginia winter chill. |
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Jefferson opposed slavery philosophically, yet was supported politically by many slave holding states. He struggled with the issue of emancipation. “The revolution in public opinion which this cause requires is not to be expected in a day, or perhaps in an age”. Jefferson owned hundreds of slaves, both as farm workers and household servants. At the time of his death, some slave families had lived and labored at Monticello for four generations. Historians agree that he fathered six children with slave Sally Hemmings. (Verified by 1998 DNA evidence)
Two died, two “ran away” and two were granted their freedom upon Jefferson’s death.
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Jefferson’s gardens were a carefully tended abundance of fruits and vegetables (peas were his favorite). The garden was both a botanic showpiece and a laboratory for useful plants and medicinal herbs. Friends sent him seed packets from around the world. He took meticulous notes on everything from the height of asparagus to number of seeds from sunflowers. Below the gardens is a vineyard – Monticello bottled both its own wine and ale. James Hemmings, Sally’s brother, was sent to France to train as a chef. According to Daniel Webster 1n 1824, “dinners were served in half Virginian, half French style in good taste and abundance.” |
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Because carrying ink pots was impractical, Jefferson would take notes while walking on this ivory pad in pencil, then wipe it off and reuse it. |
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The grand entry way with its soaring two stories was a place visitors might have to sit for hours after a long journey, waiting to speak to Jefferson. He made it intriguing, with maps and artifacts, clocks and an indoor mechanism to read the wind based on the weather vane on the roof. (Indoor photos courtesy of www.monticello.org, a wonderful detailed resource)
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Jefferson thought the polygraph, which would simultaneously copy writing, was the “finest invention of our age”. (He didn’t invent it, but suggested several refinements). It is one reason we know so much of Jefferson, because we have so many of his manuscripts and letters. |
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Seating room, with Jefferson-designed wine dumbwaiters, tucked into the side of the fireplace, to bring up bottles from the cellar below. JFK once said, when addressing a roomful of Nobel Prize winners in 1962, “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.” |
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