With the 282nd anniversary of the birth of Thomas Jefferson being celebrated April 13, it is time to recognize the third President of the United States for his brilliance, generosity, creativity, inventiveness, architectural ability and so much more.
In spite of his magnificence or his contributions to the world, for himself, Mr. Jefferson wrote the epitaph on his own tombstone;citing the only achievements he wanted to be remembered for:
Here is buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence, of the State of Virginia for religious freedom and the Father of the University of Virginia.
He never even mentioned he was the first Secretary of State, second vice President or third President of the United States.
That Jefferson towers over every President from Washington to Trump in such a wide variety of excellence cannot be denied.
He was a lover of study, music and history; his served his birth land as a lawyer, a member of the House of Burgesses, a legislator, Governor, member of the Continental Congress, Minister to France, Secretary of State, Vice President and President.
He doubled the size of the nation, created a University, and opened the country to further expansion and research.
He proved himself to be a shrewd and cautious negotiator when he paved the way for the Louisiana Purchase, a 830,000 square mile piece of land he got from France for roughly $15 million when Napoleon was asking for $22 million; it resulted in carving out the states of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, Michigan, both North and South Dakota and even parts of what are now Montana, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico and Minnesota from that land.
President Jefferson doubled the size of America with this one purchase.
He sent Lewis and Clark out those expeditions that opened up the West for this new America.
But these are the facts most people know about the man who was born in Shadwell, Virginia and is buried with his wife Martha on the grounds of his beloved Monticello in Charlottesville, which he himself designed.
There are a host of other fascinating facts about this fascinating man.
He was a musician, known to practice on the violin 15 hours a day. There’s a great story about how two other suitors came to woo the beautiful young widow Martha, while Thomas himself was courting her. Arriving at her home, the two would-be suitors heard the violin and pianoforte being played, and male and female voices raised in song. It was moving enough they realized they didn’t stand a chance against him, left and never returned to try again.
He was a voracious reader and collector of books; he had the largest library of any man in the world at one time. But when the British burned the White House and destroyed the entire library of Congress, it was Jefferson who sold his own private collection of more than 6,000 books for just under $24,000 to establish the Library of Congress.
He was an inventor and also designed improvements for earlier inventions. He is credited with inventing the dumbwaiter, that food service elevator that enabled his slaves to have prepared meals brought up to the dining room at Monticello rather than carried up steps; he was a farmer and made improvements on the plough so it could be operated on hilly pastures; he also improved the polygraph, as a voracious reader and writer, he often made copies of the more than 19,000 letters he wrote in his lifetime, many of which are preserved in various historic and private homes today. He invented a revolving bookcase, purely for beauty and convenience, he introduced crop rotation to America, improving upon what he had seen in Europe.
Jefferson brought back more than ideas from his years in France. His love of wine came about from tasting the many French varieties, his love of ice cream had him introduce that to the United States as a refreshing summertime dessert served from the ice house. He even wrote the first American recipe for ice cream which included 6 egg yolks, half a pound of sugar, two bottles of cream and a single vanilla bean.
Jefferson spoke at least four languages, English, French, Italian and Latin, and read both Greek and Spanish but by his own admission did not speak either of those two.
He was a journalist who kept records on everything from the weather and his gardens to the behavior of animals. He was an animal lover, and his pet mockingbird, Dick, was often seen perched on his shoulder at White Houses meetings.
Before he designed the University of Virginia and was the Father of the University, he designed his own home at Poplar Forest, land he had inherited, and which served as his “quiet place” when he wanted to be away from the crowds.
That building, now open to the public, is octagonal in design, with windows cut so specifically and perfectly to ensure he would receive the precise amount of sunshine he wanted to enter the rooms.
Jefferson appears to be the first President to ignore a subpoena. It was when Congress ordered him to appear in Richmond Va., with a letter he allegedly had received concerning Aaron Burr’s plan to invade Mexico.
He declined to go, saying his absence from Washington would leave the nation without a leader. Chief Justice John Marshall declined to investigate the matter; he simply dismissed the charges against Burr rather than attempt to hold the President in contempt of court.
Thomas Jefferson: tall, red-headed, quiet in tone, better on paper than by mouth, thoughtful, perhaps a bit controversial, so devoted to his wife he never married again at her request when she died after only a few years of marriage, and leader of a nation that could never have been started without him and his fellow believers in the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
GREAT to see such nice news. Me & all our family visited that house so many years ago,
good to show your kids a bit of history.
Carol