the family were unable to keep monticello. they had to sell monticello, the land, things in the home, and most heartbreakingly of all, they had to sell about 130 enslaved african americans. one of the slaves on the plantation recalls that jefferson's death was a time of great uncertainty amongst the enslaved community, and you can imagine that enslaved people here would be worried, after the death of jefferson, that their families would be split apart. what ends up happening in most cases, in many cases. the property in the 1830's would be bought by a man named uriah levy, one of the first naval officers of jewish faith in the u.s. uriah levy and his family began the process of tracking down some of the original objects of the home and, in 1923, it was uriah levy's nephew who sold this property to the thomas jefferson foundation, which continues to own monticello as a nonprofit museum and has since 1923. one of the things that we are striving to bring back here to the guest experience at monticello is a sense that monticello i

monticello. the white house kitchen, the president's house at the time would have been very similar indeed to this, and jefferson brought up from monticello three young enslaved girls in their teens, 15, 16, 17 in that range. initially, the first one called ursala granger was brought up a alone, and the reason he brought these young women in was to have them learn french cuisine from the french chef that he brought on to prepare meals in the president's house. so they had kind of an apprenticeship there learning that craft. ursala granger went back to monticello after just a few months delivering her first child, and after that jefferson brought up two other young girls in their teens, edie fawcett and fannie hearn, both who had husbands at monticello. one was a wagoner, the other a black smith. they lived under the same kind of conditions as the white servants and when his presidency ended, they came back to monticello with him, became the head cooks at monticello for the rest of their lives, an

this is a photograph also taken at monticello under the monticello foundations wing. but of course, you know, the washington -- rather the white house was burned right to the cement and stone structure in 1814 by the british, so we don't know exactly what's jefferson's dining room looked like, but it would've been very similar to this. it's what today is the green room, where he held his dinners. relatively small room, not as big or as grand as the state dining room. and, he used these dinners very much as a political tool, as well as a social tool. first of all, he would have social events for friends and family and, you know, important people coming through town and he would also have a kind of a wilderness salon where poets adored used and musicians and scientists who were visiting would be asked to dinner, and he would have friends and congressmen and senators come in to sort of enjoy the intellectual discourse of that. but most importantly, i think where what he described as his congressional dinners. he would have roughly a dozen, maybe more members of congress,

jefferson's monticello provided the video. hello, and thank you for joining us for another live stream here from monticello. i'm brandon dillard manager of historic interpretation here. and today we'll be starting a conversation about indigenous history and politics as they relate to jefferson monticello and the early republic of the united states. today's topic is far too broad to cover in one brief conversation. and we'll likely just scratch the surface of this complex enriched subject. in spite of a narrative of american history that is often told as though everything began in 1492. the history of north america is far older and more complex. it began at least 12,000 years ago although scholars argue on the origins and migrations of the first human inhabitants of these lands. and from millennia the history and political structures of indigenous america developed and solidified through long processes of power conflict collaboration and migration. thousands of cultures and nations have come and gone and thousands remain today.

it's good to be back at monticello at least in spirit. that's right you have been before well, why have you been at monticello before? i was a fellow at the international center for jefferson studies twice actually, but the second time was i was the guilder lerman junior research fellow in 2005 2006. and that's why i started writing. my book cosmopolitan patriots americans and paris in the age of revolution and i was just it was just one of my favorite places in the world. it's so i was a great place to work and you know extremely beautiful. i agree. it's the center is a terrific. it's a terrific benefit to us at monticello because we get the benefit of meeting and and then establishing connections to so many scholars engaged in lots of different work. so phillip, let's talk speaking of that work before we really jump into the topic tell you work for the papers of benjamin franklin. how's the yale university? tell us a little bit about your work with the papers and a bit about what that project involves. and what you do? so the project ha

we're about a mile and half past monticello. monroe moved into the house, he moved into the house and 1799. it was a governor's house. there's a lot of conversation about being small, he himself referred to as a cabin castle. it was a lot of false modesty. and the most interesting thing is the story of the site hadn't really been sorted out until fairly recently. and you see on our screen here, this yellow house, on the razor to story structure that some 1870 which is well past monroe. the little white portion on the left we now know was when rose president trump guest house. we don't 1818 he had to enslaved a man named peter mallory and george williams construct this house and he wrote about it. but for years and years it was misunderstood as a remnant wing of the main house. turns out the main house was completely destroyed by fire. we think probably right around the beginning of the year 1830. and oddly enough there is nothing that we can find written about from contemporary sources. you think how popular monroe was and is st

and his descendants did lose monticello. in such financial straits, you could hardly have afforded to divest such a major portion of his assets, even if he wanted to. even, disregard he's different than george washington. it should be noted this explanation of jefferson's actions does not modify his most strident criticism, including that to judge from his lifelong behavior, jefferson's grand style was more important to him than the natural rights of his slaves. the last point of criticism, mainly that jefferson was a racist, there can be no real exculpate in of this. nothing can disguise the fact that by modern-day standards he was a racist, as was made abundantly clear by his notes on virginia, part of which but not all of which i have quoted to you. i told my students over the years, you would be good to read the notes on virginia to hear jefferson's views in detail. but don't do it if you have a weak stomach, or a week constitution, or if you are a jefferson idolater, because it's pretty rough stuff. this is pretty graph

what a pleasure to greet you once more at our monticello, but as you can readily see we have somewhat of a split canvas because we're welcoming through this modern element of technology in the pursuit of science our good friend who has always been at the forefront. they're upon a doctor benjamin franklin who is with the snail from philadelphia a good afternoon, dr. franklin. good day. good afternoon to you, thomas. well,

what a pleasure to greet you once more at our monticello, but as you can readily see we have somewhat of a split canvas because we're welcoming through this modern element of technology in the pursuit of science our good friend who has always been at the forefront. they're upon a doctor benjamin franklin who is with the snail from philadelphia a good afternoon, dr. franklin. good day. good afternoon to you, thomas.

but, when she began to come out of that, somewhat he, wanted to get out of monticello and a diplomatic assignment abroad seemed the perfect thing. he went to philadelphia, where congress was meeting in december of 1782, and he stays there for about 75 days. hamilton incidentally was a member of congress at that point. hamilton was very close to james madison and jefferson was very close to james madison. and i suspect that the two must have met during jefferson stay in philadelphia. although there is no record any of their correspondents in which either says anything about the other. jefferson eventually received an appointment as a diplomat in europe that turned into a position as a united states minister to france. and he lives in paris for five years. from 1784 until 1789. and it was a pivotal moment for jefferson. his ideas had already formed. he long since had turned against monarchy and against aristocracy and as i said earlier, who wanted major reforms that would usher in this new world of which he dreamed. but in europe, in france and in england on a stay, short stay in england

welcome to another installment in the monticello live streams week. we're focusing on the relationship between thomas

their experience in the building in which they lived, to compare this building with what we have at monticello, try to get some understanding of the same experience across time and across space. i think it really helps inform archaeologists have sites like brendan can really help us inform us at monticello and across the south and across the east coast. so i think it's important to document the spaces for sure. >> so this is the equipment that i use and this collects a p.s. coordinates of a building, so i've collected it for the building and then i created a digital survey form, that has the information i'm interested in and i can fill it out hand it links to that gps coordinate. so then when i met these points out where the buildings are, we click on that point, all of this information that i've put in comes up at that point. this project started as part of my masters thesis project when i started as an architect, then i went back to school to get my degree -- masters degree in historical preservation after having gone on the real world, practicing for wild and realized i wanted to do was his

welcome to another installment in the monticello live streams week. we're focusing on the relationship between thomas jefferson and benjamin franklin, and it's my pleasure today to moderate this live stream host it and we're gonna be talking with philip. zisha who'

welcome to another installment in the monticello live streams week. we're focusing on the relationship between thomas jefferson and benjamin franklin, and it's my pleasure today to moderate this live stream host it and we're gonna be talking with philip. zisha who's the associate editor of the papers of benjamin franklin at yale university and we're really excited have philip on with us today. i love it when we have guests who are in documentary editing projects because they really have this extremely they have a very unique perspective on historical figures. they talk about that we discuss so philip welcome to a modichel live stream. we're glad you so much. thank you for having me. it's good to be back at monticellole

what a pleasure to greet you once more at our monticello, but as you can readily see we have somewhat of a split canvas because we're welcoming through this modern element of technology in the pursuit of science our good friend who has always been at the forefront. they're upon a doctor benjamin franklin who is with the snail from philadelphia a good

jefferson's monticello provided the video.

professor at harvard and 60 books including pulitzer prize and national book award for her book of monticello and american families. we were just discussing i had the fortune of being able to get the next insight in the gym, we belong to the same witness club in the pre-pandemic times but now here we are mediating through zoom like everyone else. it's good to see the two of you, how are you this morning? >> very good. >> good. it's been a winter. >> a long winter. >> rights. i always like start with the most fundamental question, this is an important book, you talk about two different subjects some degree of overlap. talk to me about how they came about and the one question that came to mind, last summer when we saw the explosion of social upheaval and reaction to the death of george floyd, all questions about policing and reform and everything we are talking about now we see in elizabeth's book on the tip of our tongue with the conversations we've been having, in the midst we saw juneteenth right after that. these big compositions about juneteenth and its recognition and significance, it was

what a pleasure to greet you once more at our monticello, but as you can readily see we have somewhat of a split canvas because we're welcoming through this modern element of technology in the pursuit of science our good friend who has always been at the forefront. they're upon a doctor benjamin franklin who is with the snail from philadelphia a good afternoon, dr. franklin. good day. good afternoon to you, thomas. well, i'm pleased to welcome you here as are all of our guests and before we begin to receive questions from our moderator his alice wagner who is again with us to receive the questions of our friends friends. will you allow both dr. franklin and myself to remove our masks? well, thank you. we have their approval doctor. well, this will not be pretty folks. oh, here we are. oh doctors. i've always known you well, i believe. well, no you i suppose. you were much younger. i was i was a bit older when when we met i believe by my count mr. jefferson. that i'm i must be something approaching 37 years older than you or something like that as i was there very closely. they're upon

if you visit his epitaph in monticello, virginia, you'll notice that there are three items on his epitaph. one is that he was author of the declaration of independence, another was that he was the founder of the university of virginia, and the third is that he was the author of the act concerning religious freedom. he does not include that he was president of the united states or ambassador to france or any of the other enormously important things that he was. he was most proud among two or three other accomplishments of the fact that he was the author of the act for religious freedom, and we know, took into consideration that he was so proud of his authorship of the act for religious freedom that when he was ambassador to france, a position in which he was serving when the statute was finally passed in 1786, he immediately arranged for the text of the statute to be printed, published, and distributed in france and elsewhere in europe. and he was enormously gratified that the high culture, the salons of paris were impressed and moved and inspired by the example that the state of virginia

what if i am sally hemings at monticello? versus sally hemings at the gym right or here. so did she live in that con? so you really transferring somebody from a particular context? these people are in civil war battlefields. i mean that general pickett does not go to kroger with you right but he could but but pick it didn't was not a kroger's as far as we know but he was at that thing. so for some people in terms of self-definition, i am reenacting because i am this character. i only know what this character would have known. right, so sami hammings did not know about the stairmaster or the life cycle. i'm using that example just she wouldn't have known necessary about those machines. so these are going to say i only know what this general knew. very much very much in terms of this and the williamsburg. people do know beyond right because it's an educational. newsburg is a paid. private museum they do know about the cotton gin they do know about the sewing machine. they do know by the american civil war. they know about obama they know about all that stuff. and they will

today, monticello is extending its focus beyond his accomplishments to the enslaved people who worked on his plantation.

what a pleasure to greet you once more at our monticello, but as you can readily see we have somewhat of a split canvas because we're welcoming through this modern element of technology in the pursuit of science our good friend who has always been at the forefront. they're upon a doctor benjamin franklin who is with the snail from philadelphia a good afternoon, dr. franklin. good day. good afternoon to you, thomas. well, i'm pleased to welcome you here as are all