Jacqueline Langholtz: Jefferson is a local boy. He grows up, he's born at Shadwell, which is really just as the base of this mountain, and you can picture him and friends, good friend Debney Carr, jogging up this mountain, coming up here to play, and fantasizing about living here one day. And if you saw the map that Elizabeth Chew referenced in the gallery there, it shows Monticello, the smaller mountain, and behind it is Mount Alto, and you'll see that on the west side of the house.

Jefferson being a man of the Enlightenment, he's also very interested in nature and bringing nature in, specifically to his house. So he brings in light, he brings in color. Help me get my bearings. Which direction are we facing? Anyone want to be the Boy Scout for the day?

Teacher 1: Sun rises in the east.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Sun rises in the east, yeah, so this is the East Walk, right here, that's what we call it. Jefferson doesn't have a back and a front, he has two fronts. This is the East Front of the house, the West Front of the house is where we will emerge after the tour, and it's where you'll see the more iconic side of Monticello.

So this went really well the other day, I had a visitor from New York and I asked her how many floors the house had, and she gave me the perfect answer, the one I wanted for. What is your answer as you glance at this. How many floors, how many stories? What'd I hear back there? You said four, anyone have a different number? Three. Well, just if you're doing a quick glance, you're not making a careful study, you just glance up at the house. You thought it was only two? One and a half back here. Great. My friend who was visiting for the very first time said, I didn't realize it was only just one story. So now if you're looking, can you understand how someone might think it was just one story?

Okay. That's what Jefferson was really hoping for, that it appears to be one grand floor, and some of the rooms on the first floor will take up two stories, but he's actually tucked a second story in. So above the windows with the shutters, do you see smaller square windows? If you're in the second floor of the house, where family and guest rooms were, to open those windows you actually open them, they're down on the floor, like that. But it's meant to be enjoyed from the outside, to give that appearance of one grand story.

Also if you look very carefully, under the roofline, there are skylights. That's the third floor, there, and that's where the dormer room is. But a lot of the house is meant to be enjoyed aesthetically from the outside and to give a certain impression, actually to make you think of buildings that you might have seen in Europe. And what kind of a building does it make you think of? Rather than a palace. It's not traditional Georgian architecture, it's got me thinking of a very different time and place. The columns. Okay, zeroing in on that. So what does that make you think of? Yeah, ancient Greece and Rome. Exactly right.

Jefferson called it his essay in architecture, meaning he was constantly revising it. He said he delighted in putting up and pulling down. So there's a Monticello One and then when Jefferson is Minister to France, and he travels through France, he comes home with so many ideas that he does such a drastic remodeling that we call this Monticello Two.

Alright, anyone want to read this for us? It does keep moving, doesn't it? We'll take a best guess. Generally coming from the north, right? Varying a little bit northeast and northwest. Jefferson would have recorded this, if you were down in the galleries and you took a look at that log for the weather. 1780s, I think, 1780s or '90s date, I forget which. It said the temperature was about 20 degrees colder than it is today, but it also had a description of cloudy. So we have a similar day. As Dr. Chew described in the galleries, Jefferson took standard weather recordings at the same time each day for the same time for over 40 years. One at dawn, which means you're up at dawn, right? So, we'll talk more about Jefferson's daily routine and how very different it is from mine in his bedchamber. But one at dawn and one at about four o'clock. So getting those standard readings there.

You see another Jefferson device here in front of us. What else do you see on the house?

Teacher 2: The clock?

Jacqueline Langholtz: The clock. And don't be shy, big loud answers, I absolutely love them. The plantation clock here has how many hands? Can you still tell them accurately with one hand?

Teacher 3: Yes.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yeah, relatively so. I think so, too. Inside the house you'll see the exact same clock, it has two faces to it. Jefferson designs this clock, and it is installed in the house about 10 years after he designs it. The nice thing is—this side, it's called the plantation clock, we get a lot of questions about it. The students who visit Monticello are often really intrigued by the clock itself, because inside it not only tells you the time but it also tells you something else. The teachers who have been here before will certainly know. It's a calendar clock, so what else does it tell you.

Teachers: The date.

Jacqueline Langholtz: The date. Exactly right, yeah. It also has three hands inside, so it gives you precise measurements, and only someone who views themselves as a scientist, who's interested in precision and measurement would have a clock with time down to the second. You'll see a clock in almost every room of the house, and one of Jefferson's granddaughters describes him as a 'miser of his time,' that's how obsessed he is with efficiency.

Jacqueline Langholtz: We've been talking about the plantation clock. As advertised, does it have three hands? Yes. As advertised, does it also have a calendar function? Somebody find that for me. Where is that? Excellent, excellent. Okay. So let's break this down. A pendulum clock usually has what that hangs from it?

Teacher: Weights.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Counterweights, exactly. So we've got the pendulum, but the counterweights, which normally come straight down from a grandfather clock could not come straight down because they'd be in front of the door. So they attached the pulleys on the sides and the weights would descend there. What day is it today?

Teacher: Saturday.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Saturday, one of the most intriguing days to be at Monticello, because you can't see the weights. Exactly right. Days of the week are on the wall here, starting with Sunday. So if Sunday's at the top, what day of the week is the clock wound?

Teacher: Sunday.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Sunday. That's when the weights are all the way at the top. So it's wound on Sunday, and the last day in that whole cycle is Saturday. That's when you see that there was a miscalculation in Jefferson's plantation clock. He designed it before it was installed in Monticello, about 10 years prior. When he brought it to the room, it's too big for the room. So he puts the calendar function—Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday is on the floor, Saturday is actually in the basement, and to keep from having weights set and rest on the floor because then the clock wouldn't be able to continue, he cuts holes on both sides there, both sides of the floor, so that the weights can make their full descent, all the way into the basement. So we'll make sure that we find Saturday in the basement there.

Earlier you told me that your students often study westward expansion and the travels of Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery. There's a lot in this room that has to do with that major contribution of Jefferson's. You see a map on the back wall here that shows the size of the country before the Louisiana Purchase, which does what to the size of our country? Doubles, yeah. Pretty easy to say doubles exactly. Great deal. Just about three and a half cents an acre for over 800,000 acres of land.

How is that paid for? Hm.

Teacher: Taxes.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yeah. Well, taxpayer dollars, exactly right. So, while now, we see this as, I think, a great decision, it was actually one that was met with some mixed feelings during Jefferson's time, and some pushback on whether or not he was actually authorized to make that decision.

Also in this room, you see, in addition to New World, you see quite a lot Old World, you see Old World art here on the wall, and some European influences with French philosophers, Voltaire and Turgot here on the wall. And actually an American here. Anyone know who this man is? 'Opposed in death as they were in life,' according to Jefferson, whose bust is opposite him. Alexander—

Teacher: Hamilton.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Hamilton. Absolutely. So depending on what conversation you wanted to have with your students, you could have it be about government, you could have an Enlightenment conversation here, you could have it be about art, about science, there's just so much in the room. And certainly visitors waiting to meet the president or to shake his hand or to get an audience with him, sitting in this room would be treated to a natural history lesson of their own. It's a wonderful room for education.

This is the Edgehill portrait. Someone describe that man's expression to me.

Teachers: Grim. Glum.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Great, grim, glum. What else?

Teachers: Tired.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Tired. Yeah, absolutely. Jefferson described the presidency as a 'splendid misery and a daily loss of friends.' Do we know him for any really rousing speeches?

Teachers: No.

Jacqueline Langholtz: What—no. What do we know him for more than his presence and his gung-ho power. Ah, maybe his—okay, some of his specific contributions, things like the Louisiana Purchase. There's a very important document. And writing. Exactly right. His writing. So the Declaration of Independence hangs over here. Certainly when we are talking about the things we remember and love Jefferson for, revere him for, it's his public service and it's things like the Declaration of Independence. Written, he's the primary author on a committee of five. And he's only 33 years old when he writes it. He calls it 'an expression of the American mind.'

So what is this room used for? It's very different from the one we were just in. This is not a public room.

Teacher: It's a parlor.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Sort of like a parlor, but we're going to see a fancy parlor for guests and entertaining a little bit later. Oh, who said—I like office. What made you say that?

Teacher: It looks like one. There's a desk. There're books. There's not too much else.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yeah. Mm-hm. Yeah. This is an office and a schoolroom. It's an office for the woman in the lower painting here. This is Martha Jefferson Randolph, Jefferson's oldest daughter. And she came to live here and essentially be mistress of the plantation for Jefferson during his retirement years. So after 1809, Jefferson can smile again, after being president, come home to retire, and his eldest daughter is mistress of the plantation. And so, think of all the work that would have had to be done, planning the menus, accommodating guests. She'll have meetings in here with the house staff. So people like Burwell Colbert, the head butler, here. Probably also with Edith Hern Fossett, the chef. Martha's doing a lot of that work organizing the goings-on and logistics of a 5,000-acre plantation that is popular, at a time when there was no Secret Service, right? So anyone who wanted to come up and knock on the window and shake the former president's hand would probably have to be greeted and dealt with. Either invited in or told, thank you, goodbye. And that's what a lot of Martha's —she writes often about working 12-hour days.

Jefferson suffers severe personal tragedy during his lifetime. So he is a family man and someone who loves his family. Is he married, actually? Here's a question, actually, back up. Is Jefferson ever married?

Teachers: Yes. Yeah.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yes. They have six children. Martha dies in childbirth with their sixth child. Only two of those six children survive to adulthood. So Martha, Martha his eldest daughter in the portrait there is one of only two. And he buries the second daughter before he dies. So she is the only one who actually survives him. She has a large family. You can only imagine that after many years of public service, not being home, having his own children pass away, being here as a grandfather with those grandchildren is a great delight to him.

So we have great stories of him running foot races with the kids on the West Lawn and giving them dried fruit and helping them with their studies. Having books for them to—drawing straws so the person who draws the longest straw will get to read the book first, all the way down, the person who draws the shortest straw gets to read it last but then gets to keep the book. So you can just imagine him being a wonderful and supportive grandfather.

Jacqueline Langholtz: It is Jefferson's—

Teachers: Library.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Library. Exactly right. Imagine having access to your grandfather's library and it is like this, 200 years ago. Jefferson described himself as having a canine appetite for reading, which is a wonderful wonderful description. This is his third library, his retirement library. His first one actually burns while he's a student. So Jefferson studies law at William & Mary, his personal library burns at that time, he describes his sadness over that.

His second library, which he works very hard to build, he gives it away, he donates it. He is paid for. Yes, excellent, nice job, teachers, exactly right. So tell me the story there. Can anyone say why it's packed up and sent to Washington? What does it, um—

Teacher: After the British burn Washington—

Jacqueline Langholtz: That's right. So here we are, 2012, actually, 200 years ago the War of 1812, which we could be talking even more about and maybe within your grant you do. But the library is burned by the British. So Jefferson, who believes in the power of knowledge, and that—I'm going to mangle this quote, but it's 'a country that expects to stay both ignorant and free and in a state of civilization expects what never was and never will be.' So if you're going to be an active and healthy democracy with a voting population, the people who are voting have to be—

Teachers: Educated.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Educated. Educated on the issues. Exactly right. That's further evidence—Jefferson, he calls it the hobby of his old age, he starts a university.

Teachers: UVA.

Jacqueline Langholtz: UVA, exactly right. Not only does he design the buildings, so we have the academical village plan here, but he also designs the curriculum. And rather than situating the buildings around a church, what was the center of the campus?

Teacher: The lawn is.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yes, the lawn, but it leads up to—what was that center building at the head of it.

Teachers: The library.

Jacqueline Langholtz: It would have been a—exactly, it's a library. And that with tradition, really. It should have been a chapel, if you were keeping in step with other universities of the day. So Jefferson was, you know, a large supporter, passionate about public education, sends his books to DC, 16 wagonloads. Actually the bookcases that you can see are boxes, so you can imagine that they're very easy to just take down, you put wood on top of it. Sixteen wagonloads to DC and then he writes immediately to John Adams and says, I cannot live without—

Teachers: Books.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Books, exactly right.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Jefferson read in seven languages. Can we name those?

Teachers: Latin.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Latin, excellent. So he's educated in Latin and the other classic language—Greek. Exactly right. I heard another one. French.

Teachers: Italian.

Jacqueline Langholtz: And Italian. Monticello, he studies architecture. And he'll read those Italian books.

Teachers: Spanish.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Spanish! And he uses that copy of Don Quixote to teach himself Spanish. He's en route to France, Minister to France, and he brings Don Quixote and a Spanish-English dictionary with him. So that's five. And the other two are actually so easy that it would be hard to guess. English. And then this one is Old English, which is used in the study of law. We know that he dabbles with German, but we don't put it into that fluency list. Just, yeah.

So here we are, in the bedroom and office of a man who reads and writes in seven languages and reads and writes a lot, right? Over 19,000 letters. That is the polygraph copying machine that you see on his desk there. Someone tell me how it works. We've got two pens that are connected here. Works differently than the one you saw in the gallery that pressed and made a copy, an exact copy, with the impression. How does this one work, if you

Teacher: If you're writing with one, the other one—

Jacqueline Langholtz: If you're writing with one, the other one makes an exact copy, so you keep one of those. He calls it 'the invention of his age.' Behind it we have a revolving bookstand, so Jefferson can look at five books at once. Maybe he's comparing translations. As a copious letter writer and writing to people about—while he actually even writes to a former governor of Ohio because he's heard about the mammoth cucumbers that they have in Ohio, so he writes and asks for seeds.

And then, I loved it, as we came in, one of the first things one of you said was 'efficient design' or 'efficient use of space.' To brighten it, we have one of Monticello's 13 skylights, exactly right. We have not just 90 degree angles here but pretty much bay windows that connect to that shaded porch where Jefferson would have—and getting southern exposure on that, would have lemon trees and just beautiful fragrances. And this alcove bed, what do you all think of this as efficient design? Thumbs up, thumbs down for who wants it. Yeah, I would absolutely want it. Probably easy to change the sheets. You can decide if you want to roll out of bed and be in the bedroom, or I'd probably connect it to maybe the kitchen or something, or the living room.

Teachers: It's like the desk lights that you get for the piano.

Jacqueline Langholtz: That's right, that's right. And you also have space above the bed, which can be used. We believe this was an out-of-season closet. I also happen to believe on a personal level that the grandkids must have hidden up there, because if I were hiding around and playing around in my grandparents' house, that's where I would go. We talked earlier about Jefferson's stature, he's described as having posture as straight as a gun barrel. What do you think that meant? People often tell us it looks short. People often tell us it looks short. Do you think it looks short?

Teachers: It's hard to tell.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yes, well, who designed Monticello? Do you think he's going to make his bed too short? It's six foot three, he's six foot two and a half. Perfect fit, perfect fit.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Here's the part of the tour where I get to use an original Jefferson gadget, the same mechanisms that operated these doors 200 years ago. Thank you for gasping for breath, because it is really exciting. What's that?

Teacher: They're both going to close together.

Jacqueline Langholtz: They're going to close together.

Teacher: And all of the equipment runs...

Jacqueline Langholtz: That's right.

Teacher: That's pretty amazing.

Jacqueline Langholtz: These are Jefferson's self-operating doors, with actually two original panes of glass, too, those are the wavy ones here, have been unbroken for over 200 years. And the chain underneath it is a figure eight, so if we picture something very similar to a bicycle chain, that's what runs it, but we're very proud that it's still going. Jefferson is proud and happy to have it in the house.

You see plenty of examples of good design in this room. You see Jefferson's parquet floor. So if you look at this, speaking of hidden mechanisms and equipment, where is the hardware. Do you see any screws or nails?

Teachers: No.

Jacqueline Langholtz: How is that floor fitted together?

Teacher: It's like the furniture.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Ah, the joints! Exactly right. So this is a floor—Jefferson is inspired by floors he sees in France, he sends a drawing of how he wants it to look. This shape, the contrasting beech and cherry woods, the joints specifically that will be used, and he sends these directions to James Dinsmore. He's a free white worker who lives here at Monticello for about 10 years, helping with the construction of the house, and John Hemmings, brother to Sally Hemmings. And the two of them put this floor together. What do you think of it? Does it look nice? It looks nice.

So they are bringing Jefferson's ideas to life, right? He sends instructions and drawings and they're not traveling through France with him. They get these instructions and then they make it happen in his house. Is John Hemmings paid for his work? He's enslaved. No. What about James Dinsmore? Free white worker?

Teachers: Yes.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yes, he's paid. And the quote is like 'he wouldn't do it again for twice the pay,' because Jefferson's designs are so intricate. Here's a man who says he delights in doing math to the sixth decimal point. Here's a man who's interested in precision, following his directions. I think it must have been a nightmare, absolutely right.

And, you know, I want to go back to talking to Adams for a moment, because Adams, there was a bust of Adams in the cabinet area. Some of you saw that, good. Adams and Jefferson have a complicated friendship throughout their life, right? Actually one student taught me the word 'frenemy,' which I thought was really funny. They become friends again later in life. And tell me about their end days. Is that a story that—tell me—

Teacher: They both die on the same day, and they say, 'Adams lives' or—

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yeah, exactly. They die on the same day, and what day is that?

Teachers: July 4th.

Jacqueline Langholtz: July 4th. And not just any July 4th.

Teacher: Fifty years after.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Fifty years to the day. You got it exactly right. So July 4th, 1826, Jefferson dies in that bedroom, on that bed, where we just were, middle of the day, and we know that Adams died on that same day in Massachusetts and his last words were something to the effect of 'Jefferson survives,' exactly right.

We have Ben Franklin in the corner. Couldn't give it up, that's right, God bless him. And here, you know, these are the three things we must talk about in this room. The three greatest men the world's ever known, according to Jefferson. Elizabeth Chew told us the names of two of them. Who's the man who looks like but is not Shakespeare? Sir Francis—

Teachers: Drake.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Bacon. Sir Francis Bacon. Father of the scientific method. In the middle, another scientist, Sir Isaac—

Teachers: Newton.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Sir Isaac Newton. And on the end, the man on the right writes about the natural rights of man, John—

Teachers: Locke.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Locke. And you see a lot of John Locke's thinking in the Declaration of Independence.

What do you all think about this bright color? What'd you say?

Teacher: It wakes you up.

Jacqueline Langholtz: It wakes you up, that's right. A nice place to have breakfast in the morning. Anyone not a fan?

Teacher: It looks expensive, too.

Jacqueline Langholtz: It looks expensive. We have reason to believe it was about four times the price of some of the other paints that could be had. So if other paints could be had, why choose this color? There's got to be a reason. What's that?

Teacher: Because you can.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Because you can. There's got to be a better reason. Ah, okay, that's right. So some of us like to believe maybe it is because you can, maybe it is because the money, but then you think intelligent design, right, and the bringing the outside in and times of the day when this would be used. He's got his personal suite and he's writing letters in that beautiful southern light. What is the north side of the house like?

Teachers: Dark.

Jacqueline Langholtz: It's dark. And it actually is cold, too, right. So this brightens up the room and gives the perception of it feeling brighter. And there's a skylight, and you get some of the western light from the West Lawn here. Again, without the dark right angles, so you get some more light. But what about warmth? You can actually close these pocket doors and in this arch, you'll also see glass. And you'll see the first storm window, I believe the first storm window in a residence in the United States. So there's good design in this room down to the wine dumb waiter. Did you see that hidden in the fireplace?

There's a great story. You saw our BFF forever hanging next to Jefferson, our French friend, the Marquis de Lafayette. So he visits Monticello in 1825, the year before Jefferson's death. Lafayette is on a victory tour, seeing old friends. The two men embrace on the East Lawn. Lafayette stays here for about a week, and Jefferson writes that after Lafayette leaves he has to restock the wine cellar. So you picture old friends talking about the days when they were forming a new nation, I'm sure they were up all night, and I love thinking about that wine dumb waiter just going up and down. 'Can we have some more?' Jefferson sees that design at a restaurant called the Café Mecanique in France and brings that back. He sees another good design in a monastery for a revolving door that you'll see when we leave this room, and that's how food actually came into this dining space. So have we seen a kitchen yet?

Teachers: No.

Jacqueline Langholtz: No. It's under the house and it's actually on the other side of the house. So it's on the south side. Food would have come all the way up under the house in the all-weather passageway, would have come up a very narrow set of stairs that you'll see, which, I am the world's worst waitress, I tried it for about a month and I'll never go back, and I can't picture food coming up those stairs. They're then put, those dishes, on a revolving service door, turned into this room, and then with minimal service needed, minimal may be one or two of the domestic house servants in this room, food is put on the buffet tables that have wheels and brought into the room. Otherwise it's mainly self-service, very little ceremony here at the house.

Here's a man who was President of the United States, he's our first Secretary of State, he's our second vice-president, he's our third president, he's Minister to France, he's Governor of Virginia, what does he want to be remembered for?

Teacher: The Declaration of Independence.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Declaration of Independence. Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom. And founding the University of Virginia. So, essentially, those are what sorts of freedoms, if you had to break those down for me? Education, religion, freedom—and personal freedom. Yeah, exactly right. So that's what he sees himself as worthy of being remembered and instrumental for, and devoting his life to, over 40 years of public service.

So that's what I try to also remember him for. And it's the reason for being here today, right? As much as it is a beautiful house and an icon, there are many beautiful houses in Virginia that you can visit, right? So this is an expression of Jefferson's thinking. It was actually called the 'curiosity of the neighborhood' during his lifetime.

Let's actually come onto the West Lawn a little bit. That way we'll talk about after his lifetime. The plantation, 135 slaves, are sold at auction after his death. And when we talk with students and visitors about slavery, Monticello is not a typical Southern plantation, right? It's not actually useful to use this as a model or common example of what slavery looked like in the American South. Can you tell me why, or why we feel that way?

Teacher: The family units.

Jacqueline Langholtz: That's why, exactly, that there are family units. Jefferson recognized marriages within the groups, and families were kept together. So we know—I mean, you heard me talk earlier about Edith Hern Fossett, the chef here. So she's the French-trained chef, she's Jefferson's chef in DC when he's president, she's here at Monticello, we have her room down by the kitchen. We know she's married to Joe Fossett of the blacksmith's shop. We know about their children, and what duties they had here. We have information about specific individuals and their families, and often multigenerational families here, over 70 Hemings family members at one point or another worked and lived at Monticello. And at Jefferson's death, when 135 were sold at auction, that breaks them apart. So that's a very tragic part of the story. Jefferson frees five slaves in his will. All of those have marketable skills. He says John Hemings is unrivaled in his skills and abilities as a joiner, and certainly these skills would have been sought after by merchants and people in Charlottesville. I mean, these are the people who have the ability to make this house, they made this house, in the blacksmith's shop, and really very skilled labor force here, but only five of them—they're given their tools and equipment and they're given their freedom, but you have sometimes husbands who are freed and wives who are not. So it's a very sad story here.

The house is sold to a local Charlottesville farmer. Essentially just the land is used, and for a number of years the house falls into disrepair. It's then purchased by Commodore Uriah Levy, a New Yorker, he made a lot of money in real estate, and then became the first Jewish naval officer in the United States. And we make a point of saying that he was Jewish, and the first Jewish naval officer, because he made a point of saving the house largely influenced and in gratitude for Jefferson's work promoting religious freedom in the United States.

Elizabeth V. Chew: This visitor center facility opened in 2009 and it has radically improved our ability both orient our visitors to just explain to them why Jefferson is important and so, why they're here, and to engage and educate.

This exhibition is really one of four that's in the building. This is the largest one, it's the one that is intended to put the house, which is the one piece of Monticello that mostly everybody sees, in the context of Monticello writ large, Monticello as a 5,000-acre working plantation.

If you look up at this light pencil drawing on the banner here, you can see the view that the young Jefferson would have seen from Shadwell, looking over across the Rivanna River, the little low mountain in the front here is Monticello. The high mountain behind Monticello is the mountain that Jefferson called Mountalto, and he bought—he bought what he could see from his mountain of that mountain in the 1770s. And so, as a boy, the little mountain just drew him and he had a dream of living there as an adult when he was a teenager. And that would have been the least practical place you could ever live. In a time when the river was a major means of transportation, where getting around was difficult at any time, where water was a constant problem and need, to live on a mountain made no sense. He really elevated ideals over being practical, over practicality.

The central section in the middle of the room here goes through and gives examples of Jefferson's just complete and total dedication to doing what he would call gathering, recording, and sharing and disseminating this idea of useful knowledge, whether it was related to science, to farming, to government, to transportation, to what you could and couldn't grow somewhere. He was interested in really every point of knowledge on the human spectrum. And nothing—there was almost nothing that was too small for his attention.

We have several really fun kind of interactive elements in the exhibition, and this one uses Jefferson's travels, both in North America and in Europe, and it shows people what, when Jefferson was traveling, what he was doing, and he said it himself, that he was gathering ideas that would be useful—'useful'—back in this country. So what we do is follow his travels—and I'm looking at southern France right here—and we talk about everywhere he went, what he was looking at.

So here we are: viticulture or wine-growing in the Burgundy region of France, or ancient architecture in Orange, France. He was also completely obsessed with the idea of people in this country growing olives. He thought that olive oil was going to be the new revolution and that the rice planters in Southern Carolina should stop growing rice and grow olive trees. And he really worked hard to convince them of that. Really, he's so interested in these little details of things that he thinks are going to help him come back here, share the ideas, and even put them to use himself.

So, this is a fun way, and, all as you all know way better than I do, young people love this kind of thing.

Elizabeth V. Chew: So I've talked about how the center is about his dedication to all this gathering and sharing and disseminating. This short wall here is dedicated to a horizontal look across the social spectrum at Monticello. Because we obviously know that Jefferson and his elite family in their 'big house,' they're the tip of the pyramid here, but obviously everything that happens that makes his household run, that makes his cash crops grow, is done by the labor of enslaved people.

So we also look across the spectrum of the enslaved community at people working in the fields versus enslaved people who work in the house or in the [?] industries, and we compare those also to hired white people. There were some hired white workers here who did things like, well, build a house, for one thing, or serve as blacksmiths or certain kinds of carpenters. They also trained enslaved people to do these kinds of jobs.

We've learned an amazing amount about the lives of enslaved people all over the plantation. So, what we know is that enslaved people owned material goods. We tend to have a notion of slavery, I think, or at least I used to, as being very fixed and abstract and this big box of awfulness and yes, it is that. But you can also come to understand it in a much more textured way where you see—we know a great deal about the names and activities and lives of the individual people who lived here in slavery and what happened to their descendants. And that combination of Jefferson's record keeping, archaeology, other kinds of written records, and then genealogy and oral history that we've been doing here for 40 years.

So we know that people who worked in the fields owned the same kinds of really fashionable tablewares that slaves who worked in the house and lived up on the mountain owned and that, in many cases, are the same kinds of things being used in the big house. Slaves had several different ways of making money. Jefferson preferred to give cash incentives to slaves rather than use harsh physical punishment, so some skilled slaves received cash money. Slaves also kept poultry yards and gardens on their own time and sold the products of those, both to the big house and sometimes in markets in towns. Slaves were paid by Jefferson for doing particularly onerous jobs like cleaning out the sewers underneath the privies, and slaves were given tips by visitors quite routinely. So with the money that people here in slavery owned, we know that they went into town on Sundays and shopped in stores. Scholars have studied shopkeepers' ledger books and found that there are records of slaves coming in and buying things.

So what we see here, I think, is examples of how enslaved people survived in a system that denied them their basic humanity. We see how people figured out ways to just get through it. And we see families over generations here whose descendants go on actually to be very involved in all kinds of work towards emancipation and later civil rights.

Elizabeth V. Chew: On the wall here behind you, we break down Monticello into four areas. We look at gardens, agriculture, plantation industries, and the house. And my interest here was making it all on the same plane. Often we tend to privilege the house over everything else. I think Jefferson saw it as being all of a piece.

So we look at how he puts what he considers to be this useful knowledge to work, in all aspects of his operations here, whether it's what he grew in the garden, his attempts to grow grapes to make wine, his intense interest in the technology of agriculture. For example, he himself invented a kind of plow moldboard. People think of him as being an inventor. He was mostly a creative adapter because of all these things he learned about, wrote down, and then later used here at Monticello. The one thing that he ever truly invented was a plow moldboard. And we have a recreation plow right here that shows this curved—it's the curvy wood part that sort of turns over the soil once it's cut by the metal blade. So he had witnessed people plowing in France that he thought were really inefficient, and he has this geometric idea for the shape of a moldboard that will do a better job with less resistance in turning over the ground. So he has this plow made here at Monticello and he writes to all of his people all over the world to tell them about it. Even though he won several awards for it, it was never really widely adopted.

The Garden Book is really a bravura demonstration of his record keeping interests. Let's see. We have a little facsimile of it right here, and it's really hard to see, but he basically—he started it as a young man still living at Shadwell. After his retirement here in 1809, he really does it every single year in earnest, where he writes down, keeps a chart where he writes down everything he plants and when, when it sprouts, how it does, and then eventually 'when it comes to table,' which means when they get to eat it in the house, and when it goes to seed. And he does this every year for over 20 years. He doesn't care if something doesn't do well, he just tries something else. His interest is really in what will grow well in this particular climate here in Albemarle County, Virginia. He wants to know what he can grow here that will be useful. So things like benne or sesame, he grows that. These hot peppers a friend in Texas sends him. There are a number of examples of things that people send him that he tries to grow. He really really really wants to grow wine grapes, but he never can. He would actually love the fact that wine is such a big deal now in Virginia.

So even though he has this amazingly gorgeous, 1,000-foot-long garden, we know for a fact that this garden was not primarily meant to furnish the table. We know that because from the beginning to the end of Jefferson's life at Monticello, we have record books kept by the women of his family, the white women of his family, recording purchases of large quantities of garden produce from slaves, and this is one of them right here. So Jefferson's garden was mostly a laboratory and an experiment. If something came to the table, that was great, but they were not relying on it. They had this very good backup plan that they had to use almost every week.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Tell me more about yourselves and what, when you woke up this morning or heard about this trip two weeks ago, you wanted to take away from it.

Teacher 1: Well, I teach fifth grade, so it's mostly U.S. geography, that's the emphasis for our course, so—

Teacher 2: Westward expansion?

Teacher 1: Yes, that's really—

Jacqueline Langholtz: Okay, so Lewis and Clark's why you're here? Great, okay.

Teacher 1: Especially the scientific discoveries and we're putting more of a science emphasis on the flora and fauna of different areas, too. So what their findings were and also what they found—yeah, I think it'll be very helpful.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Wonderful. Great.

Teacher 2: Is there information on the relationship with Jefferson or his time period with the Native Americans, because that's one of the things that we try to do as we move from region to region is that Native American element of that region.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Yeah. Yeah. So the question was the relationship that Jefferson specifically had with Virginia Indians?

Teacher 2: And his contemporaries.

Jacqueline Langholtz: And his contemporaries. Okay. Jefferson's own and only self-published book, his own book, Notes on the State of Virginia, would probably be a good resource and that's a primary resource there. That's a field that I think people are really just beginning to explore and learn more about, and I think you'll hear some different opinions about, what did that really honestly look like, and I think you'll see a lot more scholarship about that coming out, I hope so.

Teacher: Do you think that it was typical what Jefferson had here, was that a typical economy for a plantation in the South?

Elizabeth V. Chew: No. You mean the slaves—

Teacher: What you found in the—

Elizabeth V. Chew: Oh, yes, I do. Yes, I do, actually. I think Jefferson was unusual in what he said he wanted here was to use things like work incentives and not harsh punishment, that keeping families together made people more productive because they were happier. That was not typical.

Teacher: Right.

Elizabeth V. Chew: Yeah. But I think that the slaves raising gardens and chickens, perfect, totally normal. Slaves owning goods across the South, completely typical.

Teacher: Wow.

Elizabeth V. Chew: It's probably the thing that most people don't know about slavery, that is most surprising to them. That is absolutely the case. In the very very deep South, like Louisiana, and maybe even Alabama, it's less so, but in the Mid-Atlantic, the Carolinas, it's completely the way it is.

Teacher: And these are very high-quality goods that they had, then, would that have been typical as well, that they had—

Elizabeth V. Chew: It's what was available. You know, they're on the spectrum of things you could have. They're not at the very top. Jefferson has some Sevres porcelain from Paris, but he has this stuff also.

Teacher: Wow.

Elizabeth V. Chew: So it's sort of like your everyday china, as opposed to your grandmother's fancy china, but it's absolutely the same thing that any of the other

Teacher: And where would that have come from, from Europe as well?

Elizabeth V. Chew: Stores in the area. These would have still been English by this time, but they would have been available, widely available in stores in every town in the U.S.

Teacher: So, typical. Like Pfaltzgraff kind of.

Elizabeth V. Chew: Yeah, he could have gone to Charlottesville on Sundays and bought them. Merchants stayed open on Sundays so the slaves could come, actually. And they bought things like tablewares and then clothing, things like buckles and buttons and hooks for clothing that they would make themselves and fabric. Jefferson gave slaves basic food, two sets of clothing a year, blankets, and then cook pots when they got married, but people had a lot more than that, that they acquired through their own incredible ingenuity and entrepreneurship basically.

Teacher: That's interesting.

Elizabeth V. Chew: It took a lot, it took so much effort and ability to survive laboring like that.

Teacher: Is there any evidence that slaves worked with Jefferson intensely on his inventions and machinery?

Elizabeth V. Chew: Oh, yeah. That's such a good question.

Jacqueline Langholtz: What was the question?

Elizabeth V. Chew: Whether slaves worked with him. Slaves definitely made the plow. I think, he lived in this cerebral region of his brain that he never, hardly ever went out of. I think he just saw—he drew all these geometric models of how he derived it. I think he kind of felt it in the abstract and then he had slaves—made it, build it, and then try to use it. But they probably were not involved in the design decisions.

Teacher: Right. Because that would have taken a lot of skill to craft.

Elizabeth V. Chew: No kidding.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Well, I get these same feelings about what you see in the house, or even the Campeachy chairs, even the friezes. So Jefferson is—he's the one traveling, he's the one reading, and then he's saying oh, I want this in my house. And then you have John Hemmings and James Dinsmore. But John Hemmings, who has not traveled, who hasn't read about these—

Elizabeth V. Chew: Who wasn't educated.

Jacqueline Langholtz: Right, who wasn't educated, making 3D versions, bringing Jefferson's physical ideas to life. It's just incredible to me.

Teacher: Wow.

Suzannah Niepold: This is a very small exhibition called Inventing a Better Mousetrap, and it’s all about patent models of the type that would have been displayed here when this was the Patent Office Building. There is one case of “mystery patents,” where you’re just given one clue and you’re asked to figure out what you think the thing made. I want to start by breaking up into groups and having you try and guess. The goal of this is for you to be sort of conscience of your process—when you’re faced with an object, what do you look for? How do you try to reason out the purpose? And remember these are models, so the real thing could be much, much bigger, but does not have to be. [Visitors commence group discussions] [Group 1:] Speaker 1: Patent 1368. Speaker 2: It’s got little doors on it. It looks like a submarine almost. Speaker 1: Are there numbers on the windows on the other side? Speaker 2: Yeah, those are for the—I think those are for the schematic though, they’re not for the— Speaker 1: This correlates to that. Speaker 2: Cause there’s an eight on this door—Look at this door. And the portholes are clear. The copper bands to keep the pressure, but I’m worried I’m kind of locked into this submarine thing. I don’t know why I think it’s underwater, I don’t know what the invention might be. Speaker 1: 1858, so we’ve got— Speaker 2: Brooklyn. Speaker 1: St. Louis. Speaker 2: Well, the clue doesn’t help because I was thinking this was maybe the submersible to dig the pylons for the bridge. But what would "mayday" be? It has the top door, and then it has that. Speaker 1: Right, an extra door. And there’s nothing inside except little bits of wood. Speaker 2: Is it like a flare or something? Maybe it is just that size in the "mayday"? Like a signal flare? [Group 2:] Suzannah Niepold: Just try and figure out what it is. Speaker 1: You see that wire? Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, I was thinking it had something to do with that wire at the end. So those spools come in and it twists them. It’s an automatic fence builder; you’ve got the posts so it’s like— Speaker 1: Yeah, 'cause there’s the fence post— Speaker 2: And that you put the fence post in you see where that little hook is? You put the fence post in the slot, push it, and then the wire comes— Speaker 1: Oh, there you go, you see the little fence post receiver? [Group 3:] Speaker 1: Like a submarine cap, the helmets. Speaker 2: Incense or something like that? Potpourri? Speaker 3: Because, whatever that is…I know you all have talked about this, there’s a little lever. Speaker 4: Oh, I didn’t even see the lever. Speaker 2: That’s the ash maybe? Speaker 3: Yeah, or something. Speaker 4: That’s for a high or a low setting. Speaker 3: Oh, okay. Speaker 2: To let oxygen in or something. Speaker 3: The top thing looks like a lid. Do you think it was something that they would use to eat, or something to produce a smell? Speaker 4: It could be like potpourri? Speaker 1: I’m just thinking, like, to keep your food warm. Speaker 4: It’s functional. Like a food warmer. Speaker 1: Like, I don't know what it's called, it's not a crockpot. I can't remember what it’s called, but you put your food in it, you put your flame at the bottom and then it keeps the heat going. Speaker 4: The first microwave. Speaker 2: A chafing dish, is that what you’re thinking? Speaker 1: Chafing dish, thank you! Speaker 4: I have never heard of that before, I have no idea. Speaker 3: What material do you think it is? What do you think it’s made out of? Speaker 4: It looks like wood. Speaker 3: So if it’s made out of wood it's flammable. Is it wood? Or is it cast iron? The whole thing is iron. Speaker 1: Steel? Speaker 3: If it’s wood it’s going to burn. But I don’t think it's cast iron, I think it’s wood.

Suzannah Niepold: As I said, some of them are more difficult to figure out than others so the goal here was not necessarily for you all to get a right answer. But I’m curious what kinds of things, what kinds of questions did you ask yourself? What kind of information did you need to look for?

Speaker 1: Materials, what’s it made out of?

Speaker 2: Do you recognize any of the parts?

Suzannah Niepold: How else did you try and think things through?

Speaker 3: If it’s very ornate, it was made for people who had income to buy it. So some of these, like this one, it’s very decorated, painted.

Suzannah Niepold: So you meant audience as well, who was this made for? How about, can we go model by model? Group Number 1, what did you think your piece was?

Speaker 4: It’s a burglary system; it’s going to shoot bad guys if they open the door. You open the door, the gun shoots.

Suzannah Niepold: So with this one, you open the door, and the gun shoots. That is a yes. “Theft prevention device. When a thief or intruder entered from the other side of the door, the weighted chain attached to the door released the cocked hammer of the loaded pistol which discharged at the intruder.” The next one, I think, is one of the more challenging ones, 1888. Does anyone have any idea?

Speaker 5: We did it, right? Isn't that Number 2? It’s a fence builder.

Speaker 6: How could you tell?

Speaker 5: We thought it was a barbwire machine maker, because we saw the wire getting twisted, and then you see the wire is getting twisted around pieces of wood. And then you can just sort of see that it used that big hook to push the boards through after they get slid into the wire.

Suzannah Niepold: Yeah, you see the fence essentially coming out this end of the machine. Okay, that’s absolutely what it is. “This contraption automatically twisted the wires around the fence posts that were fed by hand into the machine. This is one of the few models that showed the finished product emerging from the machine.” So of course the real thing in this case would be a lot bigger. Number 3 is a bit of a trick question one. What did we think Number 3 was?

Speaker 7: We thought it was just like a mobile cotton gin. The fact that you say it’s a trick question—we didn’t get it.

Suzannah Niepold: Everyone is so familiar with the cotton gin that as soon as you see cotton, you go right to that. It certainly has to do with cotton, but it’s a cotton seed planter, rather than a cotton harvester that pulls the—it says, “The seeds were poured into the top of the planter; the pins on the rotating shaft prevented the seeds from clogging, while funneling them downward as the farmer pushed the planter along a plowed furrow.” Model Number 4, is the one someone pointed out as maybe made for a wealthier audience—less utilitarian, more attractive. Any idea what it was?

Speaker 8: We’re guessing a bad version of a crockpot? It has the little lever at the bottom so you can adjust what the flame is going to be and how hot it will keep your food. It has the opening at the top for the steam to come out. Or it could be for potpourri.

Speaker 9: It says “smell,” doesn’t it?

Speaker 8: So we were thinking like yummy food—

Suzannah Niepold: How’d you figure out the flame part? The bit at the bottom you connected to a flame—

Speaker 8: Are we right?

Suzannah Niepold: A little bit, not on the crockpot part, but on the flame bit.

Speaker 9: Is it an incense burner?

Suzannah Niepold: It is an incense burner. “A small oil burner inside the base ignited a fuse that was connected to a metal container under the removable cover of the urn. Powdered incense placed in the container then burned, emitting a pleasing odor through the openings in the cover.” Okay, Number 5 was the most challenging. What was your thought process? How did you try and tackle this?

Speaker 10: We started this by trying to figure out the shape and what it was made out of—and from there we just got lost and started talking about submarines and submersibles.

Suzannah Niepold: What led you from the shape of the materials to the idea of a submersible?

Speaker 11: The portholes, the metal bands around it. I think we got kind of sidetracked with this idea of pressure, it’s got a door. And then there’s this red herring, it was invented in Brooklyn. I got totally focused on this idea that it might have been a submersible to dig the support pylons for the Brooklyn Bridge. Then at the very end we were like maybe it’s actually this size? The clue was “mayday,” so I had zero idea. It has an opening hatch, as I was pointing out, but it also has a door on one side, the portholes are—

Suzannah Niepold: Scale is a huge challenge, right? As long as models have to be scaled for display, but it could be any size. So the answer is it’s a life-preserving container. “After the occupants,” so occupants plural, “entered the container through the door at one end it automatically detached from its fastenings on the deck as the ship sank. The floating container was fitted with three bunks for sleeping, compartments for water and provisions, and a sliding hatch cover on top that could be opened for light and air.”

So this was meant to be an example of object-based learning. How do you take an object when you have no idea what it is and kind of logic through what you’re doing. The process is a little bit different with art, as you may have seen. But you’re still sort of taking an object you don’t necessarily know the background information on and getting as much out of it as you can just by looking.

Briana Zavadil White: So, within the education department what we do is we use the portrait as a springboard into a conversation about history and biography, because the Portrait Gallery considers itself to be a biography, history, and art museum. So the art, the portrait, is always our focus, yet we're using that to get into a much deeper conversation.

The activity that we like to do is called a puzzle activity. You will need to share, and some of you will get your own. All right, this is what I would like you to do. In your pairs, or individually—depending on if you have a pair or you're working individually—just look at your puzzle piece, and try to identify what it is that you see. You're not trying to put the puzzle together yet, because we will get to that point; don't share with another group what it is that you have, just identify what it is that you're looking at. Okay? And then we'll go through in just a second.

[One group converses]

Speaker 1: [Unintelligible]

Speaker 2: It makes him seem really easy and relaxed.

Speaker 1: And interested in what he's saying. The other person over there, it's like he's not party to that conversation.

Speaker 2: Right, like he's focused on something else over here.

Speaker 1: Doesn't that look like he's looking at—maybe the city—

Briana Zavadil White: Just identify to the group what it is that you saw, but not showing anybody else your puzzle piece. Okay? Okay?

Speaker 1: Levers, wheels, some type of transportation tool? Lots of wood, and lots of levels—platforms—made of wood.

Speaker 2: We had a rug, a couple shoes—with feet and pant legs. And a map, or sketch of a building unrolled on the floor.

Speaker 3: I had what looks to be a blueprint sitting on an end table with a red rug on the floor.

Speaker 4: We have a meeting; there are many men involved. Two men are having an aside—one is turned to the other listening. There's something strange on the table, a metallic device, it looks like it's got tape through it; so we were wondering if it’s a telegraph receiver or something.

Briana Zavadil White: What do we know for certain about this portrait?

Speaker 5: That it's a formal affair.

Speaker 6: The signing of the Declaration of Independence or something?

Speaker 7: There's no women.

Briana Zavadil White: So it's a meeting, there's no women, it’s a formal affair, the signing of perhaps the Declaration.

Speaker 8: They look like prominent, powerful men; they have authoritative dress.

Briana Zavadil White: Okay, so their clothing is telling us that—again, this idea of formality—but also that they are prominent gentlemen.

Speaker 9: Movers and shakers.

Briana Zavadil White: We talked about the rug, there's some red drapery, right? And the marble pillars.

Speaker 10: There's the Franklin portrait.

Briana Zavadil White: There's the Franklin portrait.

Speaker 10: Which would mean that it's not the Declaration of Independence signing, but maybe it's inventors or industrialists.

Speaker 11: Maybe the period of Enlightenment, invention, science.

Briana Zavadil White: And you had said mid-19th century. Why did you say that?

Speaker 12: The clothing.

Speaker 13: No powdered wigs.

Speaker 12: The dark black coats that seemed to have been popular around that time.

Briana Zavadil White: Okay, okay. What do you want to do with it?

Speaker 13: Put it together?

Briana Zavadil White: Why don't we do it right there, in that open space?

[Attendees assemble puzzle]

Briana Zavadil White: What's the big "so what?" of a puzzle activity?

Speaker 14: If you did it with a class, they'd be questioning where things go, where things are placed, what's the significance of observing.

Briana Zavadil White: Okay, so observation [and] visual thinking. What else?

Speaker 15: Spatial awareness of where something's located within something larger.

Briana Zavadil White: Okay, and making inferences. Anything else?

Speaker 16: Working collaboratively.

Briana Zavadil White: The puzzle activity works really well when you choose a portrait that has a lot going on in it, like this piece does. It allows the opportunity to get into the individual pieces, because no one piece doesn't have a lot going on. Even the piece in the corner that sort of looks like a lot of just dark space, I mean, it's still an important piece of the puzzle.

Briana Zavadil White: What do all of these men have in common? Speaker 1: They've got to be inventors. Speaker 2: They're trying to make a decision. Briana Zavadil White: They have to be inventors, they're trying to make a decision. What visually in this portrait is leading you to believe "inventors" and, again, this idea of a meeting and trying to make a decision about something? Speaker 3: Blueprints, models. Speaker 4: Different things, like the gun could be a Colt; just all the different little contraptions, definitely the blueprints, and Franklin again, I think that's— Speaker 5: He's symbolic. Speaker 6: You've got the gentleman pointing at whatever it is, and it looks like the three of them together in the center are pointing at it. They may agree on something and the guy turning across the table to talk to the gentleman behind him…maybe there's two different ideas about what's going on. Speaker 7: I'm wondering though about the men on the left. The lighting is on them so they're significant somehow, but they seem on the fringe of what's going on. So I'm wondering why are they there and what impact do they have? Speaker 8: Or are they just the investors. Briana Zavadil White: Okay, okay. So this is interesting right? You're thinking that perhaps some of these individuals are investors. So again I guess the question would be, what do they allhave in common? Speaker 9: They don't look happy. Briana Zavadil White: Okay. Speaker 10: Well, they're all white males. Briana Zavadil White: What does that tell us? Speaker 10: They are leaders of some industry, because white, and they probably are property owners because they're making a decision and at this timeframe you had to own property to have any kind of power or authority. Briana Zavadil White: What does it say that Ben Franklin is in this portrait, but as a portrait within the portrait? Not physically among them. Speaker 11: It's past his time, but he's influenced the thinking or whatever is going on. Speaker 12: He's pretty much the "Great Inventor." He represents the spirit of inventing. Briana Zavadil White: Okay, so, it's past his time—which is starting to help us date this portrait a little bit; we know we're past 1795. He is above them, again as the Father of Science and Invention—the patron saint. Okay. What else? Speaker 13: This guy in the center is probably one of the lead authority figures in this group because his body is facing toward us, and his body scale is a little larger, seemingly, than some of the other ones—just the width of him. Briana Zavadil White: He's spread out, right? The way that the artist has positioned him we actually see his whole body, not profile. All inventors, right? So, we've got Franklin as the Father of Science and Invention watching over all of these men, okay? One of the reasons why we know that they're all inventors is because—this is when it all fits so nicely together for you as educators—because these men are placed in this portrait with their inventions, with models of their inventions. You've got the Colt Revolver; you've got McCormick's mechanical reaper; you have Goodyear's rubber soled shoes right here. I have had so many conversations—I was just having a conversation this morning with two of the Portrait Gallery's historians, and for the life of us, we just don't know what this is! This is the telegraph. We think that this is a model for a printing press. This is a sewing machine. And the carpet loom. And one of the reasons that we know that we're smack dab in the Civil War for this portrait is the facial hair. Think about it, Abraham Lincoln—with the facial hair—I mean, we're very much in that style. So, you've all been very curious about the individuals, and the lighting, and the way that they're faced, so here's my question to all of you: You are the preeminent inventors of the era; are you all going to have time to come together and have time to sit for your portrait to be painted? Group: No. Briana Zavadil White: No, absolutely not. So what the artist, Christian Schussele, has done in this portrait—just like he did with Washington Irving and his friends at Sunnyside right there—is he sketched them individually from life, so the connection between the artist and the sitter, and then brought them together in his imagination. Okay? So this is why we've got a little bit of strange lighting right here. It's also why most of these men don't necessarily seem to be looking at each other. I mean, they're looking in the same general direction, but it's not as if it's a straight-on conversation.

Speaker 1: It's like a memoir. Like it's telling about his history, not just that moment in time. Speaker 2: Somebody made it to show honor or respect to him. Was he president at the time? When was it painted, like right then or after? Briana Zavadil White: So even though we're seeing "Grant, 1863," the question is: Is this 1863 or not? Is it later? Speaker 3: I think it's later. Briana Zavadil White: It is later, it's 1865. Alright? So when you know that this is Grant at Vicksburg and it's 1865, what does that tell us? Speaker 4: Well, I mean, he was a failure. He was considered a failure in so many different ways. And looking at him, you know, Vicksburg was a big deal; it effectively split the South in two. So it was a big deal. You look at this and Hey, look, I am a— Speaker 5: But I think he looks sad. I don't think he looks like "I am—"; I think he looks sad. Speaker 4: He brought—he pulled himself back up. Speaker 6: The frame is black, and I find that odd—I don't think I've ever seen a frame at all like that. I mean, black is usually mourning. Speaker 7: Black and gold. Briana Zavadil White: My sense is that it's probably meant to contrast with the gold. We've got the acorns referencing oak leaves, and oak leaves are a symbol of strength, right? So it could be it's meant for the battles and for the acorns to stand out. Speaker 8: It's like somebody wants us to know that he's not a guy who just sits around and signs things, he is a man of action and taking charge of whatever. It's all done and now he's in the midst of this mess, not sitting in a tent waiting to hear how it turned out. Speaker 9: And I think his face—I do, I just see this poignancy in his eyes like glory has pain. That's that look in his eye. Speaker 10: The frame and his positioning in the picture makes it seem like he's trying to promote an agenda. Briana Zavadil White: I don’t necessarily know if the portrait was created for him. What I can tell you though is that the artist who created it, Ole Peter Hansen Balling—he was a Norwegian, I believe—he also created the portrait of John Brown that you took a look at out there. He also created Grant and His Generals, I saw some of you looking at it; it's that huge 10 by 16 portrait. This was an artist who did portraits on the side of the Union, right, and so he was commemorating. Especially with that portrait of Brown, that painting was created in 1872, long after Brown had been hung. In a way, I guess the question is: Are these portraits acting as propaganda? Speaker 11: With an agenda? Briana Zavadil White: Maybe a little bit. Right? Right?

Speaker 1: He's leaning forward like he's engaged, he's not passive. Briana Zavadil White: Okay, what else? Speaker 1: Because, you know, sitting is a passive act. Speaker 2: Also, even though he's in a suit, it's ruffled and it has the wrinkles in it. So that whole, common man, rail-splitter platform that he won the election with. Speaker 1: Even the cuff of his pants is caught up in his boot. Speaker 2: And that jacket being so crumpled in his chair. Speaker 1: His boots look a little worn, they don't look new. Speaker 3: There's a neat line that I thought of when I read—when I saw this picture; he said—they were talking to his law partner—"he had a slow but tenacious quality of his mind," [he] noted that Lincoln's "intellect worked not quickly nor brilliantly, but exhaustively. He not only went to the root of the question, but dug up the root, separated and analyzed every fiber of the root before he would come to a decision." Briana Zavadil White: I wonder what could you do—how could you make the connection with your students between that quote and this portrait. What could you have them do? Speaker 2: Pose it in a way that would represent them. Speaker 1: Make cartoon balloons of what he's thinking at that moment in time, because that would go with that thought process. Speaker 3: Yeah, he's certainly not thinking about what to eat for lunch. Speaker 4: I don't know, I think—some of the things that I read, like, at the Ford's Theatre talked about how these people were petitioning for places on his cabinet, and that he would listen to them, and that he's seen Sojourner Truth—it just seems like he was a listener. And that to me looks like he's almost listening to somebody talk attentively, he didn't brush people off—is what I kind of got the impression. Briana Zavadil White: So you're getting this feeling of him listening to somebody telling him something. Okay, interesting. Speaker 1: There's no accoutrements, there's no symbolism, there's no draped background, there's no mini log cabin on the floor. It's just him and the chair and the room. Briana Zavadil White: It lacks the objects, right? We know that there's a setting; it's most likely some sort of studio type of setting, right? But, again, like Sherman, we're forced to focus on Lincoln himself. So this particular piece—people always flock to it. It always strikes them for some reason, and maybe it's the pose, maybe it is that there isn't a lot of the extra stuff in it, but this particular image—which is by the artist George P. A. Healy—is actually a replica. Everybody knows the difference between a copy and a replica, right? A replica is a piece created by the same artist who completed the original, and a copy is a piece created by somebody entirely different. So here's the sneaky detail about this portrait, Lincoln had already died when Healey painted The Peacemakers. So he had to use a model, and then he used, mostly likely, photographs of Lincoln to create this likeness. Isn't that interesting? So, similar to the Brown downstairs—that portrait, like I said, is 1872—the artist had to use photographs from the trial to create the likeness. Alright, be in a position where you can see this portrait. Tell me about Lincoln's expression here. Speaker 2: At peace. Briana Zavadil White: At peace, what makes you say that? Speaker 2: He has somewhat of a smile on his face. Speaker 5: Relaxed. Briana Zavadil White: Okay. Does everybody agree that he has somewhat of a smile on his face. Speaker 4: He looks tired to me. Speaker 1: I don't think he looks peaceful. Briana Zavadil White: You don't think he looks peaceful. What's giving you the impression of him looking tired? Speaker 6: The eyes. Speaker 4: Yeah, I was going to say the eyes. And the shoulders are kind of slouched a little bit. He just looks tired. Speaker 1: His hair is just sort of ruffled around his ears. Briana Zavadil White: Kind of a bit unkempt, Lincoln is known for that certainly. Speaker 1: The big bags under his eyes. Briana Zavadil White: Okay. So we've got these bags, right, under his eyes here. And tell me about his cheeks. Multiple Speakers: Sunken. Briana Zavadil White: They're sunken in. What else? Speaker 1: His bowtie is askew. Briana Zavadil White: His bowtie is askew, isn't it? And it's always so interesting because this is a formal photograph, right? And yet, here we have Lincoln with his bowtie askew and his hair sort of a little disheveled, okay? It really is a true likeness of Lincoln because that's how he often was portrayed. Speaker 2: He looks like a common man. Briana Zavadil White: So, this is a photograph; where is the focus? Because we all can see a focal point, we also can see a blurred piece of the portrait. So what becomes the focus? Speaker 8: His face. Briana Zavadil White: Okay. Right really in the middle of his face, right? And then everything else gets blurred out from there. Speaker 3: The crack of the glass plate negative is a focal point though, too. Briana Zavadil White: Okay, and everybody sees that? Speaker 3: That wasn't intentional though. Briana Zavadil White: No, it absolutely wasn't. It absolutely wasn't. So is this—we certainly know, think about the plaster cast on the other side. You can tell that this is Lincoln, right, at the end of the war. This is February 5, 1865. This is one of the last formal sittings that Lincoln sat for. And this wasn't the only portrait of him that was created on that day in Alexander Gardner's studio, but the reason why this particular image was saved is because of that slight smile. Speaker 2: He did accomplish what he set out to do: he kept the Union together. And that was the goal. Briana Zavadil White: I want you to think about all of the photographs of Lincoln that you've seen. Do you ever see that expression? Multiple Speakers: No. Briana Zavadil White: No. The crack has taken on so much importance in contemporary times. But the reason why, again, the portrait was kept then, was because of the expression on his face. People talk now about how the crack is a foreshadowing of his assassination, and how it's separating North from South—but that's all contemporary ideas. Absolutely. I would urge you—and I saw that you have the Lincoln Smithsonian in your classroom, right? Did you get that? So the Portrait Gallery partnered up with the Center for Education and Museum Studies to create that issue. So in that issue you will have this piece, along with the life masks, as well as the Cooper Union carte-de-visite that I was telling you about downstairs. It really does provide a nice comparison between Lincoln at the beginning of the Civil War and Lincoln at the end of the Civil War. The other thing that you're going to get as well—and I think it's either on the CD or in your folder—is a lesson about the chronology of Lincoln. So I'm giving you about 20 different images of Lincoln spanning from I think 1857 to 1865 for your students to be able to consider that chronology and place—really place the portraits in order and to do it visually.