Some tell stories of Thomas Jefferson’s encyclopedic interests and achievements. Others of a house bustling with visitors and family members. Objects reveal the stories of enslaved people who lived and worked at Monticello. Taken together, they paint a picture of a young nation exploring new liberties and wrestling with old injustices as it expanded its boundaries, both geographical and philosophical.
Gallery of Objects
POLYGRAPH - Jefferson was a gadget lover, and the polygraph — seen in his Cabinet — a two-pen copying machine, was among his favorites. Using what he called “the finest invention of the present age,” Jefferson made copies of many of the roughly 19,000 letters he wrote during his lifetime. It’s a commonly held misconception that Jefferson invented the polygraph. Instead, the device was invented and named by Englishman John Isaac Hawkins, who assigned his American patent rights to Charles Willson Peale before returning to England in 1803. Jefferson was one of Peale’s most eager clients, purchasing one for the President’s House and one for Monticello. He soon exchanged these machines for new ones as Peale continued to perfect the design — often according to Jefferson’s suggestions. Five years after Jefferson acquired his first polygraph in March 1804, he wrote, “the use of the polygraph has spoiled me for the old copying press the copies of which are hardly ever legible … I could not, now therefore, live without the Polygraph.”
BUST OF ANNE CARY RANDOLPH BANKHEAD - English artist William Coffee visited Monticello numerous times to sculpt a group of family portraits, of which this bust of Jefferson’s granddaughter Anne Cary Randolph Bankhead is one of only two that survive. Jefferson wrote that the artist “has been for some time an intimate with us at Monticello, having been engaged in making the busts … of myself and all the grown members of our family.” Anne’s portrait, done in terra cotta c. 1820, shows a fashionably dressed young woman with a pensive expression. When she died at the relatively young age of 35, family members described how Jefferson “abandoned himself to every evidence of intense grief.” Bankhead’s bust, and that of her sister Cornelia, now stand in their mother’s Sitting Room, private and feminine counterpoints to the busts of Jefferson’s friends and American heroes who loom large over the Tea Room.
ORRERY - In building his remarkable collection of scientific instruments, Jefferson acquired an orrery from London craftsman William Jones. After it arrived at Monticello in 1793, Jefferson used the “New Manual orrery and Planetarium” to study the relative motions and positions of the solar system. The device, the same model as Jefferson’s and made by the same maker, stands 10 inches tall and features rotating arms capped with spheres of ivory or brass representing the planets. The orrery also includes a tellurium, used for the study of the rotation of the Earth, moon and sun. The various pieces, which could be easily lost (note the ivory Earth is a replacement), survive in their original, lockable mahogany box. This small but significant instrument is set up in the Library, revealing Jefferson as a man of science and reason.
THERMOMETER - For more than 50 years, Jefferson was a systematic weather observer, and Monticello was the focus of his efforts to understand the American climate. His practices and those of National Weather Service observers today are basically the same: to measure precipitation and to record the daily temperature range. Made to Jefferson’s specifications in 1788, this thermometer had to perform well for the occasional experiment. Jefferson probably mounted this thermometer outside his Cabinet window and referred to it when taking his near-daily weather readings. In his autobiography, Dr. Robley Dunglison recalled the remarkable fact that Jefferson “considered one of the best times for taking the observation to be three o’clock in the morning.”
REVOLVING STAND - The famous polygraph machine and its counterpart, the revolving stand, are now understood to be part of a larger group of furnishings Jefferson assembled to implement his personalized correspondence system. When closed, the revolving stand looks like a wooden cube on an adjustable base, not readily revealing its purpose. Once opened, it becomes clear that its five wings are meant to hold multiple documents and small books upright for reference. Most often situated next to his writing table, the stand enabled Jefferson to access drafts, reports, and letters to be answered efficiently and simultaneously, much like a computer desktop today. The stand was designed by Jefferson to uniquely suit his needs, and a reproduction base was recently built after the discovery of exciting new evidence. The ink-stained top reveals that he also used it for writing, as one early commentator noted that it “was used by Mr. Jefferson as a writing-stand, and on which yet remain some blots of ink which declared their independence of his pen.”
CLOTHES PRESS AND BEDROLL - On July 6, 1828, Jefferson’s granddaughter Cornelia Randolph wrote to her sister about their dying aunt, Anne Scott Jefferson Marks, who lived at Monticello during the last 17 years of her life. In her letter, Randolph wrote: “Scilla has nursed her through the whole with a care & attention as unwearied as it is watchful, bearing patiently with the fretfulness & ill humour of disease & discomfort, sleeping in her room at night & watching by her during the greater part of the day; she has spared us much.” Scilla was an enslaved woman who spent much of her life caring for Marks. The reproduction bedroll in this room calls to mind the countless nights Scilla spent watching over the sick, at the expense of her own comfort. Marks’ clothes press, which is next to the bedroll, was probably made in the joiner’s shop at Monticello, evidence of the range of work executed by just some of the enslaved workers there.
BATTLE ROBE - During their epic journey to the Pacific Ocean, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark sent a Mandan battle robe to President Jefferson in 1805 from their winter encampment at Fort Mandan in present-day North Dakota. Though the original robe no longer survives, Mandan-Hidatsa hide painter Dennis Fox created this battle robe in 2002, based on an example in the Peabody Museum at Harvard. Historians have called Monticello “mission control” for the 28-month-long adventure that took Lewis and Clark into the wilds of the American West. As president, Jefferson secured funding from Congress for the expedition in hopes of establishing trade with the Native American peoples of the West and finding a water route to the Pacific. Jefferson showcased Native American objects and natural history specimens that Lewis and Clark sent back to him during their journey in his newly completed two-story entrance Hall at Monticello, which he called his “Indian Hall.”
MARTHA JEFFERSON RANDOLPH’S SEWING BOX - The private rooms upstairs offer a glimpse of what life was like for Jefferson’s family and the enslaved house servants, but little is known about the objects used in these rooms during Jefferson’s lifetime. One notable exception is Martha Randolph’s (Jefferson’s daughter) small sewing box, a copy of which is on view in her Bedchamber. The fragile and precious original is on loan to Monticello from a descendant. When Randolph’s box arrived back at Monticello in 2014, it was filled with remarkable personal items. The contents included ivory sewing implements, tiny notes and a lock of dark hair — a rare time capsule of what was meaningful or useful to the owner.
CAMPEACHY OR SIESTA CHAIR - Jefferson has traditionally been associated with Campeachy chairs, an adaptation of a classical form that has ties to both colonial Mexico and New Orleans. He is credited by contemporaries with introducing “those Spanish Chairs” to Washington, D.C., when president. Over the next 20 years, Jefferson owned imported examples, as well as versions made by enslaved carpenter John Hemmings. This chair is probably one of the Louisiana imports. Plain but reliable, it saw hard use at Monticello, necessitating iron reinforcements that may have been wrought in a shop on Mulberry Row. Jefferson commented on how comfortable he found his “Siesta chair” because the semirecumbent posture eased his aches and pains. Today, visitors can sit in reproduction Campeachy chairs at Monticello, experiencing the ease that Jefferson so favored.
SILVER COFFEE URN - One of the great neoclassical objects at Monticello is the diminutive silver coffee urn that Jefferson acquired in Paris in 1789. This beautifully proportioned vessel is ornamented with leaves, swags made of husks, and a rosette situated where the spigot joins the body. A year earlier, Jefferson ordered “cups for tea, coffee and chocolate of East India porcelaine,” indicating his understanding of the etiquette surrounding the polite rituals of the table. The coffee urn was probably used in the Tea Room—the irony of which was not commented on by contemporaries.
TJ’S SPECTACLES - Jefferson first purchased reading glasses in Paris in 1789, at the age of 46, and probably began wearing them in the 1790s. In 1806, Jefferson collaborated with a Philadelphia optometrist to make these spectacles with extremely narrow lenses, inspired by Benjamin Franklin’s glasses. In 1812, at nearly 70, Jefferson’s vision declined to require the use of glasses at night and other pairs for reading fine print. His prescription corrected for nearsightedness — an optometrist measured Jefferson’s lenses at +2.75 for the left lens and +1.75 for the right.
FINGERPRINTS IN BRICK - In a recent talk, Monticello historian Niya Bates reflected on the difficulty of remembering the violence of slavery amidst the beauty of Monticello. However, the bricks of the big house carry the memory of the labor and handiwork of enslaved craftspeople. Bates showed a poignant photograph of fingerprints in a Monticello brick, posing the question: Were they left as a memory by an enslaved person, to remind others that he or she was there?
PARQUET FLOOR - Irish immigrant James Dinsmore made the beech and cherry wood floor in the Parlor. He became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1798 and began working as a master carpenter at Monticello. Assisted in his efforts by an enslaved man, John Hemmings, Dinsmore created much of the stunning woodwork at Monticello. Jefferson likely based his design for the parquet floor on examples he had seen in France. When the floor was first installed, the contrast between the rich red cherry wood and the golden blonde beech would have been more striking than it appears today. Beeswax was the only substance used to bring out the color of the woods.
KITCHEN CLOCK - The maker of the tall case clock used in the Kitchen assured Jefferson that “the workmanship is good, and the regulation nearly perfect.” Precision was essential because the clock, represented by a copy today, helped enslaved cooks at Monticello keep time while preparing fine sauces and other French-inspired cuisine. Isaac Granger Jefferson, an enslaved blacksmith whose mother had been a cook, described how Thomas Jefferson went into the Kitchen only when it was time for him to wind the clock. It was later sold “as is” at the Monticello Dispersal Sale in 1827. The carpenter who repaired the case said “the smoke has punctuated the wood and [it] has the appearance of having been scorched by fire.” His observations indicate that the Kitchen was hot, congested and acrid with smoke, a difficult work environment for the enslaved cooks who turned out daily meals for the house.
CONCAVE MIRROR - Not much is known about how Jefferson stored his large collection of scientific apparatus, because they were too numerous and valuable to have sat out permanently in his Private Suite. One possible exception is this concave mirror, which could hang neatly on the wall. Acquired in 1806, at a time when Jefferson was actively conducting experiments, he sent to London for “a 12. Inch concave glass mirror in a plain black frame.” This unusual mirror served to concentrate “auxiliary light” on objects being studied under a microscope. As the years went by, Jefferson gave some of his instruments to his grandsons, and the mirror, which caused unintended delight by showing people and scenes upside down, was moved to the Hall and later sold. Treasured by a legion of owners over the years, it returned to Monticello in 1961. It once again resides in the Cabinet, where Jefferson conducted many of his experiments.
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: BINNS ENGRAVING - Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence when he was 33 years old and kept the rough draft, “scored and scratched like a schoolboy’s exercise,” at Monticello all his life. Counting the Declaration first among the achievements for which he wished to be remembered, Jefferson said the words weren’t his alone, but were “an expression of the American mind.” Along with an engraving of John Trumbull’s Declaration of Independence that hung in Monticello’s Hall, Jefferson also owned at least three different prints of the document itself. Newspaper publisher and printer John Binns sent a proof of his print to Jefferson in 1819 soliciting comments. Jefferson wrote that the print’s “great value will be in it’s exactness as a facsimile to the original paper.” Jefferson’s prints of the Declaration were dispersed among his family following his death in 1826, and none are known to survive today.
MRS. JEFFERSON’S BUREAU - Inherited by one of Jefferson’s granddaughters, this mahogany chest of drawers is now recognized as “Mrs. Jefferson’s Bureau,” a piece of such importance it was singled out in Septimia Randolph Meikleham’s (Jefferson’s granddaughter) will and labeled with care to preserve its history. Made in Virginia around 1770, the graduated drawers would have contained Martha Jefferson’s clothes and trimmings, while the pullout slide made letter writing more convenient. It was a stylish, expensive and multifunctional piece, perhaps a gift from Jefferson to his bride. Rather than pass this heirloom along to one of his daughters, which would have been the tradition, Jefferson kept it close by in his Bedchamber, a sentimental connection to his wife, who died in 1782. Today, it survives as one of the earliest and most storied objects at Monticello, situated in Jefferson’s Bedchamber as he intended.
There are more than 5,000 items in Monticello’s collection, many of which are on display. Here are just a few of the things waiting to be discovered at Jefferson’s Monticello. We hope you’ll visit us soon to see these objects — and more — for yourself.
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