Encyclopedia
Mulberry Row
Mulberry Row was the industrial hub of Jefferson’s 5,000-acre plantation and center of work and domestic life for dozens of free and enslaved people.
Organization of the Monticello Plantation
Organization of the Monticello Plantation
Thomas Jefferson's landholdings in Albemarle County totaled some 5,000 acres. Measuring approximately eight square miles, the Monticello plantation's landscape featured wooded hills, two small mountains, rolling pastures, streams and the Rivanna River, which provided waterpower to Monticello's mills and — thanks to Jefferson's dredging efforts – a waterway to the markets in Richmond and beyond.
Mulberry Row
Mulberry Row—a 1,300-foot-long section of the road encircling the Monticello house—was the hub of the plantation. Over time, it included more than 20 workshops, dwellings, and storage buildings where enslaved people, indentured servants, and free black and white workmen lived and worked as weavers, spinners, blacksmiths, tinsmiths, nail-makers, carpenters, sawyers, charcoal-burners, stablemen, joiners, or domestic servants. Mulberry Row changed over time―structures were built, removed, and re-purposed―to accommodate Jefferson’s changing plans for Monticello.
The Greater Plantation
To manage his vast estate, Jefferson divided the land into separate "farms."
Monticello mountain was the plantation's "home farm." Outlying lands were divided into manageable parcels known as "quarter farms" and were run by resident overseers. Thomas Jefferson's quarter farms were Tufton (adjacent to Monticello), Shadwell, and Lego (both north of the Rivanna River, which bisected his landholdings). Jefferson sought to further organize his farms by dividing them into agricultural fields of forty acres each.
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![A drawing of Shadwell looking toward Montalto with Monticello to the right (marked with a small o above it) and Jefferson's mill on the Rivanna to the left.]()
EncyclopediaShadwell
Thomas Jefferson was born in 1743 Albemarle Co., VA, at Shadwell, his father's plantation which later became part of Monticello.
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![Map of Tufton]()
EncyclopediaTufton
Tufton farm was one of Thomas Jefferson’s quarter farms and borders the Monticello plantation and is now home to the Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants.
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![Modern black-and-white map of Albemarle County depicting several river and mountain systems as well as the locations of several places important to Thomas Jefferson]()
EncyclopediaLego
Lego was one of the Monticello plantation's four quarter farms.
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EncyclopediaPantops
Pantops was one of Jefferson's "quarter farms" that subdivided the Monticello plantation, consisting of land he inherited from his father, Peter Jefferson, and subsequently given as a dowry to his daughter Maria Jefferson Eppes.
Map (plat) of the Monticello plantation by Thomas Jefferson, 1806 (N209; K168 recto), courtesy the Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society
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![A modern-day painting by Nathaniel Gibbs depicting several enslaved workers cutting, stacking, and loading wheat onto a cart driven by two oxen.]()
PageWork on the Monticello Plantation
A look at the various kinds of work that occurred on Thomas Jefferson's Monticello plantation with links to further information about each task.
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![A line of 20 enslaved men, women, and children, walk in pairs with two horseman, one at the line's font and one at its rear, holding whips. At least one pair of men appear to be bound together at the wrists.]()
PageTreatment
Find out how violence and coercion supported the American slave system and how Jefferson tried to mitigate slavery's violence.
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![A small drawing of too enslaved men and two enslaved women carry sheaves of wheat in front of an overseer holding a whip in between notes the artist had been making about the weather.]()
PageEconomy
Find out how Virginia's local and global markets and economies determined how slavery functioned at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello plantation.
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![Watercolor of 16 enslaved men and women, each carrying some kind of item on their heads or shoulders with side notes by the artist on what the various character are doing.]()
PageLabor
A look at the topic of labor at Monticello, including the size of Jefferson's workforce, the types of tasks it completed, and the breakdown between hired and enslaved workers.
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![Details from a sketch by Thomas Jefferson of plans for a row buildings and spaces, including a "Joiner's Shop," a "Timber yard," and "Carpenter's Shop"]()
PageSkills
A look at skilled labor at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello and the role it played the development of the plantation and in the lives of its free and enslaved workers.
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![A watercolor depicting the Haitian uprising showing buildings on fire, people lying in the streets and being chased as they run to a harbor and the safety of a ship.]()
PageResistance
Learn more about the different ways enslaved people resisted the dehumanizing effects of slavery at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello.
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