Jefferson Monroe Levy: Restoring Our History
Nineteen years had passed since Uriah Levy's death, and during that time, the estate had been transformed into a working farm, with pigs rooting in the flower beds, cattle grazing on the West Lawn and being stabled inside the house, and grain stored in the house. Jefferson Levy ousted Wheeler as overseer and began a search for a more appropriate caretaker.
In 1889 he found the highly competent and dedicated Thomas L. Rhodes. The two of them effected a thorough rehabilitation and restoration, purchasing Jefferson's furniture wherever they could find it, and even adding 300 acres to the property.
Levy served as a Congressman at times during the early 1900s and was encouraged by associates in Washington to turn the property over to public ownership. Though initially reluctant, in 1914 he offered the federal government the opportunity of purchasing Monticello, but after much congressional rhetoric on the subject, no funds were forthcoming.
Monroe Levy
In the depression following World War I, Jefferson Levy found it necessary to put the property on the market. On April 13, 1923 (the 180th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth), the Thomas Jefferson Foundation was formed in New York. The organization negotiated with Levy for the purchase of the property at a cost of $500,000, and has carried on to the present the tradition of preservation established by the Levy family.
The above text was condensed from an address, "The Levy Family and Monticello," written by the late Dr. Malcolm H. Stern, Genealogist at the American Jewish Archives, and delivered by Mr. Saul Viener at Monticello on June 7, 1985.