April 2021

 

Saving Monticello: The Newsletter

The latest about the book, author events, and more

Newsletter Editor - Marc Leepson

 

Volume XVIII, Number 4                                                              April 1, 2021

“The study of the past is a constantly evolving, never-ending journey of discovery.” – Eric Foner

 

A ‘PURPOSEFUL LITTLE WOMAN’: I am no fan of Maud Littleton, the Long Island socialite who in 1909, after a visit with her husband, Martin Wiley Littleton, to Monticello decided that Jefferson Levy had no right to own Thomas Jefferson’s “Essay in Architecture.” Two years later, she mounted a national campaign to convince Congress (Martin Littleton was a member of the House from New York) that the government should confiscate the property and turn it into a government-run house museum.

In her well-funded and well-organized campaign, Mrs. Littleton, as she was referred to in the press, unfairly attacked the Levy family in barely concealed anti-Semitic terms (calling them “aliens” and “outsiders,” for one thing). She also based the campaign on the falsehoods that Levy was turning the house into a shrine to his uncle, Uriah P. Levy; that he never allowed people to come on the grounds; and that he kept made it difficult for Jefferson family members to visit his gravesite. Not to mention calling Monticello—which Jefferson Levy had repaired, restored, and preserved for more than thirty years—a “poor, neglected, forsaken home.”

Mrs. Littleton (above) knew how to work the news media—which in the early twentieth century consisted exclusively of newspapers—and received much favorable press. However, some of the extensive coverage of her 1912-17 fight to wrest Monticello from Jefferson Levy was decidedly condescending and sexist. I included quotes from two such editorials in Saving Monticello, and recently came across other examples primarily thanks to the ever-expanding Library of Congress online digitized historic American newspaper database called “Chronicling America.”

An editorial, for example, in the February 26, 1014, Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, contained an  egregious description of Mrs. Littleton’s campaign to wrest Monticello from Jefferson Levy as “hysterical prodding by a lady from New York.” Another, in the April 1, 1914, Newport News, Virginia, Times-Herald, lambasted her movement as little more than an idle rich woman’s crusade for headlines.

“Mrs. Littleton,” that editorial pontificated, “is not averse to the applause, and she is winning.” Her “agitation gives Mrs. Littleton something to do, which she can do brilliantly, and it draws upon her the attention of the nation, which she seems to enjoy with great complacency. Perhaps it’s more fascinating than bridge.”

The Fort Wayne (Indiana) News on January 9, 1917—just three months before the U.S. entered World War I and Congress dropped the Monticello matter—bashed Mrs. Littleton in a strongly worded editorial the blasted her movement for trying to force Jefferson Levy to sell Monticello to the government.

Not bothering to mention Maud Littleton or her female supporters by name, the newspaper decried “certain women” who were looking for “some means of getting themselves before the public,” and who “began to squawk quite dolorously that Mr. Levy should be forced to relinquish the property and that the federal government should take it over.”

A feature article ran in several newspapers four years earlier, in January 1913, when Mrs. Littleton was working full time lobbying Congress after the House in December 1912 had defeated a bill that would have set in motion a government takeover of Monticello. The article—headlined, “Brings Dismay to Congressmen Who Oppose U.S. Ownership of Monticello,” in The Rock Island (Illinois) Argus of January 22, 1913—was written by Robert F. Wilson, evidently a Washington correspondent.

It focused on Mrs. Littleton’s campaign to gather signatures on petitions from across the country and then put pressure on members of the House representing those districts to vote to take over Monticello. Calling Mrs. Littleton “a purposeful little woman,” Wilson wrote that she had become “a constant source of amusement to the legislators.” After the House had voted down the proposal to confiscate Monticello in December, Wilson wrote, “the fair crusader only lifted her perky chin a bit higher and declared bravely that she had only begun to fight.”

Going through my own files, which I compiled more than twenty years ago, I found a copy of a pro-Jefferson-Levy editorial in the March 24, 1914, Charlottesville Daily Progress with a strongly worded pro-property-rights tinge that lambasted Mrs. Littleton—and Native Americans.

“We know nothing about Mrs. Littleton’s antecedents,” the editorial announced, “but the way she has trailed [Jefferson Levy] seems to indicate that she is of aboriginal strain. She has tracked him down not because he ought to be tracked down and scalped, but because of the zest she has for the chase, and the ambition she has for the scalp—the one thrills the blood, and the other adorns the person.”

********************

PHILIP L. LEWIS, 1923-2021: Dr. Philip Lewis, a great-nephew of Jefferson Monroe Levy, died March 5, at age 97. Born and raised in New York City, Dr. Lewis graduated from Dartmouth College and Albany Medical College in New York.

While serving as a captain in the U.S. Air Force at Lowry AFB in Denver, he founded the base’s first pediatric clinic. He went on to a nearly 60-year career as a prominent Denver-area pediatrician. Dr. Lewis, whose grandfather, L. Napoleon Levy, was Jefferson Levy’s brother, also was a clinical professor at the University of Colorado Medical School—and, according to his son Steven Lewis—the last of his generation of descendants of Uriah and Jefferson Levy.

I was struck by the words of remembrance by former patients and family friends on legacy.com and tributearchive.com

One acquaintance, Regina Mitchell, wrote: “What an incredible man with a gentle and caring soul. Dr. Lewis cared for my four children from birth to his retirement. He treated his patients like family.”

Another, Matt Haligman, said: “Phil was my family’s childhood doctor and I actually looked forward to my annual physicals, shots and all! Dr. Lewis had such a calm demeanor and was always interested in your life and activities. He was like the Mr. Rogers of doctors.

“I’m 62 now, but to this day I still use Dr. Lewis as a role model for taking good care of yourself. He was a wonderful person and he always made people feel good. Literally and figuratively.”

My deepest condolences to Steve Lewis and the family.

EVENTS: None scheduled this month. Something could pop up, though, so stay tuned to the Author Events page on my website, https://marcleepson.com

GIFT IDEA:  Want a personally autographed, brand-new paperback copy of Saving Monticello? Please e-mail me. I also have a few as-new, unopened hardcover copies, along with a good selection of brand-new copies of my other books.

The SM Newsletter on Line: You can read back issues of this newsletter at http://bit.ly/SMNewsLtr