July 2022

 

Saving Monticello: The Newsletter

The latest about the book, author events, and more

Newsletter Editor - Marc Leepson

 

Volume XIX, Number 7                                                           July 2022

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

 

JEFFERSON LEVY’S 4th: Jefferson Levy, who lived in New York City during the years he owned Monticello (1879-1923), visited the house irregularly during the year. He made it a point, though, to spend Fourth of July at Thomas Jefferson’s house. And when he did, the always-social New Yorker hosted Independence Day ceremonies on the mountaintop. 

Levy invited his staff at Monticello and guests from Charlottesville to take part in the festivities. After 1889, Levy’s on-site Monticello superintendent Frederick Rhodes built catapults and scaffolds for displays of fireworks. Often, a band came from Charlottesville to play patriotic tunes.

Jefferson Levy would end the evening by reading the Declaration of Independence from Thomas Jefferson’s music stand in front of the guests assembled on Monticello’s West Lawn.   

The Independence Day tradition continues to this day at Monticello. It’s perhaps most famous for the swearing-in ceremony for new U.S. citizens that was added to the event in 1963. That’s President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the photo speaking at Monticello on July 4, 1936.

STATUE CORRECTION: A few weeks ago I came across new information about the larger-than-life, full-length statute of Thomas Jefferson that Uriah Levy commissioned in Paris from the noted French sculptor David d’Angers in 1833, and donated to the people of the United States—the one that’s displayed today in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda in the nation’s capital. 

In sketching the history of the statue’s journey from France to Washington, D.C., in Saving Monticello, I wrote that following Uriah Levy’s donation, U.S. House and Senate resolutions called for the statue to be displayed outside the Capitol’s East front (facing the Mall), but for “reasons that are unclear,” it was placed inside the Capitol, in the Rotunda. 

On February 16, 1835, a resolution was introduced in the House to remove the statue from the Rotunda “to some suitable place for its preservation, until the final disposition of it be determined by Congress.” After some debate, during which one member said that Congress should accept statuary only from “distinguished” sources, debate was cut off and no action was taken. 

“Sometime during the James K. Polk administration (1845-49),” I wrote, noting also that “the exact date is not certain,” the statue left the Rotunda, and was shipped up Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. There, with the permission of President Polk, David’s bronze Jefferson was placed on the grounds on the north side facing Lafayette Park.” That’s the statue in a photo above taken in the 1860s. 

I wrote, “not certain” because the only source I found that provided a date was a statement from Uriah Levy’s brother Jonas (Jefferson M. Levy’s father), in 1874 when he led an effort to get the rusting statue off the White House lawn and back to the Capitol.    

Turns out that Rosie Cain, a graduate fellow at the White House Historical Association, was digging through digitized old newspapers and came across a handful of articles and editorials that prove that the statue was moved to the White House North Lawn in April 1843. Which means that it the statue moved during the John Tyler Administration—not two years later under Tyler’s successor, James Polk, as I reported in the book. 

I did a quick search on the Library of Congress’ invaluable Chronicling America page—which contains hundreds of thousands of searchable newspaper articles from 1777 to 1963—and found a half dozen articles and editorials documenting that the statue did, indeed, move in the spring of 1843. 

Here are two examples: an editorial from May 24, 1843, Alexandria (Va.) Gazette, and a May 6, 1843, blurb from the Richmond, Indiana, Palladium that also appeared in a few other newspapers around the country. 

EVENTS: Just one appearance on tap for this month: On Sunday, July 16, I will be taking part in Fort Stevens, the annual Fort Stevens Commemoration event Washington, D.C., which goes from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

I’ll be doing a book signing and a brief talk at 11:30 on my book, Desperate Engagement, the story of the July 1864 Civil War Battle of Monocacy and Confederate Gen. Jubal Early’s subsequent attack on Washington, D.C., which centered on two days of fighting at Fort Stevens.

The event is free and open to the public at 6001 13th St. NW. It’s is sponsored by the Alliance to Preserve the Civil War Defenses of Washington. 

If you’d like to arrange an event for Saving Monticello or for any of my other books, email me at marcleepson@gmail.com

For details on other upcoming events, check the Events page on my website:  https://bit.ly/NewAppearances

GIFT IDEAS:  Want a personally autographed, brand-new paperback copy of Saving Monticello? Please e-mail marcleepson@gmail.com  I also have a few as-new, unopened hardcover copies, along with a good selection of brand-new copies of my other books: Flag: An American Biography; Desperate Engagement; What So Proudly We Hailed; Flag: An American Biography; and Ballad of the Green Beret: The Life and Wars of Staff Sgt. Barry Sadler.