Saving Monticello: The Newsletter
The latest about the book, author events, and more
Newsletter Editor - Marc Leepson
Volume XXI, Number 4 April 2024
DANIEL P. JORDAN, 1938-2024: There’s no doubt in my mind that Saving Monticello would not have been the publishing success it’s been without the generosity and graciousness of Dan Jordan, who led the Thomas Jefferson Foundation from 1985-2008, and could not have been more helpful to me as I researched and wrote the book in the late nineties and after it came out in the fall of 2001.
Dan, who died at 85 on March 25, and Susan Stein, then as now Monticello’s senior curator, were my guiding lights at the Foundation.
They always took the time and
effort to answer my questions, made great research suggestions, and paved the
way for the Foundation’s most-welcome and extremely important support of the
book, which continues to this day.
Among many other things for which I will be eternally grateful, Dan hosted my very first book talk and signing at the old Monticello Visitor’s Center in late October 2001. Dan and Susan were extremely welcoming when we arrived on the mountaintop the afternoon of the talk and at the event itself. I can still see Dan sitting attentively and proudly in the audience.
Dan regularly wrote to me during the next seven years while he headed the Foundation. That continued after he retired, as he shared always-positive thoughts with me on the book’s success, on this newsletter—which he subscribed to—and on “The Levys of Monticello,” Steven Pressman’s great, award-winning 2022 documentary inspired by my book, in which Dan appeared. That’s him below in the Jefferson Library in a still from the documentary.
Daniel Porter Jordan, Jr. was born in Philadelphia, Mississippi. He was a standout baseball and basketball player at the University of Mississippi, majoring in English and history. He received his BA and his MA in history from Ole Miss, where was elected president of the student body.
He trained in Army ROTC at Mississippi and went on active duty after getting his MA. After getting out of the Army, Dan earned a Ph.D. in history from the University of Virginia in 1970. After that, he taught U.S. History, specializing in the colonial period, at the University Richmond and at Virginia Commonwealth University before accepting the job as the head of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation in late 1984. He became the first historian to lead the Foundation.
You can find lots more details on Dan’s life and work at Monticello in the excellent obituaries by Richard Sandomir in The New York Times and Harrison Smith in The Washington Post at https://bit.ly/NYTJordanObit and https://bit.ly/WPJordanobit
Championing the Levys’ Cause
I am so thankful to Dan for his steadfast support for my work—and for championing the Foundation’s recognition of the Levy Family’s crucial 89-year stewardship of Monticello. Dan’s advocacy on behalf of the Levys began not long after he accepted the job at the Foundation.
I told that inspiring story of Dan’s role in recognizing the Levys in Saving Monticello, and it’s worth summarizing here. Dan filled me in on the details when we sat down 25 years ago to discuss how it all came about. He told me that a month after he began his official duties on the mountaintop on January 1, 1985, his friend Saul Viener—a Richmond businessman, biblical scholar, and historian, and the founder of the Southern Jewish Historical Society—wrote to Rabbi Malcolm Stern in Norfolk to relay the news that Dan was the new head of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation.
“A wonderful choice,” he wrote to Rabbi Stern, who did pioneering work in Jewish-American genealogy. “When I phoned him congratulations, he brought up the Levy family!”
Viener, Stern, Virginius Dabney (the Pulitzer-Prize-winning editor-in-chief of the Richmond Times-Dispatch), and Irving Lipkowitz, a longtime Richmond lawyer who also had championed the Levys, soon thereafter “began working on Jordan,” in Stern’s words. Dan corroborated that when we spoke.
“Almost immediately after the announcement I started to hear from various Jewish friends—some were imminent scholars and some just had an interest in history—as well as from Virginius Dabney,” Dan said, “all with the same message: namely, that an important story was not being told at Monticello.”
His friends convinced him. “I looked into it. What I was told was correct," Dan told me. “I went to the [Foundation] Board and asked about it. The Board, I think, was genuinely naive. No one could recall, in their opinions as trustees, any issues or controversies. But all agreed that we needed to find a way to tell an important story.”
Rabbi Stern helped the Foundation contact several Levy descendants, and on June 7, 1985, family members and several dozen guests took part in a joyful commemorative ceremony at Monticello.
Dan welcomed the guests, saying the occasion marked the beginning of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation’s recognition of the Levys’ “good stewardship” of Monticello.
“This morning,” he
said, “we are pleased to honor the Levy family who, for the better part of a
century, owned and preserved this priceless estate, which is perhaps unique in
our land for its combination of historic significance and scenic beauty.”
Edgar Bronfman, the head of World Jewish Congress and CEO of Joseph E. Seagram & Sons, made the principal address. Bronfman, who owned a large estate in Albemarle County, had agreed to speak at the behest of Saul Viener and Dan Jordan.
In his remarks, Bronfman focused on Thomas Jefferson and Uriah Levy. Monticello, Bronfman said, “was rescued from destruction by a Jewish-American naval officer whose own fiery independence led him through a highly successful but storm-tossed career in the service of his country.”
Following a scripture reading by Charlottesville’s Temple Beth Israel’s rabbi, and a prayer from Louis C. Gerstein of New York City’s Sephardic Congregation Shearith Israel (the nation’s oldest Jewish congregation where Levy family members worshipped), Levy descendant Harley Lewis unveiled the new plaque (in photo below) at her great-great grandmother’s grave.
Since that auspicious day, the Foundation has taken many other steps to recognize the Levy family’s important role at Monticello. That includes an exhibit in the Robert H. and Clarice Smith Gallery at the Visitor Center and the updated, illustrated marker at Rachel Levy’s grave. (in photo below).
Rescuing the story of the Levys at Monticello was but one of Dan Jordan’s many other accomplishments as head of the Foundation. As Jane Kamensky, the Foundation’s new president, wrote after his death:
Dan Jordan “was the most consequential president on the Mountaintop since Jefferson himself. It’s no exaggeration to say that everything we understand about modern Monticello stems from Dan’s long, fruitful, and collaborative tenure as President of the Foundation, for more than thirty years, beginning in 1985.
“A historian with a deep belief that scholarly excellence must drive visitor experience, he presided over the creation of the [International Center for Jefferson Studies], Getting Word, and the Jefferson Library. He then followed the scholarship where it led: to the acceptance of Jefferson’s relationship with Sally Hemings, in many ways the backbone of the interpretations we share today.”
Ann Lucas, Monticello’s Senior Historian Emerita, has put together a stirring tribute to Dan and his work at Monticello on the Foundation’s website at https://bit.ly/DanJordan It includes words of remembrance of Dan as a scholar, leader, and as a person from past and present Monticello staff and scholars. I am honored that Ann included my words in that group.
I proudly repeat my last sentence here: Dan Jordan was, in every respect, a great man.
EVENTS: Save the date: The pub date for my next book, The Unlikely War Hero, a different kind of Vietnam War POW true story, is December 17. You can get a sneak preview at https://bit.ly/PrePubInfo
I have three in-persons events this month. On Sunday, April 14, I’ll be doing a talk on the Huntland book with the architectural historian Maral S. Kalbian, my indispensable collaborator, at Foxcroft School in Middleburg, Va., followed by a tour of the Huntland estate, stables, and kennels. It’s a fundraiser for the Virginia Piedmont Heritage Area. The event is sold out.
On Wednesday, April 17, I’ll be taking part in a panel discussion. “The Life and Legacy of Francis Scott Key, Class of 1796,” at St. John’s College (FSK’s alma mater) beginning at 7:30 p.m. It’s free and open to the public. Details at https://bit.ly/FSKPanel
On Thursday, April 25, I’ll be doing a talk on the life of Key, based on
my biography, What So Proudly We Hailed, at the Glebe Retirement
Community in Daleville, Virginia. For more details on these and future events, please
check the Events page on my website: marcleepson.com/events
THE 11th PRINTING: My friends at the University of Virginia Press tell me that the
paperback Saving Monticello, which the Press began publishing in 2003
after the Simon & Schuster hardcover went out of print, will be going into
its 11th printing. The paperback now is on backorder until physical
copies come off the presses.
In the meantime, if you would like a new paperback of Saving Monticello, I have a few on hand,
along with a few as-new used hardcovers.
To order those
books, or the recently published hardcover of Huntland, go to this page
on my website:
https://bit.ly/BookOrdering or email me at marcleepson@gmail.com
I also have
a stack of five 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 SM
Newsletter on Line: You can read back issues of this
newsletter at http://bit.ly/SMOnline
