When the alarm clock rang at 6:00am on Monday May 17, 2021, I nearly jumped off the television stand and into the camera case due to pure excitement. Even though we had three hours to wait before Jefferson’s home opened, I was anxious to make the 10-mile trek up the mountainside to one of the most historic homes in our country – Monticello. When I visited Jefferson’s mansion in 2019, the weather was miserable, which made our exterior photos mediocre at best. In addition to the outdoor photos being hindered two years earlier, interior photography was prohibited altogether; which meant Tom had to candidly sneak an image of me standing near Jefferson’s bed. But what a different two years can make – the weather forecast for the day was perfect and interior images were now permitted. Combine those two factors, along with mansion tours being on a self-guided basis, and the day was shaping up to be possibly one for the ages.
The three of us arrived at the Monticello Visitor Center at 9:00am, but our tour of the mansion wasn’t scheduled until 10 o’clock; which gave my companions and I some time to visit the Jefferson museum first. In 2019, I was photographed alongside numerous items in the museum, and nothing seemed to have changed in the past two years. With that said, Tom proceeded to snap a few images of me posing next to some of Thomas Jefferson’s personal belongs – mainly because he’s constantly in search of the perfect photos and we needed to kill some time.
At one point during our time inside the museum, I laughed to myself when a security person arrived and examined a display case that I had leaned against. The case contained a small book that was once owned by Thomas Jefferson and my photographer had placed me on the acrylic case for a photo. Roughly five minutes after that image had been captured, the guy came into the room, immediately walked to the case, and then radioed to someone that he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. No surprise there!
The three of us boarded the shuttle bus to the mansion just before 10 o’clock and within a few minutes we were dropped off in front of historic mansion. After a short orientation conducted by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, we began the interior tour of Jefferson’s beloved Monticello. While there were 33 rooms inside the house, we were only allowed on the first floor and cellar – which was okay with my companions and I because we had visited the top floors on a “behind-the-scenes” VIP tour in 2019. In our minds, the “really good rooms” were on the first floor. Now sit back, enjoy the photos of my time inside Monticello, and let those images tell the story. Like Rod Stewart once sang: “Every Picture Tells A Story”.
Even though it seemed like my photographer and I were inside Monticello a very long time, in reality it took us only 20 minutes to stroll through the eight first-floor rooms that were open. After we made our way through the cellar, then visited the kitchen and Sally Hemmings’ room, Tom and I headed onto the grounds for some exterior photos of the mansion. While the COVID pandemic had made it difficult or impossible for us to visit certain Presidential sites in the past year, the virus was a definite benefit during our time at Monticello – there simply wasn’t a lot of people to get in our way. I posed at numerous locations around the East and West Entrances to the historic home, but it was the South Pavilion, or Jefferson’s “Honeymoon Cottage”, that seemed to be the most underappreciated by the folks who visited Monticello. In my mind, that two-story brick structure was a very historic and important part of Thomas Jefferson’s life; and it was a place I was honored to stand alongside.
Construction of Monticello began on the mountaintop in 1769 and Jefferson moved into the two-room South Pavilion in November 1770. After his marriage to Martha Wales Skelton on January 1, 1772, the couple resided in the small two-story brick ‘outbuilding’ until construction on the main house had progressed enough for the Jefferson’s to leave the “South Side” and move into the mansion. Thomas Jefferson was known to never be satisfied and he was always tinkering and making renovations to his home. Monticello as we know it today was finished around 1809. Please allow the following images to help you follow me around the grounds of historic Monticello as I try to walk or stand in the footsteps of Thomas Jefferson.
During our three-plus hours inside Monticello and on the grounds, I saw nearly every inch of the mansion’s exterior and took two self-guided tours of the interior. Seconds after I had posed on the East Entrance portico, Mongo walked up and asked the woman guarding the door if we could take a second tour. She quickly looked around and said to the three of us: “There’s no one else ready to go in and it’s not crowded inside, so go ahead. Please don’t tell anyone that I let you back in a second time.” At first, Tom and Bob intended to use the second interior tour to look at the rooms and furnishings with their eyes instead of through the lens of a camera, but that didn’t last long. As a matter of fact, during ‘Tour Two’ I was placed on the wooden floor in The Cabinet next to Jefferson’s bed, which gave me the opportunity to stand in the footsteps of Thomas Jefferson in the place he loved the most. And in the Dining Room, I was honored to stand on the original wooden Tilt-Top Tripod table that was made by John Hemmings and used by Jefferson during some of his meals.
Following our second tour, my companions and I made one last walk around the grounds near the mansion before we headed down a small pathway that led to the Monticello Graveyard. Once we arrived just outside the sturdy iron fence that guarded Jefferson’s tombstone, Tom held me through the bars where I posed near the tall granite obelisk that marked the 3rd President’s grave. While the original obelisk that once stood over Jefferson’s remains was in Columbia, Missouri (I visited that tombstone in 2019), the current monument contained the same inscription as the original – an inscription that listed Thomas Jefferson’s greatest achievements, at least in his mind: Author of the Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom; as well as the Father of the University of Virginia. The most surprising and heartbreaking story about Thomas Jefferson was the fact that he died in debt – he was so broke that his heirs had to sell Monticello and his possessions to pay off his debts that exceeded $100,000 at the time of his death. I wished that I could’ve stood on Jefferson’s final resting place and paid tribute to our greatest President. In my resin-filled heart, I knew he would’ve approved.
While Tom carried me down the quarter-mile pea-stone pathway that led us to the Visitor Center, I stood in the camera case and thought about the past three hours and what I had experienced. I’ve never felt so close to Thomas Jefferson at any time or anywhere during this amazing eight-year journey I’ve been on. Jefferson’s presence was everywhere inside that house; and I was blessed to have been there with him.
With my photographer behind the steering wheel of our Rogue and Mongo barking out directions, the three of us headed down Jefferson’s mountaintop, past James Monroe’s Highland, and south for just over eight miles until we arrived at another Presidential home – Albemarle Estate that was owned by Donald Trump. When we finally made it to our destination, the entrance gate to the estate’s mile-long driveway was locked. In a last-gasp effort to gain entry onto the property, Tom used the intercom near the gate; but his usual persuasive plea fell on deaf ears. The young woman had sighted security reasons for declining our request – our visit was finished before it began. It was disappointing – I had stood at the threshold of Trump’s Oval Office in 2019; but I was denied access to see the exterior of his glorified winery. Tom and Bob found a clearing in the trees along Carter’s Mountain Road where they saw Trump’s impressive place off in the distance. Perhaps some day we’ll come back and I’ll be allowed to pose in front of the Albemarle Estate. If not, that was okay, too – Trump’s Charlottesville home wasn’t high on my list of places I desperately needed to visit. Donald Trump may have been President; but he was no Thomas Jefferson. I’ll take Monticello over Albemarle anytime.
In my mind, it would’ve been cool to pose outside of Albemarle Estate and stand where Donald Trump stood when he opened the place in 2015. It didn’t take long for me to forget about our recent failure, however, because we were headed to another Thomas Jefferson home. Nearly 90 minutes after we bid farewell to the Charlottesville area, I watched from an opening in the camera case as Tom guided the Rogue down the long driveway to a place we had visited in 2019 – Tuckahoe Plantation. As the three of us made our way on foot towards the historic two-story H-shaped home, we walked past a family who had just finished their tour. We were alone on the grounds of Thomas Jefferson’s childhood stomping grounds. Two year’s earlier, my companions and I had taken a house tour; but on that Monday in May, we just showed up unexpectedly to walk the grounds and to see the exterior of the house where young Jefferson grew up. But there was another surprise upon our arrival – two border collies met us at the gate and they seemed anxious to see the three of us. As a matter of fact, Mongo found a tennis ball lying in the yard and he played fetch with the two dogs for nearly ten minutes. Pearl and Tilly followed us around the property during our entire tour.
When the original owners of Tuckahoe, William Randolph III and his wife Maria, died a year apart in the mid-1740s, Thomas Jefferson’s parents (Peter and Jane) left their Shadwell Plantation and moved their family to the Richmond area to care for the Randolph’s orphaned children. At the time of the move, the future 3rd President was two years old and he lived at Tuckahoe until age nine. As we walked the historic grounds where Thomas Jefferson lived and played as a young boy, I thought about my first tour of Tuckahoe when I was photographed inside the house. Those thoughts quickly left my resin-filled head, however, when we arrived at the east side of the historic home. Located roughly 100 feet from the plantation house was a small, one-room schoolhouse where Thomas Jefferson learned to read and write for the first time. I had vivid memories of standing on the original floorboards of that schoolhouse where I envisioned the young red-headed Jefferson, with pencil in hand, writing his ABCs for the first time. Tuckahoe Plantation didn’t seem to be as famous as other plantation houses in Virginia, but it definitely held its own with its unique and rich history. It was a true hidden gem.
It was nearly 5:00pm when we made it back to the parking area and to our vehicle. The weather had been hot all day and my two companions were exhausted. As Tom and Bob sat in the vehicle’s air conditioning, Mongo made reservations at the Best Western Executive hotel that was located about 10 miles from Tuckahoe near Dumbarton, Virginia; a suburb of Richmond.
Once my travel mates had their stuff transported from the Rogue to our hotel room, they decided to venture out to a nearby Chinese eatery. But when Tom and Bob arrived at the China Wok that was located roughly five miles from the hotel, they immediately changed their minds when indoor seating was unavailable due to COVID protocols. When my friends mentioned to the owner they needed a place to dine inside, the friendly Asian American quickly pointed the three of us in the direction of a place he thought they would enjoy – the World of Beer Bar and Kitchen. And he was right – Tom and Bob had a table on the WOB’s outdoor patio and each enjoyed an amazing meal. What I thought was funny was neither guy drank a beer in the World of Beer; and I think their server Micailah found that interesting as well – although she didn’t harass them. When my mind centered on Tom’s beverage choice, while I stood silently inside the camera case, I thought maybe photographer should dine at the World of Diet Coke instead!
The three of us returned to the hotel room at roughly 7:45pm where my friends relaxed for a couple of hours before the lights went out. I stood at my usual spot near the television where I couldn’t help but think of Monticello and my time inside that sublime mansion. After an hour or so, my thoughts turned to John Tyler’s Sherwood Forest Plantation where we were scheduled to tour the following day. In 2019, the three of us walked the grounds, but we never made it inside the house – mainly because Tom was denied permission to take interior photographs. But again, what a difference two years can make. On April 19th, when my photographer reached out to the caretakers of the historic Tyler mansion, Tom was flabbergasted when Annique Dunning granted him permission to capture an image of me posing in a single room of the house – and we had our choice of rooms, which was even more incredible. Throughout the rest of the night, I had wondered which room Tom would choose. In my mind, it didn’t matter; although I was somewhat concerned about The Grey Lady – which was the name of the “resident ghost” of Sherwood Forest. Would my photographer place me on the staircase where the infamous ghost had been seen in the past? I certainly had hoped not!
