ery nice and encouraged us to come back the next day. We made it with enough time today! Madison and Jefferson were lifelong friends (Jefferson designed Madison's front door), so it was very appropriate to take our free time in the afternoon today to visit Monticello. We took a tour of his house and grounds and then walked down the mountain trail to see his grave. When we returned to the visitors' center, the security guards we had talked to yesterday actually opened up the new exhibit, which had closed already for the evening, so we could go in and see it! That was so nice of them. I wish I had more time to write about my visit to Montpelier, but since it is very late, I'll just put some pictures at the end of this blog.
We also heard a lecture today by David Marion, Director of the Wilson Center for Leadership, Hampden-Sydney College. He was fantastic! His explanations of Madison's reasoning were so clear and he had us look at many primary sources to back up his arguments. I just counted how many pages I used in my notebook to take notes on his lecture and I counted eleven pieces of paper, front and back! So that's 22 sides of a page! I really wish I had time to explain what I learned from his lecture in this blog entry, but it's too late at night. Perhaps tomorrow I'll have time to type it up. His lecture made me wish I were one of his students in college.
In the afternoon today, we had group discussions on some primary sources. Then we visited Gilmore Cabin & Freedman's Farm, a small cabin and farm that was owned by one of Jefferson's former slaves that was later freed. We also visited the Montpelier Station -- the train station the duPont family had built. The station has been restored to what it looked like in the Jim Crow Era -- there is a "white" door and a "colored" door. There is also a real post office in the station so I mailed some post cards today. A few other teachers and I left directly from here for Monticello.
I took a better picture showing the orange soil:
Make up your own caption for this one. I'd like to think Jefferson and I are looking into the future to see our amazing experiment in democratic government come true. Notice "Jefferson's" red water bottle by his foot. It was nice of the tour guide to lend him some water.
Posted by JENNIFER MITNICK at 6/29/2010 10:30:00 PM
Today was another fascinating day at Montpelier! In the morning we heard a lecture by Will Harris about Madison's thinking and his reasons for designing the Constitution in the way that he did. He also showed us a way of examining the Declaration of Independence. Professor Harris developed a theory which explains that the Declaration of Independence has a "symmetrical" structure. Picture a diagram of 7 rectangles -- like a bar graph. The outside two are the tallest. Then moving inward, each gets shorter until the shortest one is in the middle. Hence, the most important parts of the Declaration of Independence are the beginning and the end. The beginning unanimously gives us the name "The united States of America" and the end lists the signers' names. Then, moving inward from each end, you have the "theory of Constitution-making" (Locke's social contract theory) and the end proclaims us as "free and independent states." The next parts going inward on either side are the "He has...He has...He has..." parts. Then the middle is the "For...For...For" part. This was a very unique way of teaching the Declaration of Independence!
One part of the lecture I found interesting was when Professor Harris explained how Thomas Jefferson's house was also symmetrical, except that it was tall in the middle and short on the ends. The Declaration of Independence goes down in the middle -- hence, it's not a very good "house." In other words, it presents a very negative picture of government and lists all of the injustices the colonies have suffered under the British government. I thought this was a clever analogy.
After lunch, we had a walking tour of archaeology at Montpelier. The tour was led by Mark A. Trickett, Field Director of James Madison's Mont