![]() Beside designing Monticello, he also designed his own tomb. He was said to be no “public” speaker, but his ability to compose written works was exemplary. Jefferson was tall and thin, but athletic in build. Thomas and Martha Jefferson had six children together, but only two survived into adulthood: Martha, their firstborn, and Mary, their fourth. Needless to say, her dowry added to Jefferson’s already sizable fortune. It was not completed until after he was president. Eventually, he also met and fell in love with Martha Wayles Skelton, a recent widow and one of the wealthiest women in Virginia. Jefferson said of Wythe, “No man ever left behind him a character more venerated than George Wythe.” Wythe guided Jefferson through an extraordinarily rigorous five-year course of study (more than double the typical duration) by the time Jefferson won admission to the Virginia bar in 1767, he was already one of the most learned lawyers in America. There were no law schools at this time instead aspiring attorneys “read law” under the supervision of an established lawyer before being examined by the bar. Nevertheless, the serious and precocious Jefferson fell in with a circle of older scholars that included Professor William Small, Lieutenant Governor Francis Fauquier and lawyer George Wythe, and it was from them that he received his true education.Īfter three years at William and Mary, Jefferson decided to read law under Wythe, one of the preeminent lawyers of the American colonies. Jefferson was dismayed to discover that his classmates expended their energies betting on horse races, playing cards and courting women rather than studying. Although it was the second oldest college in America (after only Harvard), William and Mary was not at that time an especially rigorous academic institution. In 1760, having learned all he could from Maury, Jefferson left home to attend the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia’s capital. In 1757, at the age of 14, he took up further study of the classical languages as well as literature and mathematics with the Reverend James Maury. He began his formal education at the age of nine, studying Latin and Greek at a local private school run by the Reverend William Douglas. His father died when Jefferson was in his teens. The young Jefferson was the third born of ten siblings. His father, Peter Jefferson, was a successful farmer as well as a skilled surveyor and cartographer who produced the first accurate map of the Province of Virginia. His mother, Jane Randolph Jefferson, was a member of the proud Randolph clan, a family claiming descent from English and Scottish royalty. Jefferson was born into one of the most prominent families of Virginia’s planter elite. president, was born on April 13, 1743, at the Shadwell plantation located just outside of Charlottesville, Virginia. Thomas Jefferson, author of the American Declaration of Independence and the third U.S.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |