Tuesday, August 7
Today
was our first marathon president day. We did five presidents, today and learned
a whole lot. We started a little slow with William Henry Harrison. All our
research said that his plantation in Charles City would open at 8:00. Even
the sign by the road said that. But when we got to the front door, it said
that it didn't open until 9:00. None of us were happy about the situation.
We did find a worker, but she was unable to help us until nine when others
would be there to cover the gift shop. So we just bought a couple of postcards
and went on to our next president, John Tyler. We figured that was for the
best, anyway, since Harrison was only in office a month before he died and
left the presidency to Tyler who finished his term for him.
Tyler happened to have his plantation, Sherwood Forest just 10 miles down the road. We really enjoyed this plantation (photo on left) more. Vienna really loved it too. Probably the highlight was the cats and dog we saw on the plantation. Yes, we are suckers for cute little animals. Poor predictable Wood family. We had a lovely self-guided tour around the grounds and then a guided tour of the mansion, which was very informative. The docent told numerous stories about the president and his life on the plantation. For instance, he was in the confederacy after his term in the White House and even withdrew his citizenship. He died not being a citizen of the US. His house was ransacked by the Union army but was saved from burning by another group of Union soldiers. Outside his mansion was a pet cemetary which was the final resting place for many Tyler pets.
After Tyler, we went on to Monticello - you know, that building on the back of the nickel. We never realized that until our visit. Monticello was really neat, too. A much more elaborate tour than we have taken so far. His mansion was very nice and we saw where he worked, the bed where he died, and the site where he is buried. He has three things that he wanted to be remembered for, noted on his epitaph - the declaration of independence, the document that declared the separation of church and state, and the University of Virginia, which he founded in his retirement years. He was a really neat man. Unfortunately, once we got back on the road, the only thing we were able to do for Zachary Taylor was a sign marking his birth home, I think. That was a short stop.
Finally,
we went to another plantation; this one for James Madison, called Montpelier
in Orange, Virginia (Andy's in the temple to the right). Again, it was a lovely
mansion and we learned some neat things about him that we didn't know before.
Mostly, I was impressed with his wife Dolly who saved many treasures from
the White House when the British burned it down in the war of 1812. She seemed
like such a warm and caring person and very hospitable. Can you believe that
we got all this done by 5:00? We were very impressed with ourselves. It helped
that all these sites were within an hour or two of each other. Not a lot of
drive time.
So, we ended off the day with a drive to Fredricksburg to get ready for James Monroe, tomorrow. We got a great deal on a Ramada Inn that had an indoor pool so we got a chance to relax with an evening swim and some TV. Andy and Vienna chased each other around the pool and I enjoyed the hot tub, too. Then, after a quick game of Foosball (quick because none of us knows how to play very well) went off to bed to get ready for tomorrow, another marathon day.