The Weaving Chronicle: Poplar Forest: In Winter or Summer

Image 1: Personal Photo

I just visited Thomas Jefferson’s retreat home, Poplar Forest. This is not the first time I have visited this historical site, I took my future wife there for one of our first dates. I have deep fondness for this location. Furthermore it has some fantastic exhibits to offer despite its relative small appearance. When you drive up to the home you are greeted by a group of buildings there is the house itself, smaller than Monticello, but exhibiting similar Jeffersonian characteristics. There is the admissions and gift shop, a small classroom, where tours gather to go to the house. Finally the archeology exhibit, displaying artifacts found from digs on the property. Three things the museum does very well are the house tour, the enslavement community tour, and its winter program called Winter Reflections Weekends.

I have gone through many presidential house tours but Poplar Forest is the most fun I have ever had in a president’s house. This partly because of the shape of the house, Poplar Forest is an octagon. No other building quite captures Jefferson’s genius for architecture than Poplar Forest. You enter into the front door and going through the entire house. The most unique quality of the house is that it is not finished. Historians and master builders are attempting to restore the house using the plans and tools of Jefferson’s era and in some cases using wood from the property itself. After seeing the beautiful semi-finished product in the first half of the house, you are escorted into the second half. The second half has been left to mostly unrestored for educational purposes and this is the most interesting part of the tour. You get to see behind the plaster and discover some of the building practices of the early 19^th century.

Image 2: jeffersonia.wordpress.com

The second program at Poplar Forest that I enjoyed greatly was the Enslavement Community Tour. A tour that explores the lives of the enslaved peoples that lived and worked on Poplar Forest. This is not a unique program, similar tours are offered at Monticello, Montpellier and Mt. Vernon. I confess this was the first Enslavement Community Tour I have ever gone on, but from my limited experience Poplar Forest does a good job of introducing the guests to the lives of these enslaved people. One could tell that the museum had done a great deal of research providing their guests with names of these people and not merely saying “there would have been a cook here and a stable boy there.” The tour shows their guests locations that the slaves would have worked and artifacts that the slaves would have used. Poplar Forest does not shy away from the controversial nature of slavery and that one of Virginia’s most famous figures practiced it, instead they welcome the discussion, an important attitude to have for any historian and historical site. The Enslavement Community Tour is new to Poplar Forest only being developed last spring, but it is well conceived.

The last program to mention in this blog is their Winter Weekends. Poplar Forest is closed for the winter except on the weekends. As opposed to the regular tours of the house where a docent walks the group through each room of the house, Winter Weekends offers a semi-self-guided experience. There are two docents in the house to answer questions but the guest may browse the many plaques and exhibits. One of the best things about this program is the hands on experience this program offers. In the parlor the southernmost room of the house one can lounge in a Campeachy chair or play a game of chess. My day was made when I was able to dawn a pair of white gloves and actually touch some two hundred year old books.

Poplar Forest is one of my favorite historical sites not only because of my personal experiences but because of the many opportunities for historical discovery. I would recommend it to schools as a great location for a field trip or for a young family to spend a day trip in winter or summer.

http://www.poplarforest.org/