If you get a chance, you really should visit his home in Charlottesville, Virginia. Do NOT miss the museum there, which describes which architecture books or classical buildings he took ideas from. The dome is from the Temple of Vesta in Rome, but he had to adapt the design to his existing house which made the dome slightly longer on one axis. Jefferson used trigonometry and pencil-and-paper calculations (to 1/100,000 of an inch!) in his detailed design.
I was impressed in how he designed systems to channel rainwater away from where it otherwise might pool and cause rot. It's very ingenious. He also had a document copier, and corresponded with Eli Whitney about Whitney's patent application for the cotton gin. Reading the letter gives a sense of his unbridled curiosity.
More travel pictures later, but if you are anywhere nearby, this is worth a detour.
I loved the clock he made just inside the Main Doorway (and the fact that he made a mistake in his calculations and had to cut a hole in the floor to make room for the mechanism to work). I've never made a mistake like that (well not in the last 5 minutes anyway.) Made him real to me.
ReplyDeleteAmazing genius, no question. And the clock is something else... :-)
ReplyDeleteTemple of Vespa? Images of Toad riding into the vending machine in American Graffiti?
ReplyDeleteDiffer, fixed. I blame autocorrect.
ReplyDeleteCharlottesville, not Chancellorsville.
ReplyDeleteStill, it's a great place to visit. I haven't been to Monticello since 1978, but we are planning a trip there this fall.
We were there once and I would go back if I could. We also visited a smaller home nearby, "Poplar Forest" or something like that.
ReplyDeleteJFK was hosting a dinner for Nobel Laureates and said, “This is the greatest assembly of intellect in the White House since Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
ReplyDeleteJuvat, he designed the clock years before he designed the house. It's said that he used to say that he built a house too small for his clock.
ReplyDeleteRoy, thanks. Fixed. Busy day today.
There were giants in those days.
ReplyDelete