Presidential Houses - Part 1, Montpelier

Ever since we moved to Maryland we have been talking about going to Monticello. This October we finally made that happen. But why settle for just one Presidential house when you can have three?

We began our tour of Presidential homes at the home of James Madison, Montpelier.

Madison was our fourth president, and he is also known as the Father of the Constitution. He spent much of his life studying governments and helping to form our fledgling nation. We owe much of the Constitution to his ideas. Madison was the author of many of the Federalist papers which helped spur voters to ratify the Constitution. He also introduced the Bill of Rights.

Madison's house has had an interesting life. It started out fairly modest and then grew. At one point it was a duplex with Madison's parents living on one side of the house and James and Dolley living on the other. Jefferson's Monticello inspired Madison to put the portico on the house, and Jefferson designed the entryway that you see below.

Our tour guide at Montpelier. She was so awesome.

Madison met Dolley in Washington when he was serving in Congress. After he became president, Dolley really helped to define what the role of the First Lady would be. She was apparently very politically savvy. Madison was the president during the War of 1812, and Dolley also gets the credit for saving the White House's big portrait of George Washington before the British burned the capital.

Madison had an amazing view from his front door.

After Madison died the home fell into disrepair. Madison was in debt when he died, partially because the presidents at this early period in the country's history had to fund everything themselves--their travel, the White House parties. It was expensive to be the president. Currently the home is being restored to its 1836 state. The architectural restoration is complete and they are working on furnishing  the house. You can go down to the archeological site to see what new, old things are being discovered.

Beckett and Felix hanging out in the temple.

This is Madison's outdoor study. I insisted on calling it a folly. It fits perfectly into the tradition of 18th century gardens and landscaping.  I guess it wasn't purely decorative because they did keep all their ice far underneath the temple. Apparently Dolley really liked oyster ice cream. This was in the very early days of ice cream.

The Annie duPont Formal Gardens just behind the house are stunning.

We then took a walk through the James Madison Landmark Forest. It was a bizarrely warm October weekend. It looked like fall, but it felt like summer.

In 1901 William and Annie duPont purchased Montpelier. (Yes those duPonts.) They enlarged the house significantly and preserved the grounds. Big horse people, they built a race track that still hosts horse races today. They also convinced the railroad to build a Montpelier stop so that William could commute to Delaware. Their last surviving heir willed the house to the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

B in front of another train station.

We loved visiting Montpelier. The tour was superb. The kids survived it. The grounds were pretty, quiet, and peaceful. 

After our tour of Madison's home we drove into Charlottesville. There we got everyone ice cream (but not oyster ice cream) for good behavior in the big house.

B ate some too, but Felix eating ice cream is cuter.

P.S. Interested in the War of 1812? Trips to Fort McHenry here, here, and here.