I’m about to subject you to an essay on why I eschew visits to historical sites. I’m still working this out in my head. I concede that some of what you’re about to read is not fully formed thought, and my opinions may change as I work through it. If you’re not interested, just skip to the photos!
Facing the prospect of a tour of the home of another founding father, I’ve been confronting my aversion to American historical sites and asking myself why I so dislike them. I’ve been able to come up with four reasons.
First, I am not particularly interested in how people lived in the eighteenth century because frankly, life in the eighteenth century seems pretty miserable. Certainly, there were positives about eras passed—closeness to nature, a less complicated existence, a cleaner environment, a more predictable (if, perhaps, more boring) pattern of life. And I agree that life in the twenty-first century—with its pollution and noise and heightened awareness of violence and struggle and misery—has not yet reached an idyllic state, but lacking our conveniences, being at the mercy of the elements, corseting ourselves into societal norms and expectations—I find these thing to be memories happily left in the past or in the pages of books.
I’m also not much of a “Rah! Rah” fellow. The snob in me eyes anything “popular” with suspicion, it’s true, but also I am wary of the kind of mob mentality that erodes a critical analysis of the past. That Jefferson believed in the equality of all people but still owned slaves, for example, is an interesting dichotomy that was glossed over on yesterday’s tour with, “He was a complicated man.” I realize that it’s hard to explore that kind of complexity during a tour of his home (and doing so without sounding like a pedant is even harder), and I understand that many or even most people don’t want to evaluate critically how Jefferson might have sustained those seemingly opposing points of view, but that lack of critical interest is precisely my point. Unlike perhaps most consumers of historical tours, I don’t want to hear, “He was a complicated man” in one breath followed in the next by, “He saw domes on stately buildings in France and knew he wanted one for his home.” I’m not willing to “ooh” about the dome but dismiss the complexities. Perhaps that’s why I enjoyed our conversation with a volunteer after the tour so much. She pointed out that Jefferson was America’s biggest advocate in Europe and wanted Monticello to be an example of why America is a strong and as cultured as Europe. Suddenly, the dome wasn’t a vanity that Jefferson added to the house to make it look more continental but rather was another way for him to say, “Yes, American’s can do this, too.”
Third, I think that there’s a scent of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” around many historic sites. Dan I were just talking about this, and he summed it up pretty well. There is a significant difference between the values of historic sites like the White House, the Capitol, and Independence Hall and those like Monticello and Montpelier. As Dan said, “Jefferson lived there. So what?” by which I think he meant that few tangible events happened at Monticello itself to advance humanity. Jefferson thought about things at Monticello, but he did something at Independence Hall. Independence Hall represents a coming together of thought. The underlying point that I’m trying to make is that when we label many things as having “historic value,” the value of all of those things is lessened; the White House becomes just one more stop on the tour. Another way to think of it is that overvaluing some sites propagates the tourism “industry,” in the worst sense of the word.
The last reason that I struggle with historical sites (limiting my discussion to “American” sites may be unfair; they do comprise most of my experience, though, so I don’t have a lot of choice) is a bit touchy. Many of the sites our society seems to consider culturally important are located at points of extreme violence. For me, that creates a couple of difficulties. For one thing, the association with violent acts—the Arizona Memorial, the Vietnam Memorial, and most recently, the 9/11 Memorial—makes those sites (to me) monuments to violence. Don’t misunderstand me; I’m not saying the 9/11 Memorial celebrates violence. But sites like these commemorate acts that I don’t particularly want to invoke in such visceral ways.
I also can’t help but view historic sites where violent acts occurred as pins mapping where humanity failed to unite. When I was at the Arizona Memorial a few years ago, I felt like the prevailing attitude was a divisive, almost xenophobic, “They did this to us, and we kicked their asses for it.” I found the experience to be indescribably sad not only because of the lives lost on the ship and during the war but also because of the apparent lack of intellectual and critical growth on the part of human society between 1941 and 2009.
I’ll spare you a summary while I continue to ponder my attitude toward historical sites. In the meantime, on with the show.
We had lots of plans for today. Alex and Mark were talking about going to a winery. Dan and I were going to kayak on the lake. All four of us have been talking about playing miniature golf since we arrived. In the end, we went to James Madison’s Montpelier, stopped at a barbecue joint that Dan liked and wanted to visit again and then came back to the cabin and took naps. Sigh. It is vacation after all.
I liked the house at Montpelier much more than I liked Monticello even though we got to see much less of it. Montpelier was in the hands of the DuPont family for decades; only recently did it become a public site and renovations to return it to its original form begin. It was a more livable house, I think; less of an architect’s Frankenstein and more of a family home.
I didn’t care as much for the grounds, though. They included a formal garden that was well maintained and very nice, but the plantings weren’t as various as those at Monticello, and I tend to like less formal gardens. I also found the tour to be more representative of the kinds of tours that I don’t like. I felt like we were very much getting “the spiel” about the house and less about the people in it and their ideas. The large tour group and the fussy child didn’t add to the experience. Because of the so-so grounds and the fact that, like Monticello, photos in the house were forbidden, I don’t have many photos from Montpelier, but here are a few.
After we left Montpelier, we stopped in Gordonsville at a barbecue joint for a late lunch. I think Dan is mad at me because, again, I didn’t eat. It was late in the afternoon, I wasn’t particularly hungry (I’d been eating chocolate-chip cookies all day; thanks, Alex!), and I didn’t want to spoil my supper. He’ll get over it.
Tonight, Alex cooked up bacon-cheese fries and chicken nachos from our leftovers. Delish! Now, we’re all getting ready for bed and an early start home tomorrow. I doubt I’ll have an entry tomorrow since the day will consist pretty much entirely of the drive back to Columbus, but if anything fun happens along the way, I’ll let you know.
