Chapter 10
The Building Campaign of 1825

The little of the powers of life which remains to me, I consecrate to our University. If divided between two objects it would be worth nothing to either.

—Jefferson

Funds Still Needed

Shortly after the first of the year the proctor estimated that $25,000 was needed to finish the Rotunda,⁽⁶⁶⁹⁾ not counting the $5,000 owed for work already performed at the building,⁽⁶⁷⁰⁾ and Jefferson figured that another $5,000 would be required to erect the Anatomical Hall.⁽⁶⁷¹⁾ Knowing that the university lacked those funds Jefferson recommended leaving the Rotunda in its unfinished state "for the present" rather than risk "renewing the displeasure" of the Virginia legislature by hinting of additional aid.⁽⁶⁷²⁾ In early March Dinsmore & Neilson calculated the "Probable expence of finishing the wood work of the library Room and finding the materals" to be $3,000, "exclusive of the Columns," which would demand another $2,000. Supposing another $1,000 for "Plast & Paintg," the firm reckoned that it would cost $6,000 to finish the Rotunda's dome room.⁽⁶⁷³⁾ With the approach of spring when Jefferson was engaged "in preparing a general view of the state of our finances on the 1st. day of January last," he wrote Brockenbrough: "I have had so many terrible rides to the University lately that I must now ask the favor of you to take one to this place to confer with me."⁽⁶⁷⁴⁾ The resulting financial statement, dated 15 March and sent to the members of the Board of Visitors exactly one month later, accounts for $29,713 and shows that on the first day of 1825 over half of the university's funds were allocated for items other than construction costs, such as "Ordinary current expences" and professors' salaries. In fact, the only future building expense included in the statement is the $6,000 estimate for finishing the "Library room" that Dinsmore & Neilson had submitted to the proctor a few days earlier.⁽⁶⁷⁵⁾

Professors Expected

The surviving records reveal little of the other remaining tasks that surely must have need to be completed over the winter as the university awaited the arrival of the professors and the opening of the school to its first class of students.⁽⁶⁷⁶⁾ When the first week of the new year passed without bringing the last of the foreign professors to the university Jefferson became almost frantic that his cherished institution would not open as scheduled. He confided to Joseph Carrington Cabell: "We are dreadfully non-plussed here by the non-arrival of our three Professors. we apprehend that the idea of our opening on the 1st. of Feb. prevails so much abroad . . . that Students will assemble on that day, without awaiting the further notice promised. to send them back will be discouraging, and to open an University without Mathematics or Natural philosophy would bring on us ridicule and disgrace. we therefore publish an advertisement stating that, on the arrival of these Professors, notice will be given of the day of opening the institution."⁽⁶⁷⁷⁾ Professors Bonnycastle, Key, and Dunglison, along with the wives of the latter two, had embarked on the Competitor at London in October 1824 but unfavorable winds had kept their vessel from sailing out of the English Channel for six weeks, and it was February before the vessel dropped anchor in Norfolk.⁽⁶⁷⁸⁾ A week later the party was greeted in Richmond by enthusiastic university supporters, but before the professors and their wives could begin the trek to their final destination severe winter weather forced them to sit still for several more days.⁽⁶⁷⁹⁾

University Opens

When word of the professors' long-anticipated arrival in Virginia reached Charlottesville, Brockenbrough issued a proclamation that the University of Virginia would open on 7 March 1825.⁽⁶⁸⁰⁾ Before that date, however, Jefferson concluded that the lateness of the season necessitated the issue of another notice informing potential students that for the present year they could enter the university at any time.⁽⁶⁸¹⁾ Although Jefferson was eager to open the university, the buildings still lacked, among other things, sufficient mattresses and lamp oil.⁽⁶⁸²⁾ Nevertheless, thirty or forty students had arrived at the university on the day of its official opening, and by 12 April Jefferson could boast to his future grandson-in-law Joseph Coolidge, Jr., of Massachusetts that the number had risen to sixty-five. "I wish they may not get beyond 100. this year," Jefferson wrote, "as I think it will be easier to get into an established course of order and discipline with that than with a greater number. our English Professors give us perfect satisfn. the choice has been most judiciously made."⁽⁶⁸³⁾

Brickwork at the Rotunda

In March, Thorn & Chamberlain resumed brickwork at the Rotunda, where a sizeable amount of brickwork apparently remained to be completed, in the early spring.⁽⁶⁸⁴⁾ On 13 April, Jefferson's eighty-second birthday, Brockenbrough wrote to John Hartwell Cocke to complain about two slaves that Cocke had sent from Bremo to the university to help in the brickmaking.⁽⁶⁸⁵⁾ The young men, Brockenbrough said, "are so small—I fear they will not be able to stand the work of the season—My intention is only to work one table—the Moulder whom I have employed is an Irishman and will work by the Thousand, consequently will be (every day) a great days work (say three thousand bricks per day) I shall keep the boys for a few days on trial (to day they are much fatigued with the walk of yesterday—I wish very much tho' that you will send me two larger boys say Frank and another of the largest size we had of you before . . . It is probable Capt Perry will take the two boys if you wish, and will send me two other I will hire them to him."⁽⁶⁸⁶⁾ When drafting a year-end report that reviewed the expenses of maintaining the institution's fifteen-member hired labor force and overseer for one year, the proctor estimated that in 1825 the laborers had made between 800,000 and 900,000 bricks for the Rotunda, "in addition to the other labour we have performed."⁽⁶⁸⁷⁾

Macadamized Roads

The construction work that took place at the university during the rest of the spring and summer, and into the fall of 1825, must be viewed through scanty records. Although the process of building was winding down, Jefferson was as eager as ever to turn his inventive mind toward a novel approach, and accordingly he directed his attention towards the feasibility of laying macadamized roads for the streets and alleys that criss-crossed his Academical Village. For some time he had "heard and read a great deal" about the road-making method of John Loudon McAdam, the Scottish road surveyor and merchant of New York. McAdam's method had become popular in England because it proved "much superior to the former roads, and much cheaper." Therefore Jefferson cheerfully escorted a "Mr. Owens" on a tour of the university grounds on 15 March to discuss the proper way to lay the broken stones. From Owens, who had been at the "head of great works, and well skilled," Jefferson heard that:

no foundation is to be dug, the road is only smoothed, and shelves from the middle towards the edges 1. inch in 10. feet. the hardest stone is then broken into small peices, no one of them to weigh more than an ounce, and the smaller the better, this is laid on the road to a proper thickness, and duly attended to for some time by smoothing the wheel tracks, until the mass becomes as solid and smooth as a rock, which it soon does. he [Owens] thought 5. or 6. I. thickness for our walks across the lawn would be abundant, and 10. or 12. I. for our streets. we have so much hard stone, and so near, that this will be our best way of preparing them. we will begin with the cross walks first, by way of trial. this will render it necessary to keep your waggon till it is done. he says the breaking of the stone is the work of children. it is probable our Professors know something of this process. our paling should be very slight, merely of riven slabs. three years last will be enough.⁽⁶⁸⁸⁾

The tests on the cross walks apparently produced favorable results, but soon after the university's hired labor force began to pave the eastern street, it deviated from Mr. Owens' directions. The difficulty stemmed from the proctor's inability to procure satisfactory sledge hammers for the laborers to do the job.⁽⁶⁸⁹⁾ Jefferson learned of the trouble and requested Brockenbrough to correct the operation before matters went further astray. "Two or three persons have mentioned to me their opinion that the way in which the laborers are proceeding with the road of the Eastern street is not conformable in material circumstances with McAdam's method," Jefferson informed the proctor. "I think you had better hold them strictly to that; for if we differ from what has been proved good by experience, and should fail, we should be justly blamed as wasting the public money on projects of our own, and have to do the work over again." Jefferson went on to restate his own ideas of how the work ought to be done:

I think you told me you had preserved the Enquirer of May. 6. which had McAdam's plan in his own words. were I to direct this work, I would first arrange all the stone in a row on the outer side or edge of the street. then smooth the earth 20. f. wide in the middle, making the middle 1. Inch higher than the sides. taken there a stone of 3. oz. weight, and form an iron ring thro' which it would just pass: then break up the whole of the stone, so that not a single one should be larger than that, and spread it over the 20. feet of breadth 3. I. thick. leave it thus to be used until it becomes solid, when another coat of 3. I. should be laid on. if this (which I think is McAdam's method) has not been strictly pursued, I would immediately change the method and go on in McAdam's way; and if experience should hereafter shew that the part first done is not sufficient, it may then be taken up, and done right. I would recommend to you therefore not to lay another stone but in literal conformity with McAdam's letter.⁽⁶⁹⁰⁾

The process of macadamizing the streets, which required a "wagon & a pair of Horses only," was not finished until about six weeks after Jefferson's death in 1826.⁽⁶⁹¹⁾

Clock and Bell

Next, Jefferson turned his still fertile mind to the ingenious clock and bell mechanism that he wished to have installed in the tympanum of the portico on the Rotunda's south front (see appendix Q). Understanding that the "art of bellmaking is carried to greater perfection in Boston than elsewhere in the US.," Jefferson on 12 April wrote to Joseph Coolidge, Jr., asking for assistance in finding a skilled bell and clock maker. "we want a bell which can generally be heard at the distance of 2 miles," he said, "because this will ensure it's being always heard in Charlottesville. as we wish it to be sfft for this, so we wish it not more so, because it will add to it's weight, price and difficulty of managemt."⁽⁶⁹²⁾ The page of specifications for the clock and bell that Jefferson enclosed in his letter to Coolidge shows that the octogenarian still retained his lifelong fascination with machinery and, at least where the university was concerned, was still willing to give his full attention and remaining vigor to such inventions:

A clock is wanting for the Rotunda of the University; the size and strength of it's works must be accomodated to two data.

1. the bell weighs 400. lbs and is to be heard with certainty 1½ miles

2. the dial-plate is to be about 6 feet 2 I. diameter. it is to be fixed in the tympanum of the Pediment of the Portico. the triangle of this tympanum has not been measured exactly yet, therefore we cannot exactly ascertain the size of the dial plate it will admit.

the bell is to remain free to be rung.

the ropes for the weights will have to go directly back about 30 f then turn off at a right angle horizontally about 21. f. to the hole of their descent, which is 50. feet deep consequently upwards of 100 f. long

the rope for ringing must do the same, but on the opposite side, where there are stairs.

it must be wound up on the back or inside.

and the hands must be set right by a key on the back or inside

what will such a clock cost?

the tympanum is 9 f 4 I in the perpendicular 42. f. in the span measured within the cornice.

the hole for the descent of the weights is 5. f. diam. in the clear opening 48 f. depth, i.e. from the level of [t]he axis of the dial plate to the ground

Within the naked of the [drawing of triangle] formg. the tympanum, a circle of 52. I. rad. may be inscribd. but more than this may I beleive be obtained if necessary for the pendulum, the whole interior of the roof of the Portico being vacant.

allowing the dial plate 5. f. diam. clear within the tympanum, imbedded in an architrave of 10. I. breadth, there will still be a space or margin 12. I. wide in it's narrowest parts.

the dial plate must be of metal of course, as wood would soon rot, in addition therefore to the 5. foot of dial plate which will shew there must be margin to be imbedded in a rabbet of sfft breadth to hold it firm within the architrave.⁽⁶⁹³⁾

It was nearly the fall of the year before Jefferson received Coolidge's letter of 5 August saying that he could engage Simon Willard of Roxbury, Massachusetts, to build "as good a clock as can be found in america" for $800, "the movement to be of purest brass, and of cast steel. . . . the dial would be made at the University, where it could more exactly be proportioned to the tympanum of the pediment." For a small compensation the maker himself promised to travel to Virginia to ensure its "being well set up."⁽⁶⁹⁴⁾ Willard estimated that it would take about two months to make the clock but the university's financial plight prohibited the placing of the order until exactly one month before Jefferson's death in 1826.⁽⁶⁹⁵⁾ A temporary system thus was devised to be set up "before a window of the book room" in one of the pavilions on the west lawn in early 1826: its "face so near the window as that it's time may be read thro' the window from the outside," directed Jefferson, and the bell fastened to the ridge of its roof. It was left to the proctor to "contrive how the cord may be protected from the trickish ringings of the students."⁽⁶⁹⁶⁾ Willard's clock was destroyed in the fire that ravaged the Rotunda in 1895 but its companion, the bell, survived because it had been replaced in 1886 by one cast by McShane & Company of Baltimore after a "group of high-spirited students" removed it from its mounting, "turned it upside down and filled it full of water. Left through an unusually cold night, the water froze, expanded and cracked the bell. The formerly clear tones became harsh and discordant."⁽⁶⁹⁷⁾

Chemical Laboratory

A month to the day after he sent his grand-son-in-law the specifications for the Rotunda's clock and bell, Jefferson received a letter from Professor John Patton Emmet regarding his experimental chemistry classes in Pavilion I. "I speak feelingly," Emmet explained, "When I say that even a Small furnace, when in operation, makes my room oppressively hot, & myself even more so, for from its necessary position, I am compelled, almost to Sit upon it. You have determined that the room originally intended for me, should be fitted for a museum, and with great propriety, for a chemical Laboratory would ruin any room in the Rotunda." Emmet ventured to correct what he considered a deplorable situation by submitting to Jefferson his sketch of a "lecturing room & Laboratory," separating into two rooms the lecture hall and the laboratory "Apparatus" for conducting experiments. After making an appeal in favor of the students' best interest and of the usefulness of the "great Character of Chemistry" for society, the professor, with what must be described as faultless Jeffersonian logic, asserted that his design ("drawn up without any reference to a Scale") could "accommodate a full Class; being persuaded that if the measure be at all worthy of your Consideration, it is the best economy to build it ample." Moreover, Emmet indicated that a store room, "always useful in holding Supplies," could be built over the laboratory room.⁽⁶⁹⁸⁾

What Jefferson thought of Emmet's plan is unknown but the university's precarious financial situation did not permit the undertaking of any unexpected major structures at this time. By June it was decided to allow the professor to set up his laboratory in the small room of the Rotunda's basement (or ground floor) but the doctor quickly complained that the "want of room & light" thwarted his purpose and demanded the two large oval rooms of the same floor.⁽⁶⁹⁹⁾ Jefferson consented even though it meant relocating the proposed museum to one of the upper oval rooms.⁽⁷⁰⁰⁾ The laboratory's Rotunda location was still incomplete at year's end, however, when Emmet, visiting his home in New York City, wrote Brockenbrough that he was anxious that the state of the room "should be looked to—the tin-man promised most seriously to have the stove-pipe made & put up—as well as the dampers, grate-doors &c—In raising the Stove pipes—let him secure the hanging shelf with Sheet iron—he may then fasten the pipe to the Shelf."⁽⁷⁰¹⁾ Incidentally, Professor Emmet's house, Pavilion I on the west lawn, still awaited completion at that time, apparently owing to James Oldham's disagreement with the proctor and the carpenter's lawsuit against the university. "My dear Sir," Emmet also pleaded with the proctor, "I must here, while there is time, beg you to set my House in some order—I confidently expect, from your own promise, to find the garret stair-case finished & the Kitchen & cellar room plaistered."

The Dome Room

The correspondence in June 1825 between Jefferson and Brockenbrough regarding the placement of Dr. Emmet's chemical laboratory also helps show the approximate progress of the carpenters in completing the dome room (see appendix K). "In finishing the Library room of the Rotunda," the proctor asked the rector, "in what way do you propose securing it at the head of The stairs? whether by a partition around the well hole of the Stairs and a door in the front of landing or a lobby extending to the rear of the columns next the stairs."⁽⁷⁰²⁾ Jefferson, who was again ill and thinking that "it may be weeks yet before I shall be able to visit the University, even in a carriage," declared that he wished to erect a balustrade around the wells of the staircases and enclosed for the workmen a "very beautiful form of a balluster" suitable for both the balustrade and the staircases.⁽⁷⁰³⁾ The proctor considered a balustrade insufficient to protect the library from "any & every person" who might enter the building but Jefferson, who did not live to see either the balustrade or the library room's bookcases in place, fortunately did not deviate from his intention.⁽⁷⁰⁴⁾

The dome room at this time not only still lacked its balustrade (as did the staircases) and bookcases, the room's columns also lacked their wooden composite capitals. The Richmond artisan who contracted to carve the capitals, Philip Sturtevant, wrote to Brockenbrough on 18 June, saying that "I Have Ben More fortunate in Getting timber than I Expected that Is White Pine from the State of Main for the Most important Part of My work that is the Capitals . . . I Have Drawn the Capital and Shall Commence Cutting up my Stuff tomorow."⁽⁷⁰⁵⁾ Sturtevant, who also informed the proctor at this time that he would accept $4 for each of eleven sets of wooden blinds that he had crafted and sent to the university, wrote after finishing the capitals: "I never worked so Hard in all My Life Before I Worked Nights till 12 and 1 Oclock Even in July and August [1826] untill I Got them done But I think the work will Show for it Self."⁽⁷⁰⁶⁾ Photographs of the dome room as it existed before the Rotunda fire of 1895 attest to Sturtevant's skill as a woodcarver.⁽⁷⁰⁷⁾

Other work at the Rotunda progressed slowly, when at all. In July university plasterer Joseph Antrim visited ornamentalist William J. Coffee in New York City to deliver drawings of the decorative modillions and rosettes planned for the cornice of at least one room in the building (that intended for the museum) and for the entablature of the portico. Brockenbrough and Coffee exchanged several letters regarding what the latter called "Compositions Ornaments for a corinthian Cornish." Dissatisfied with his earnings for the composition work that he sent to the university at the end of the previous year, Coffee informed the proctor that he did not wish to work in putty, "which is quite out of use and never Employed," but only in lead and "my Composition."⁽⁷⁰⁸⁾ Coffee instead proposed to make 170 modillion leaves, a like number of rosettes, and 128 feet of frieze ornament in his "baked earth" composition for $350, a fee the proctor called "extravagantly high."⁽⁷⁰⁹⁾ By September the proctor had convinced the artist to cut his price in half, but the two men apparently discontinued their communication during the next month without settling an agreement for the ornaments.⁽⁷¹⁰⁾ Not that it mattered much, for the unfinished state of the plasterwork in the dome room would have prohibited the fastening of the ornaments in place. (The joiners' dilatoriness in finishing their work apparently hindered the plasterers.)⁽⁷¹¹⁾

Stables

Meanwhile, the proctor arranged for stables to be constructed at a site selected by Jefferson below the eastern range (see appendix R). The brickworkers judged the area unsuitable when they arrived to lay the buildings' foundations, however, and Brockenbrough dispatched a servant named John to Monticello with a message for its owner, informing him that "the situation for the eastern range pointed out by you is rather unfavorable in consequence of the ground falling two ways, (to the east & south) about fifty or sixty yards from the place designated by you and on the same side of the eastern street there is a beautiful situation for them, if agreeable to you, I will place them there."⁽⁷¹²⁾ Jefferson consented to Brockenbrough's proposal to relocate the stables, "provided it be exactly in the line designated, that is to say, provided their front is exactly in the range of the line of the future Hotels &c. on the opposite sides of East & West streets."⁽⁷¹³⁾ In September 1826 Doctor Robley Dunglison desired the "corner behind the stable on my side" (Pavilion X) for a place for his two "Sous" because it did not require "Much fencing" and wrote the proctor to see if the land was unappropriated.⁽⁷¹⁴⁾

Wooden Blinds

The proctor also began looking for a craftsman capable of making the hundreds of sets of wooden shutters planned for the windows and doors of the buildings, and in August Joseph Pitt, Malcom F. Crawford, and John W. Simpson handed in separate bids to make them. (Philip Sturtevant, who had already made eleven sets of wooden blinds for the university but was carving the wooden capitals for the Rotunda's dome room, did not offer a proposal.)⁽⁷¹⁵⁾ Pitt offered to furnish the university "Blinds Complete" for $8.75 "on windows of 12 Lights—glass 12 by 16 and in the Same Proportion for Larger or Smaller."⁽⁷¹⁶⁾ Crawford said he would "put Venition Shutters to all of the doors & Windows . . . Ironed and Painted in the best Manner, to W[i]t. all the Twelve Light Windows, Twelve by Eightteen Glass @ Eight Dollars & fifty Cents pr. Window—and all the other Windows & doors at the same rate—in proportion to that Size."⁽⁷¹⁷⁾ Simpson said he was "disposed to undertake the making of the Vernission Blinds, which I understand is to let, for Eight dollas 62½ Cts. pair and the meterials of the best quality & If requested will give security for the performance."⁽⁷¹⁸⁾ Crawford's bid was accepted and he was still engaged in installing shutters in the fall of 1827.⁽⁷¹⁹⁾ Shutters for all the windows of the pavilions and dormitories were later estimated to cost $2,500.⁽⁷²⁰⁾ Interestingly, in August 1825 Benjamin Blackford was still shipping large numbers of "Large Sash Weights" from the Isabella Furnace to the university, apparently for the windows of the Rotunda.⁽⁷²¹⁾

Anatomical Hall

In September 1825 Brockenbrough estimated that another $15,000 would be needed to finish the Rotunda, "exclusive of the Circular room."⁽⁷²²⁾ When the Board of Visitors assembled for its scheduled fall meeting during the first week of October it had nothing concerning the buildings on the table for consideration except a section in the draft of its annual report to the president and directors of the Literary Fund.⁽⁷²³⁾ "It has been indispensable," the report stated, "to finish the circular room, destined for the reception of the books; because once deposited in there places, the removing them for any finishing which might be left to be done hereafter, would be inadmissible. That has therefore been carried on actively, and we trust will be ready in time for the reception of the books." The visitors also reported that it had been indispensible to begin the work at several "other apartments" in the Rotunda—"two for a Chemical Laboratory, one for a museum of Natural History, and one for Examinations, for Accessory Schools, and other associated purposes. An additonal building too for Anatomical dissections, and other kindred uses, was become necessary. We are endeavoring to put these into a bare state for use, altho with some jeopardy as to the competence of the funds."⁽⁷²⁴⁾

While Dinsmore & Neilson continued to perform the carpentry work in the dome room, William B. Phillips began laying bricks at the Anatomical Hall.⁽⁷²⁵⁾ In mid-winter Jefferson instructed the proctor to reserve all his funds for the "book room" of the Rotunda and for the Anatomical Hall. "till the latter is in a condition for use," Jefferson said, "there can never be a dissection of a single subject, nor until the bookroom and cases be completely done can we open another box of books."⁽⁷²⁶⁾ Furthermore, Jefferson complained a couple of days after he celebrated his eighty-third and last birthday in April 1826, "We are not satisfied with the slowness with which the buildings have been conducted the last year, and particularly with respect to the Library, and the Anatomical theatre. these ought to have been done before this.⁽⁷²⁷⁾ Professor Charles Bonnycastle, frustrated that "No preperations are yet making for plastering" the elliptical lecturing room assigned for his use in the Rotunda "or, I beleive, for any thing else," found "nothing that I can see but the interest of Messors Nelson & Di[n]smore to oppose me."⁽⁷²⁸⁾ In fact, it was a month after Jefferson's death before Joseph Antrim submitted his proposal to "put stucco cornices and do the plastering that remains undone inside of the rotunda . . . Said subscriber will also Plaster the Anatomical hall on same terms except the materials which must be acertained, say one half of the amount of Plastering & materials."⁽⁷²⁹⁾ The roof of the Anatomical Hall was not finished by August 1826 when Brockenbrough complained to the surviving member of the committee of superintendence: "I do not recollect how the roof is finished agreeable to Mr Js: design, but D & Neilson is geting timber for an expencive chines raling around the top, this, if left me whether the original design or not, I think I should stop, a plain plinth like Pavilion No 8 over the Cornice is quite sufficient."⁽⁷³⁰⁾ Shortly after this, professor Robley Dunglison asked the proctor to require John Neilson to stop working on the building's "lower floor which may not be wanted for a considerable period" and finish the "upper Room . . . which is appropriated for a Lecture Room."⁽⁷³¹⁾ The incomplete state of the Anatomical Hall, however, had not prevented the university from spending $85.25 for two skeletons that it obtained from Dr. Robert Greenhow of New York in the spring of 1825 for use in training the medical students.⁽⁷³²⁾

Jefferson Still Active

As another building season was drawing to a close, Jefferson was aware that he probably would not live to see the buildings at the university entirely finished. In his October reply to a query about the French Revolution he described his declining health: "Eighty two years old, my memory gone, my mind close following it 5. months confined to the house by a painful complaint, which, permitting me neither to walk nor to sit, obliges me to be constantly reclined, and to write in that posture, when I write at all . . . I never declined business while I was equal to it. but I am now, and for ever past it. I am dead as to that [the French Revolution] and my friends and the world must so consider me. . . . the little of the powers of life which remains to me, I consecrate to our University. if divided between two objects it would be worth nothing to either."⁽⁷³³⁾ Although he never lost interest in the university, Jefferson's contributions to its establishment waned in proportion to his increasing debilitation during the last months of his life.

That Jefferson still troubled himself with smaller objects like the construction of wood yards and smokehouses for the professors is evidence of his persisting concern for the institution, however. "Wood yards, inclosed in paling," Jefferson said, could be placed in areas convenient for the professors and their families, like in a "nook of ground adjacent to Dr. Dunghilson's inclosure, on the outside, where the wood yard would not be in the way of any thing. there are similar ones I believe at Mr. Tuckers, and Dr. Emmet's I see no objection to the wood yards being placed there. the gentlemen in interior situations will be obliged to have them in their inclosures, or in a corner on the outside."⁽⁷³⁴⁾ Jefferson also informed the proctor that "a smoke house is indispensable to a Virginia family," and instructed him to erect several of the buildings:

When I wrote to you the other day on the subject of meat-houses for the Professors I omitted to mention three essential precautions in building meat-houses.

1. they should be tightly paved with brick to prevent rats from burrowing under them. 2. a shelf should be run all round the inside of the house above the top of the door 12 I. wide at least; 18 I. would be better, smooth planed below, and no supports below. a rat from below can never pass that shelf to get to the meat in the roof. 3. not a crevice should be left for a ray of light to enter the house. a fly cannot stay in a room compleatly dark. every housekeeper knows the losses in meat houses from rats & flies.⁽⁷³⁵⁾

The smokehouses, if they were built at this time, had not been paid for by the end of 1826 when Brockenbrough made a statement for the Board of Visitors estimating the cost for six of the buildings to be about $100 each.⁽⁷³⁶⁾

Marble at Richmond

The only other matters pertaining to the construction process at the university during the fall and ensuing winter were the difficulties that Bernard Peyton faced in Richmond as he tried to find river captains willing to transport the Carrara marble bases and capitals up the James River from Rocketts to Scottsville, and from Scottsville to Shadwell Mills on the Rivanna River. The marble, which had been ordered in October 1823, arrived at Boston from Leghorn in August 1825, 31 bases and 37 cases of paving squares on board the ship Caroline, and 24 capitals on board the brig Tamworth. It was then transported from Boston to New York City, where the bases were placed on board the sloop Eliza and the capitals on the schooner General Jackson, for their voyage south.⁽⁷³⁷⁾ Once at Richmond, however, boat captains in the area steadfastly refused to take on board any of the pieces because of their weight, estimated by Peyton at 3 to 5 tons each.⁽⁷³⁸⁾ Neither would any of the numerous Augusta County wagoners dragging between Richmond and the Shenandoah Valley take on the marble, not being fixed for hauling blocks of such massive size. Even after boat captains were found who were willing to freight the marble, low water in the fall and ice in the winter prevented its shipment until spring 1826, and the last piece was not shipped from Richmond until the third of May.⁽⁷³⁹⁾ It should be noted that bricklayer William B. Phillips could not begin building the portico's brick columns until after the marble bases had been delivered and set in place by stoneworker John Gorman. Once Phillips finished his work, Joseph Antrim plastered the columns, and John Gorman fixed the capitals upon them.⁽⁷⁴⁰⁾