At home with George

I knew, of course, that George Washington's home was called "Mount Vernon."  Just as Jefferson's was "Monticello." 

Here in the Northwest Corner, we even have our own "Mount Vernon, Washington," where our world-famous I-5 bridge collapse occurred last month.  (We even have -- so help me, I'm not making this up -- our very own "George, Washington" (population 501).)

What I didn't know, exactly, was where one might find Mount Vernon.  I mean, yes, I knew it was somewhere in Virginia.  I guess I vaguely pictured it as down near Richmond.  But, after my recent trip to Washington, D.C. -- I now know the truth.

On Sunday, I took the Metro a couple of stops south from my hotel -- adjacent to National Airport -- to Alexandria.  Back in the good old days, before the District ceded its Virginia donation back to Virginia, the District of Columbia contained three incorporated cities:  Washington, Georgetown, and Alexandria.  So, Alexandria was sort of a big deal at the time -- quite the port on the Potomac -- and it's a fascinating city to visit today.  Lots of small, brick buildings that now house hotels, restaurants, bars, antique and bric-a-brac shops.  Alexandria Old Town resembles a large-scale Carmel, but less ersatz and built in the original colonial architectural idiom.

The walk from the Metro station to the waterfront was a full mile, but a mile of street so lined with interesting sights that the walk went by swiftly.  My objective was the dock where I was to catch the boat to Mount Vernon.  Because -- as I by then realized -- Mount Vernon is just a few miles -- maybe ten or fifteen -- down river from Washington.

At the dock, I quickly located the kiosk for the Potomac Riverboat Company, where -- for a mere forty bucks -- I secured a round trip ticket to Mount Vernon, including entrance fee to the site.  The 90-minute cruise, atop an awning-covered boat, was scenic and relaxing, with a continuous narration describing what we were seeing.  I had no previous experience with this area, so the talk was welcome (if at times a bit corny).

We arrived at Mount Vernon's wharf, diametrically opposite the grounds from the noisy official entrance for tour buses and autos, and strolled on our own up the hill to the "mansion." We had four hours to kill before our return to Alexandria.  The place was humming with tourists, but the only time the grounds seemed at all crowded was while we waited in line for the tour of the mansion, and shuffled through the mansion itself, hustled along from room to room at a steady pace.  The rest of the grounds, some 500 acres, including a substantial number of outbuildings, trails, gardens, a "pioneer farm," and livestock paddocks and stables, was there to be seen at our own pace.  Including the time I allowed for a fast lunch, I found four hours to be an appropriate length of time to spend.

George Washington considered himself primarily neither a politician nor a general -- but a gentleman farmer.  He reproduced, insofar as possible within the limitations of colonial life, the amenities of an English estate, but an estate that was virtually self-sufficient.  Everything possible was grown, manufactured, and/or serviced on the grounds (which at the time were a far more extensive eight thousand acres).  George experimented continually with new ways to improve the efficiency of the farm and the lives of his family and his workers.  The Washingtons lived a good life, and his hired workers appear to have been housed and fed well.

Slavery, of course, is the inescapable issue.  The Washingtons had a large number of slaves, both field and house slaves, who worked from sun up to sun down.  Although some of the slaves with higher responsibilities -- supervisors, dining room servants -- didn't seem too bad off, the great majority of slaves had diffiicult lives, often compounded by separation from family members except on Sundays.  On the other hand, hired workers doing similar work also had difficult lives in those days, and the Washingtons seem to have been stern -- but not cruel or despotic -- slave owners.  (George Washington's slaves were all freed at his death, pursuant to the terms of his will.  Martha, reportedly, was not pleased.)

For those of us who grew up and live in the West, "olden times" means the late nineteenth century.  Mount Vernon gives a fascinating introduction to daily life as lived at a certain social level, a century earlier, by Americans still strongly influenced by their British antecedents.  Mount Vernon -- at least as presented by those managing it -- gives a sympathic picture of our first president, and an understanding of important social and economic aspects of his life not emphasized in our high school history classes.