In the current issue of the UVA Magazine, there is an article "Anatomy of a Mystery" which addresses the issue of Jefferson's alleged paternity of slave children. In the article, Lucia Stanton is quoted as saying that Edmund Bacon (the overseer at Monticello who asserted he knew the father of Sally Hemings' daughter and that it was not Thomas Jefferson) had a reputation among Jefferson’s grandchildren as "a great tale teller and exaggerator." Also, in the article, Peter Onuff was quoted as saying that, "What we take as the big taboo—crossing the racial boundary—was the norm in this period. What we think is the worst was then probably the most acceptable behavior. It happened all over the place." Does anyone have any references that Bacon was known as "a great tale teller and exaggerator"? As to whether interracial sex was the "norm" I guess depends on how "norm" is defined. However, there were laws against it, so how was it "acceptable"? 

Richard E. Dixon
Editor, Jefferson Notes 
Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society
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fax 703-691-0978