This book review appeared in the Washington Times,
http://www.washingtontimes.com/books/20020106-53100075.htm.

How an American Jewish family
helped save Monticello

     SAVING MONTICELLO: ONE FAMILY'S EPIC QUEST TO RESCUE THE HOUSE THAT
JEFFERSON BUILT
     By Marc Leepson
     Free Press, $25, 303 pages, illus.
     REVIEWED BY RICK BRITTON

     In 1782, Maj. Gen. Francois-Jean, Marquis de Chastellux wrote that
"[Monticello] resembles none of the [other homes] seen in this country; so
that it may be said that Mr. Jefferson is the first American who has
consulted the Fine Arts to know how he should shelter himself from the
weather."
     Thomas Jefferson ? archeologist, botanist, paleontologist, author of
the Declaration of Independence, third president of the United States, and
founder of the University of Virginia ? passed away on July 4, 1826. To his
family he left, among other items, his beloved mountaintop home, Monticello
? a creation of his own fertile mind ? and debt totaling over $107,000.
     Still scrambling, five years later, to keep the creditors at bay his
heirs in 1831 sold the neoclassical mansion to James Turner Barclay, a
Charlottesville, Va. druggist. Unfortunately, the house and grounds were
already in a state of decline. And the 24-year-old Barclay, evidently, was
unable to reverse the process. "The late residence of Mr. Jefferson," wrote
visitor William Barry the following year, "has lost all its interest, save
what exists in memory, and that is the sacred deposit of his remains. All
is dilapidation and ruin . . . "
     With hindsight it's obvious something had to be done to preserve
Jefferson's "essay in architecture," a structure that bears indelible
witness to his ingenuity and intellectual curiosity.
     Enter Navy Lt. Uriah Philips Levy.
     In "Saving Monticello: One Family's Epic Quest to Rescue the House
that Jefferson Built," writer Marc Leepson presents a heretofore
little-known tale. Americans are familiar with the stories of how Jefferson
labored 40-some years over his home ?"putting up and pulling down" as he
called it?and (along with John Adams) of his coincidental death, in 1826,
on the Fourth of July. Millions, too ? at the current rate of 600,000 per
year ? visit Monticello and marvel at its wonderful state of preservation,
the work of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation which acquired the
property in 1923. Few, however, know about the intervening 97 years.
     Mr. Leepson's book connects the dots. Drawing on diaries, letters, and
public records he recounts the fascinating tale of how two generations of a
Jewish-American family, for close to 90 years, preserved and protected the
house that Jefferson built.
     It's a story with many twists and turns. And an eclectic cast of
characters.
     Druggist Barclay ? after the failure of his plan to raise silkworms on
the estate ? sold Monticello to Uriah P. Levy in 1834. Mr. Leepson
describes the 42-year-old as "one of the most colorful, controversial
officers in the history of the United States Navy."
     "He is best known for his fight for the abolition of flogging in the
Navy," writes Mr. Leepson, "for his courageous service in the War of 1812,
and for his overcoming more than his share of anti-Semitism to attain the
Navy's highest rank [that of commodore]. He has won a place of honor in
Jewish-American history . . . "
     An ardent admirer of Jefferson, Levy over the course of his ownership
put a considerable amount of money ? earned in New York City real estate
investments ? toward Monticello's repair and maintenance. When he died, in
1862, he left the estate to "the People of the United States."
     His intention was that Monticello be converted into an agricultural
school for the orphaned sons of U.S. Navy warrant officers. That same year,
however, the estate was seized by the Confederate States Government as
property belonging to an "alien enemy."
     Hard up for cash to maintain the war effort the Confederacy sold
Monticello two years later, in 1864. The purchaser was Benjamin Franklin
Ficklin, a locally-born thrill seeker whose life reads like fiction.
Ficklin had fought in the Mexican War, the Mormon War in 1857, and is
credited with thinking up, and establishing the route for, the
wildly-adventurous Pony Express. When the Civil War came Ficklin returned
to Virginia and fought in the Southern Army, briefly, until he began
running the Union naval blockade ? the profits from which probably netted
him the cash to buy Jefferson's home. Because the property had been
confiscated illegally, the end of the war found Monticello back in Federal
hands.
     Or rather in the hands of the New York State Court of Appeals, for its
fate was being contested by the heirs of Commodore Levy. Sadly, the issue
would remain that way until 1879. In the interim, all matters Monticello
were handled for the Levy family by the commodore's younger brother, Jonas.
Interestingly, this Northerner had gone over to the Southern side during
the war and spent several years in Wilmington, N.C., organizing a
blockade-running operation.
     While the matter of who owned Monticello remained in litigation, the
house and property fell into an awful state of disrepair. "There is
scarcely a whole shingle upon [the house]," wrote a visitor during this
period. "The windows are broken. Everything is left to the mercy of the
pitiless storm. The room in which Jefferson died is darkened; all around it
are evidences of desolation and decay."
     When the courts finally agreed to sell Monticello at auction the
purchaser was Jonas Levy's eldest son ? Uriah P. Levy's nephew ?- the
ponderously-named Jefferson Monroe Levy. "The man who would own Monticello
from 1879 to 1923 was tall, square-jawed, and sternly handsome," notes Mr.
Leepson, "with a full mustache and receding hairline." He is usually
identified as a lawyer, "[b]ut his main business, from the time he left law
school, was real estate and stock speculation. His business dealings earned
him large sums of money . . . "
     Once in charge he devoted much of that money, writes Mr. Leepson, "to
repairing, renovating, and restoring Jefferson's mansion." In these efforts
he succeeded. When, in 1923, the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation
(TJMF) bought the property from Mr. Levy the original structure was largely
intact. "The saving grace was that [Levy] had resisted, as had his uncle
before him, the common urge of Americans to remodel," wrote Director of
Restoration William L. Beiswanger. "For the most part the nephew's efforts
were directed toward stabilization of the building and making only those
changes necessary for the house to function as a summer residence."
     Within the past 15 years, according to Mr. Leepson, the TJMF has made
efforts to recognize the Levy contribution. "At two crucial periods in the
history of Monticello," reads a plaque near Jefferson's home (alongside the
grave of Uriah P. Levy's mother), "the preservation efforts and stewardship
of Uriah P. and Jefferson M. Levy successfully maintained the property for
future generations."
     Thanks to the Levys, we can still appreciate Monticello, the only home
in America on the United Nations' prestigious World Heritage List of
structures worthy of preservation at all cost. Thanks to Marc Leepson's
in-depth research, we can now enjoy this wonderful tale.

     Rick Britton is a writer in Charlottesville.
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