The VCU Center for Judaic Studies and the VCU Friends of the Library present The Sixteenth Annual Brown-Lyons Lecture. This year's speaker will be Dr. Melvin I. Urofsky of Virginia Commonwealth University's Center for Public Policy. Dr. Urofsky will present the lecture, "Saving Mr. Jefferson's House: The Levy's and Monticello, A Drama in Five Acts," at 8:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 29, 2001 in the School of Engineering Auditorium, 601 West Main Street, on the Academic Campus of Virginia Commonwealth University. Dr. Urofsky's lecture will examine the little known history of the Levy family and their ties to Monticello. Commodore Uriah P. Levy, the first Jewish American to obtain the rank of Commodore in the U.S. Navy, purchased Jefferson's "essay in architecture" in 1836. It remained in the Levy family for over ninety years, weathering the Civil War, great legal battles and even an attempt by the government to purchase it before it was sold to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation in 1923. Dr. Melvin I. Urofsky is the Director of the Doctoral Program, Center for Public Policy, at Virginia Commonwealth University and has been a professor of History at VCU since 1974. The author and editor of more than forty books and hundreds of articles in several fields, he has concentrated in recent years on American Jewish and Constitutional History. Dr. Urofsky received his undergraduate and doctorate from Columbia University and holds a J.D. from the University of Virginia. His latest work, Saving Thomas Jefferson's House: The Levy's and Monticello, 1834-1923, will be published in the spring of 2001. This annual lecture is made possible through the generosity of Jacob and Selma Brown and the late Dr. Harry Lyons. This event is free and open to the public. A reception will immediately follow the lecture. Deck parking is available on the 800 block of West Main Street across from Richmond's Landmark Theater. For more information or to arrange special accommodations, please contact Melinda Gales at (804) 828-1108 or by e-mail at [log in to unmask] -- Ray Bonis Assistant Archivist James Branch Cabell Library VCU Libraries Phone: (804) 828-1108 FAX: (804) 828-0151 Email: [log in to unmask] Web: www.library.vcu.edu/jbc/speccoll/speccoll.html To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html