Thomas Jefferson’s Poplar Forest will begin an intensive two-year project, “Sharing Knowledge of Thomas Jefferson’s Retreat” thanks to the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services’ (IMLS) Museums for America grant program. Poplar Forest received an award of $106,345 that will be used to support the most current archaeological excavations at Thomas Jefferson’s retreat home.
The grant will allow Poplar Forest’s archaeologists to catalogue and analyze approximately 23,500 Jefferson- era artifacts that have been recovered from two sites located almost 100 yards southeast of the octagonal brick house. The inclusion of this data into Poplar Forest’s archaeological database will allow Poplar Forest staff to better understand the entire collection of over 200,000 individual artifacts as they continue reconstructing the history of this nationally renowned historic property.
The research will inform both online and on-site exhibits that focus on changes in the lives of Poplar Forest’s slave community and the evolution of Jefferson’s landscape design and the alterations that turned his Central Virginia plantation into a formal villa retreat. More... |
