Poplar Forest and Thomas Jefferson

Story by Tom Straka
Photographs by Pat Straka

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Why a tree to lead this article? To start with, it is a tulip poplar, located at Poplar Forest. It is a very old tree, believed to be over 200 years old. Popular Forest was a Virginia tobacco plantation which included a plantation house, also known as Poplar Forest. Work began on the mansion, which is still there, in 1806. The tree is thought to predate the construction of the mansion. The person who owned Poplar Forest and built the mansion was an interesting fellow.

We recently traveled up U.S. Highway 29 through Virginia. At Charlottesville, we visited Monticello, Thomas Jefferson’s primary residence. Most folks know about Monticello, but he had a second home, a “vacation home,” or retreat, which most people do not know about. His retreat is also just off U.S. 29, near Lynchburg, Virginia. The two related sites are about 80 miles, or an hour and a half, apart. Poplar Forest, like Monticello, shows the strong hand of Jefferson, giving the feeling of being a smaller Monticello. Visiting both on the same trip made sense, as it easier to see the connection between the two, and better understand Jefferson.

 North view, front of Poplar Forest, with carriage turnaround.

South view, back of Poplar Forest, with sunken south lawn, influenced by bowling greens
Jefferson had experienced in Europe. Notice the service wing to the east or right.

Thomas Jefferson and his wife Martha inherited the nearly 5,000 acres Poplar Forest plantation in 1773 from his father-in-law. The name was inherited with the land, based on the poplar forest that once thrived there. Jefferson was too busy with his law practice and government work to spend much of his early ownership years at Poplar Forest, and administered the tobacco plantation using an overseer. However, at the end of the Revolutionary War in 1781, his family needed to evade British troops hoping to capture him and spent two months in seclusion at Poplar Forest, probably utilizing the overseer’s house. During those two months he wrote Notes on the State of Virginia, his only published book.  

View from the parlor looking south through the portico and across the sunken yard,
designed to focus the view on the landscape.

View of the top of the service wing, used as a patio of sorts and for entertaining. 

Just prior to his retirement, he began to build his retreat in 1806 using his own design, just like Monticello. By the end of his presidency in 1809, construction was nearly complete. Like Monticello, Jefferson would make the final form a long-term project, redesigning it as new inspirations arose. It would be smaller than Monticello, octagonal-shaped, and built of brick. The north and south facades included pedimented porticoes. Jefferson designed the interior as a central square surrounded by four elongated octagons. When inside, the visitor is very much reminded of Monticello, with classical and neo-classical European architectural ideas Jefferson developed from his time as Minister to France (this style came to be known as Jeffersonian classicism). Poplar Forest was America’s first octagonal house.

Floor plan of Poplar Forest, illustrating the geometry of Jefferson’s design.

 Poplar Forest is being reconstructed and construction work was ongoing at places on the tour.
It is interesting seeing how craftpersons recreate the original rooms.

One advantage of seeing the reconstruction is the ability to see the framework of Jefferson’s original design.

The reconstruction unveils all kinds of interesting internal aspects of the building.

One central thing that seems to dominate Jefferson’s homes: books.

 Dining table in Poplar Forest.

Inside Poplar Forest is much brickwork, like this fireplace.

Jefferson’s own invention, a copying machine, where he could make duplicate copies.

Jefferson situated the mansion as to act like a compass. It pointed due north. It could also serve as a sundial. To the north and south, the octagonal exterior protrudes, and to the east and west are porticos with stair pavilions. The yard is circular, like a compass. A service wing is attached to the house, built into the ground not to distract from the house.   

The service wing has examples of activities performed at Poplar Forest, like making fabrics.

The service wing has many innovations, like a kitchen with a “range”
allowing for three temperatures at the same time.

 One of the interesting things in the service wing was a batteau.
Jefferson sent his barrels of tobacco and flour to a warehouse in nearby Lynchburg on the James River. Then he hired a batteau with watermen to transport them to market in Richmond.

What else would you expect? An octagonal necessary or privy, one of two that symmetrically flank the house. Jefferson designed these domed outhouses using the same rules
of architectural proportions as the main house.

Poplar Forest was Jefferson’s escape from the many visitors and distractions at Monticello, a perfect retirement home, and he made at least three trips annually there, describing it as “the best dwelling house in the state, except that of Monticello; perhaps preferable to that, as more proportioned to the faculties of a private citizen.” The trip from Monticello took three days, but once he got there, he wrote he was “comfortably fixed and attended, have a few good neighbors, and pass my time there in a tranquility and retirement much adapted to my age and indolence.” 

The trip today takes less than two hours. A visit to better-known Monticello is really incomplete without a side-trip to Poplar Forest. Or, Poplar Forest is interesting enough to be the main trip. The combination makes for a perfect historical destination.

https://americanroads.net/museum_row_spring2018.htm
https://americanroads.net/renees_route_spring2018.htm

Author/Photographer. Tom Straka is an emeritus professor of forestry at Clemson University. He has an interest in history, forestry and natural resources, natural history, and the American West. Pat Straka is a consulting forester and the photographer on most of their travel articles. They reside in South Carolina, but have also lived in Mississippi and Virginia.