Mount Vernon In Virginia (1950)

[Music] after as prosperous a journey had be expected at this late season of the I arrived at my seat the day before Christmas with these words George Washington Lord of his retirement burnin in 1783 the revolution was over and from the noise of battle he become to the peace and privacy of his first purse at home in nine long at last Milly are all oh he was back to the sight of familiar little things in his own room and of the privacy of his own thoughts in a letter to a friend he spoke of the change in his life I am at length become a private citizen of America and free from the bustle of camp and intrigues of court I showed you the busy world with serenity of mind now he could unpack his battle equipment and put it away among his memories of fateful events that now were history the sight of the enemy routed from Boston his forced retreat from Long Island with the British at his heels the bitter defeat at Brandywine that left the Americans in peril until aid from France opened the way to the final great victory at Yorktown the commander-in-chief who had ordered the bugle call in the field of battle could become once more the country squire who answered the call of the hunting horn and the claim of his own peaceful field here at Mount Vernon he still followed the customs of England although freedom from British rule had been won in the space of a few years the culture of the old world would not give way so quickly to that of new even after the Revolution George Washington looked out from his house over land and buildings that still Express the way of life of an English planter in colonial Virginia and whether as a loyal subject of the king or now as a citizen of a new and independent nation he was always proud of Mount Vernon which he described in a letter it lies in a high dry and healthy country on one of the finest rivers in the world in a latitude between the extremes of heat and cold he loved the life of a farmer best of all but the soil to which he now returned was far from rich he had changed his crops from tobacco and corn to wheat and grass in order to conserve his land he now cultivated more than 2,000 acres well stocked with sheep horses cows pigs and fowl he trained his apple and pear trees are through French and English methods adapted to his own soil and climate [Music] his studies of other homes seen on his travels led him to plant poplars and boxwood in formal patterns thus in our plantation but rather than a wealthy country gentleman playing with a hobby he was a vigorous and enterprising farmer who had to work his soil hard for a livelihood his crops went to market as far as the West Indies from his kitchen garden came honey and spice for his own table the produce of his vines and vegetable beds provided food for his family and household and for passing guests resting from travel through the surrounding wilderness mount vernon included five fives surveyed on a map of the general himself he had enlarged by more than three times the property he had acquired through his half-brother Lawrence the Washington family had originally been given the land by a document signed in the name of that same British royal house from which the general had now said his country free in little more than a hundred years a piece of wilderness in the first English colony of the new world had been made into a civilized and productive American homestead that could now provide for itself to meet its needs its plan included many different buildings called dependencies each one had a special function in the complex business of keeping a large community clothed and fed on the simple implements in the spinning house the women fork turned out a thousand yards of cloth a year from wool cotton and flax gathered on the estate from these fabrics came most of the clothing and linen used by the people of Mount Vernon in the wash house the laundresses did a big chore every week made bigger by the lack of running water the articles needed forgetting and boiling the water for making soap and for drying and distributing the wash had to be made right on the place just as the meat consumed at Mount Vernon had to come from its own livestock enough be mutton and pork was cured in the smokehouse to fill the year-round needs of two hundred and fifty people who worked on the estate a plantation manager who lived in a house by himself had charge of all their labor whether farming the land or keeping the gardens or building and painting the houses or making the tools needed for their jobs he worked under orders from the general who was proprietor watched over everything in everyone keeping a careful record of all that was produced and stored on his farms or with fatherly care sending food from his own kitchen to nourish those who was sick or injured the general set the policy that kept Mount Vernon going he was always planning something new and so his grounds and buildings kept on growing each a part of the other with his own brick and oak timber he had gradually improved a small house of one and a half stories until it became a mansion with three floors and twenty rooms and now after the Revolution he completed a new type of Piazza his own original contribution to colonial architecture like his extensive use of pine she me which was beveled painted and covered with sand to withstand the elements and look like stone I have a large room which I intend to finish in a plane each style independent of present taste is my choice he thanked a friend for sending him the mantle for his new room the chimney pieces arrived too elegant and costly by far I fear for my Republican style of living but he set it up for it was a gift from England like other useful and decorative household objects that came from abroad it took its place among things made by local craftsmen his house was like America many cultures were forming it and then were being formed into something new life was comfortable here but it never exceeded the modesty of the two people who had taken their wedding breakfast at this table there's was a simple and charming life yet like families and other remote farms at that time they could fulfill a desire to have beautiful things around them sitting in the evening in their West parlor in front of a landscape painted to order for the panel beneath the family coat of arms they could rest from the heavy duties of managing a farm in a household here George and Martha Washington could talk over all the details of the full life that they were to share for nearly 40 years with no children of their own they extended to her children by a former marriage the responsibilities dignity and love that composed their life together and it was their home they took her grandchildren George Washington Park and Nelly Custis who filled the house with laughter and the sound of youthful fingers practicing in the harpsichord and flute [Music] sometimes Nellie grew weary of a music lesson for life could be such fun and a plantation like Mount Vernon lessons came first of course but there were games and parties too and how she could make the general laugh by mimicking some of his important visitors her charm was enhanced by the beauty and warmth of this house where she was later to be married the gifted young girl who grew up in this room was trained by her grandmother to be a good housekeeper and like young ladies in Europe at that time this young gentle woman of America became accomplished in the arts of decoration the fingers learn to do needlepoint or in those days decoration meant making things she was given out lessons too and taught to paint a still life on silk but the hands that worked so delicately on peaches plums and grapes were also taught to use them in more practical ways in Mount Vernon's busy kitchen she learned how to provide meals for a large establishment and its many guests the menu on record for a typical dinner included roast beef leg of boiled pork mutton chops and goose hominy and potatoes onions and pickles mince pies cheese pours and Madeira the cook had to know how to build many different kinds of fires and what the timing must be for each one the general compared Mount Vernon to a well resorted tavern for his kitchen provided food for a great many guests and his house was no ordinary meeting place statesmen and thinkers like Thomas Jefferson James Madison and Patrick Henry and former comrades-in-arms like major Horatio gates in the Marquis de Lafayette came together here with other important men of the day their exchange of ideas later influenced history some of the thoughts on democracy first shared in this room were eventually written into our Constitution by men who first met here and talked across the dinner table words of freedom spoken here were joined with liberal thought across the sea carried home by the young Frenchman Lafayette who had fought for American Liberty and who later presented his host with the key to the Bastille the royal prison in Paris a symbol of tyranny which he helped to destroy during the French Revolution a replica made from it's ruined stone was given to the general and with the key came a message from Lafayette it is a tribute which I owe as a son to my adoptive father as an aide-de-camp to my general as a missionary of liberty to its patriarch thus a houseguest acknowledged the depth of hospitality for at Malvern and Lafayette felt at home sleeping in the room which ever afterwards for his name and strolling with his host in the flower garden whose formal patterns made him think of his own land across the sea here also the general could walk alone among his tulips and his sweet William and perhaps in this quiet retreat he thought sometimes about the young and unsettled nation to which his life had been devoted now he might hope to spend the rest of his days working peacefully on his farm where land buildings and people were forming a harmonious and productive community under his leadership [Music] but his hope was not to be fulfilled the nation needed its leader again the states had not yet learned to live together and George Washington feared that unless they remained United the result might be anarchy breeding ground of tyranny in the fateful year 1789 he answered the summons to become the first president of the United States i bared a Jew to Mount Vernon to private life and to domestic felicity and oppressed with anxious and painful sensations set out for New York to render service to my country in obedience to its cars the same stewardship that had created Mount Vernon now brought the states together in a strong Federal Union as he had built his house so he built our government and a foundation that was firm eight years later a grateful people allowed him to return to Mount Vernon at last with more than 60 years behind him he was happy to retire to the peace and comfort of life with his family on his farm sitting at his desk he replied to the homage paid him by citizens of high and lowest states all over the world here he had drafted many of the ideas to which free men would always claim allegiance now he could devote his attention to the writings of other men in other lands in these last years of his life he could spend more time in the privacy of his library he spoke of the education of future Americans in proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened George Washington knew that men could achieve an enlightened wisdom only through practical knowledge in all matters concerning their welfare in their freedom for his was annoying brought to life by doing a creative process symbolized by the motto in his book played exitus after Probot the result of actions proves their worth but the days of the life must come to an end [Music] in the last month of 1799 the general secretary wrote a letter it read about three o'clock on Saturday morning he became ill every aid that medicine could give was administered but between ten and eleven o'clock at night he resigned his breath into the hand that gave it through the steadfastness of purpose and the courage by which he lived George Washington has taken his place among the men who have led the world forward his life has become our life [Music] like many pioneers and farmers he lies buried at his own request on the grounds of his own home and when we pay tribute at his grave we are also able to admire the harvest of his life we can feel the force of the spirit that was caught by the great sculptor who da over a hundred and fifty years ago and is evident in every part of the shrine we can visit today here at Mount Vernon we can see an American form that was built when the country was changing and its people were fearful but hopeful we who make a pilgrimage here today live in a world that has also changed we too know fear but we have hope and as in that other time we are concerned about the way of life that we are building it is important for us to be reminded how seeds grow when they are carefully planted how all stand when they are set on roots and how ideas of citizenship flower in the soil of Liberty is not an empty house of memories the dead it is an American meeting place where we recognize the Living beauty the order and the dignity that George Washington built into the structure of our Free Republic [Music]