Mount Vernon

On Thursday, I had the opportunity to travel with the James Madison Fellows to Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington. If you've never had a chance to visit Mount Vernon, I would definitely recommend it. We got there early in the morning on a gorgeous summer day, and were able to tour the house before the crowds arrived.

This is a picture of me in front of George Washington's house.

The outside of the house looks like it was constructed of stone, but looks can be deceiving. Since stone was expensive, they built the house out of wood and carved the pine boards to look like stone blocks. Then, they mixed sand with the white paint, so the surface of the wooden "stone" blocks looks like sandstone. This process is called "rustication."






You can see the wood in this picture where some of the paint has been scraped away.





This is a picture of the Piazza on the back of the house and the view from the Piazza. You can see why George Washington might have longed to return to Mount Vernon during his time away from it as Commander-in-Chief and as President.


On the property of Mount Vernon, a short walk from the house, is the tomb where George Washington, his wife Martha, and 25 family members are buried. George Washington is buried in the marble casket on the right. One of the teachers in my tour group was a veteran (he had served in the marines), and he got to place the wreath inside the tomb.

Other than seeing George Washington's House itself, the best part of visiting Mt. Vernon was the new Visitor's Center and the new exhibit they have. For all of you people interested in "CSI" stuff, this is right up your alley. A number of scientists and artists set out to figure out what Washington looked like when he was 19, 45, and 57. To do this, they studied the bust sculpted by Jean Antoine Houdon, considered to be the best likeness of Washington, as well as his "death mask," dentures, and clothing. In my opinion, the most famous picture of Washington by Gilbert Stuart, which is on the dollar bill, looks nothing like Washington if one compares it to the Houdon bust. If you look at the pictures below, you'll really get a sense of Washington's appearance. When I saw the statues in person, it gave me chills because for the first time, you could "see" what the real man might have looked like.