On Monday, June 23rd we took our first family fielf trip of this new area and went to visit Mount Vernon. We waited until after lunch to head that way because I heard that the crowds are biggest in the morning. And boy, I'm glad we made that decision. When we pulled up there was a line of charter buses at the entrance where all kinds of schools, touring organizations, etc were getting ready to leave. I was worried at first that the crowd would be out of control, but we ended up having a great afternoon and didn't have to really wait to see anything. It was really neat to see this old property dating back to the late 1700s, but to also see how they made everything work back then. I noticed two things particulary: One, the mansion was much smaller than I thought it would be. However, the grounds of the property were much bigger. Back then, they had a different building for almost everything! The kitchen, bathrooms, office, pantry, garage, etc were all separate buildings. It was almost like a village rather than a single family home. That was super interesting for all of us! I'll explain more with the pictures...
Outside and the grounds/gardens were beautiful! Washington's gardens were broken up into four separate areas. He had different gardens for vegetables, fruits, spices, etc. It was really neat to see how many different areas he had growing at one time and to see how many people it would have taken to take care of all of that land!
One of the neatest ares of this trip were the slave quarters. It was an eye opener to see where the slaves had to live, how much they got to eat every day, their clothing etc. We let Zachary pick which tour he wanted us to go on and we went through one that was basically a day in the life of a slave. He was very interested in all of it! And he has retained a lot of it too and has asked a lot of questions. These pictures are of the slave quarters and where they had to live.
One of the things that I said that amazed me so much were all the different buildings. I guess if you put all of these building in the house itself, the mansion would be a lot bigger. However, it is neat to see how they stored things back then. They had a shoemaker on site to take care of the Washingtons and the slaves.
They had a blacksmith on site to make their own tools, nails, horseshoes, etc.
They had a doctor on site as well as a clerk and the master of the land
The salt house below...
The wash house below...
The garage with Washingtons' original cars.
The next big thing was Washington's tomb. We went to a ceremony where they changed out the wreath on Washington's grave. The lady asked if anyone wanted to lead the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance and ofcourse, Zachary jumped right up there. Tyler wanted to help to, so the two of them led the crowd! They did such a good job and were so proud of themselves! In Zachary's words, "I can't believe that I led the Pledge of Allegiance at the grave of our first president" The first thing he wanted to do was call his Grandaddy to tell him the news!
The day was fun and very educating! The boys also got to meet Mrs. Martha Washington who told all kinds of stories about the General and their life together. However, she didn't know where Tennessee was when the boys started telling her where they were from. Apparently it wasn't one of the original 13 colonies. Try explaining that one to Eli and Tyler! Lol. We also took their picture in front of a Tulip Poplar that George Washington himself planted back in the late 1700s. Here are just a few more pictures from the day...
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