This week on the Thomas Jefferson Hour, Clay Jenkinson visits with Pat Brodowski, formerly the head gardener at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. Pat explains how she found her way to Monticello, what she learned about Thomas Jefferson from working every day in his extensive garden, and how she is occupying her time now as a retiree. Plus, Pat gives tips to our listeners about how to grow something in the next year.
Dr. Lindsay Chervinsky and Clay Jenkinson discuss Jefferson's daughters. Thomas Jefferson was highly expectant of their behavior and let them know it through a series of letters. When he died in bankruptcy, his daughter Martha was left nearly penniless and had to deal with the aftermath of Jefferson's poor money management.
Clay Jenkinson speaks with David Swenson about the ethnomusicologist Frances Densmore and her work with the Lakota in the Dakotas beginning in 1911. David has spent the last year working on The Densmore Repatriation Project, re-cataloging and restoring her wax cylinder recordings.
At Standing Rock in 1911, Frances Densmore met with dozens of tribal elders and recorded traditional songs on wax cylinder. Densmore documented this work in her book Teton Sioux Music which became a touchstone for learning about Lakota/Dakota culture. The Densmore Repatriation Project reintroduces the songs with new recordings made by contemporary Native singers.
The Densmore Project’s website: lakotasongs.com
The Densmore Project on YouTube
KX News: Re-introducing Lakota Songs
Dr. Lindsay Chervinsky and Clay Jenkinson discuss King George III and his effect on the American Revolution. According to the British historian George Otto Trevelyan, the King was determined to "keep the rebels harassed, anxious, and poor, until the day when, by a natural and inevitable process, discontent and disappointment were converted into penitence and remorse."
Notes on the State of Virginia
This week, Clay takes a deeper look at Jefferson and religion. Jefferson considered the teachings of Jesus as having "the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man," but he felt that the pure teachings of Jesus were inaccurately appropriated by some of the early followers of Jesus which led to a Bible that had both "diamonds" of wisdom and the "dung" of ancient political agendas.
"But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
— Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia
We discuss Jefferson’s only published book, Notes on the State of Virginia. Jefferson completed his first draft of the book in 1781 and first published it anonymously in Paris in 1785. It is widely considered the most important American book published before 1800.
The psychological fallout came screaming out in Query XIV—a kind of dark racist diatribe against African-Americans, a subterranean fantasy projection of Jefferson’s guilt, anger (including self-anger), eroticism, self-protection, and what is known as casuistry—making the case for something you know is wrong.
This week, in the continuing series of Jefferson biographical shows about President Thomas Jefferson, Clay and David present part two of a discussion about Jefferson’s book, Notes on the State of Virginia, and how some of the things he wrote came back to haunt him politically.
In the continuing series of Jefferson biographical shows about President Thomas Jefferson, Clay S. Jenkinson and David Swenson present part one of a discussion about Jefferson’s published work, “Notes on the State of Virginia”, often called the greatest book written in America before 1800. In this episode, Jefferson’s positions on race are discussed at length.
Jefferson 101 is a series of biographical shows about the life of Thomas Jefferson that ran from 2016 to 2017.
Jefferson was a pragmatic utopian, and a utopian pragmatist.
I’m a devoted American patriot. I love this country, but I want it to be more like the country I love than the disillusioned, vulgar, and divisive place it has become.
"Two seraphs await me long shrouded in death; I will bear them your love on my last parting breath."
— Thomas Jefferson, July 1826
We conclude our Jefferson 101 biographical series by discussing his final days at Monticello, his legacy, and the deaths of both Jefferson and John Adams on July 4th, 1826 — the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.