Review: Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello Is Celebrating America’s Semiquincentennial

At Monticello, the central Virginia home of Thomas Jefferson, the phrase Our Guy Wrote It is emblazoned on banners and T-shirts hailing the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson’s estate is also the home to “1776: Road to the Declaration,” a compact new exhibition tracing the Declaration’s origins.

The exhibit greets visitors with a 1795 quotation from Jefferson: “This ball of liberty, I believe most piously, is now so well in motion that it will roll around the globe.” A highlight of the exhibition is the commemorative copy of the Declaration owned by Jefferson’s friend, the fourth president of the United States, James Madison. There is also a handy timeline intertwining significant events in Jefferson’s life with the history of America.

Since 1776, the Declaration’s bold claim that “all men are created equal” and endowed with “unalienable Rights” to “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” has inspired countless subsequent struggles for freedom. That ball launched two and a half centuries ago by Jefferson’s Declaration keeps battering tyrannies across the globe today.