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Thomas Jefferson was not only an outstanding figure in the field of politics, he was also respected and admired as an intellectual on both sides of the Atlantic.
Jefferson was most proud of three specific achievements which he requested should be carved as his epitaph: “Author of the Declaration of Independence, of the Statutes of Virginia for religious freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia.” But, he was also deeply interested in the sciences as well as in anthropology and zoology. He devised our monetary system of the dollar and the dime, and was a highly respected architect, designing Monticello and the University of Virginia. In later years, he sold his vast library to Congress. The task of cataloging was so immense, he would trust no one other than himself to set up the Library of Congress.
This highly complex man was a controversial figure. His friends revered him. To his enemies he was weak, vacillating and cowardly.
Thomas Jefferson, the third child of ten, and the oldest son of Peter and Jane Jefferson, was born in 1743.1 His mother, the former Jane Randolph who was born in London , appears to have been an intelligent, and for those days, a well educated woman. Unfortunately, there is very little information about her.
Peter Jefferson, whose education had been neglected in favor of two older brothers, was a physical giant and very ambitious. Deprived of a formal education, he studied on his own, displaying an unquenchable curiosity which was also