Then you actually dig into the project. Moving furniture, taping doorframes, laying drop cloths, and dusting. The project could be hours old before the brush even touches the wall. A whole house in one morning, flag football and grilling in the afternoon? You’ll be lucky to finish three rooms in time for Sunday’s 4:00 p.m. NFL kickoff and takeout.

The lesson: home improvement takes time. The Dining Room wallpaper installer, Patrick Shields, arrived at Montpelier last week. We expect the whole process to take approximately ten days. Patrick will hang the wallpaper almost the same way an installer would have during the Madisons’ time.

Anyone who has worked on their own walls knows it’s much easier to paint than wallpaper. But as complicated as wallpapering is now, it took even more time and skill two centuries ago.

During the Madisons’ time, wallpaper was applied with wheat paste glue (sometimes hide glue), but moisture corroded these natural glues over time. Patrick will attach the Dining Room wallpaper with a modern clear adhesive based on traditional wheat paste.

A protective sealant will be applied to the plaster first, followed by an acid-free paper liner. The liner will be installed horizontally, while the finish paper will be hung vertically.

Each roll of the ground paper must be carefully trimmed to fit together side by side, overlapping on one edge so the paper on the right sits on top of a plain bit of the paper on the left. The trimming of the paper and border, both with fancy, carved edges, requires careful work and takes considerable time. The border is applied over the ground paper, right at the ceiling.

Because Montpelier’s walls and ceilings were plastered by hand, the installer will need to make several adjustments, panel-to-panel, and border piece-to-border piece. For example, on the south wall from east to west, there is a two-inch difference in ceiling height!

Anyone who has undertaken a lengthy home improvement project can appreciate all of the detail that goes into this wallpapering process. It’s never as quick or as easy as it sounds. For now, we’re happy to report that wallpapering in the Dining Room is underway.

Want more? Last Friday’s Daily Progress featured a great front page story that details the installation. You can also check out our Facebook page and YouTube channel for more play-by-play!

That urgent sense of waiting for an important package has captivated the Montpelier staff recently. By now, you have probably read all about our curatorial team’s efforts to carefully choose the most appropriate wallpaper for the Madisons’ Dining Room. Curators spent months consulting leading historic wallpaper experts and examining period samples that were known to exist during the time the Madisons would have originally purchased their wallpaper.

Courtesy Adelphi Paper Hangings, LLC

Once the curatorial team settled on a pattern, they placed the order with Adelphi Paper Hangings, which specializes in historic reproduction wallpaper. Fulfillment of the order was anything but simple. The technicians at Adelphi used carved wooden blocks to hand-stamp the paper layer by layer, to create the finished product you can see in our previous posts.

Once the curators placed the order, the waiting began. Excitement swelled all over Montpelier. Staff members and guests constantly wanted to know when the wallpaper would arrive. Even in the age of tracking numbers, there was a glimmer of hope that the tracking system was wrong and the paper would magically arrive a few days early.

The wallpaper finally arrived last week in an unassuming, brown shipping box, but Christmas morning-levels of excitement enveloped our staff. Thankfully the box arrived in our curatorial department. Since curators handle some of the world’s most fragile objects, they are trained to be disciplined and methodical, unlike the crazed shopping maven who has just taken delivery on an iPhone 4. So one of our curators carefully opened the box, to reveal the wonderful drapery patterned wallpaper.

Montpelier's curatorial team examines the wallpaper as it arrives from Adelphi. Left to right: Grant Quertermous, Cheryl Brush, Lynne Dakin Hastings. Courtesy of The Montpelier Foundation.

And now a new countdown begins: the installation. The technician will arrive at Montpelier on Monday, August 16, to begin installing the wallpaper and its dramatic border. Visitors will actually see the installation during their tours. In fact, we’re going to give away commemorative wallpaper samples as paper becomes available!

We expect this process to take about ten days. Once the installation gets rolling, we will post photos and updates on the blog. Stay tuned!

Before we tell you, we want to provide some context for the choice. Remember that, as we mentioned in the last post on this topic, tastes in interior décor were different in the early 19th century. Period aesthetics showed a preference for strong colors, often combined in way foreign to twenty-first-century eyes. Patterns were popular, and there was little hesitation in using a different design for the carpet, wallpaper, curtains, and upholstery in the same room.

We know that when President Madison died in 1836 there were 36 engravings on the Dining Room walls. Today we would be loathe to hang so many prints on a highly patterned wallpaper. Not so in the early nineteenth century. Our team of experts believe that showing that aesthetic is important in creating the visual feel of this period room. They chose the circa 1815 paper with the green and buff pattern imitating draped fabric and originally made by the Philadelphia firm of Virchaux.

Another factor in the paper’s selection was its French-inspired design. The many ads for “Paper Hangings” in the National Intelligencer reveal that the local market followed the period predilection for fashionable French wallpaper patterns. Drapery papers frequently appear in the ads. Among the most popular papers available in the Washington region were those imported from France or produced by Philadelphia paper makers adapting French designs. A number of these paper makers were French émigrés like Henri Virchaux.

Virchaux wallpaper and frieze

Interestingly, what we know about James and Dolley Madison’s wallpaper acquisitions suggest that like so many others, they were selecting French-made or French-inspired papers. The fragmentary survivals of two papers purported to have been hung in the Madison White House appear to be French. And, the wallpapers the Madisons purchased for The Seven Buildings, the executive residence after the White House was burned, came from an Alexandria, Virginia merchant whose stock of papers highlighted designs imported from France or “in the French taste” from Philadelphia.

What’s exciting about the Virchaux paper is that the designers and manufacturers, Henri Virchaux and Joseph Ramee, submitted a number of their designs for patent protection; the samples sent with their application are preserved in the collection of the Library of Congress. Having been archived since their submission the designs and colors survive in pristine condition.

Our reproduction will be block printed by Adelphi Paper Hangings, a company based in Sharon Springs, New York. Adelphi not only reproduces documented eighteenth- and nineteenth- century wallpaper patterns, but they do so using historically accurate methods and materials, including pasting individual sheets of paper together to form rolls and block printing the designs. The drapery paper and its accompanying border will also be installed using traditional techniques. Visitors will be able to watch the installation during tours later this year.

Many people said they like the yellow wallpaper displayed in the Madisons’ Dining Room. This paper is French or American, circa 1800-1810. Of the three papers on the wall, it seems to be the most modern. Some of you commented that the yellow paper would match Dolley’s china. Although the reproductions of James and Dolley’s Nast china are yellow tinted, the original pieces are more of a salmon color, as you can see in the photograph of the Nast tureen which Montpelier owns.

Peter Meyerhof asked, “Since a speck of original scarlet wallpaper was found in the drawing room, why isn’t there a sample with a red background being considered here?” This is a great question. We know the Madisons liked red and used it in several rooms in their house, however, it is unlikely they used it in every room.  During the Madisons’ time in the President’s  House they used several different color schemes throughout the house.  We also have other fragments of Madison-era wallpapers that were found in a rats’ nest at Montpelier. Both fragments are multicolored, but not large enough to see a pattern. These are small clues, but they lead us to believe the Montpelier interiors were decorated in a variety of colors.  If we chose red for both the Drawing and Dining Rooms – the two major public rooms in the house–we could overuse that color.

Donna Spencer noted our mention of the artwork on the walls and said she thought it might be too busy, although she acknowledged that it might be fine for the period. This is a very important point. Taste in interior décor has changed a great deal in the almost 200 years since the Madisons were decorating their home. It’s not that surprising when you think about it. All you have to do is compare the stylish interiors of 1970 to one from this week to see how rapidly tastes can change!  In fact, it was common during the Madisons’ time to put artwork over a very complicated wallpaper. Fashionable interiors from the early 19th century in America look very busy to modern eyes, especially those from the first quarter of the 19th century, when the Madisons were decorating Montpelier and the President’s House.

Finally, Sarah Everett asked, “What do the experts think?” For the answer to that question, you’ll just have to wait for our next post. Don’t go away. This Presidential Detective Story has a lot more twists and turns before we can say, “case closed.”

The mirror trail begins with Montpelier visitor accounts. We know at least two mirrors hung in the Drawing Room. Our first witness, John H. B. Latrobe, described the room to a friend in an 1832 letter, saying “Its walls are covered with paintings, save where two immense mirrors, on the side at which you enter, conceal large portions.” ¹ Latrobe’s description referred to the wall opposite of the triple hung windows.

But, were these the only mirrors in the Drawing Room? Other quotes from the Madisons’ time mention more mirrors.  This makes sense. In a time before electricity, mirrors offered a good way to help light a whole room because they reflect light. Mirrors across from the large drawing room windows would have been logical. Where else in the room might they have hung mirrors?

Like a good detective, we can’t conclude that a logical statement by a witness automatically makes what the witness said fact. We have to see where the evidence trail leads.  Visitor accounts, such as Latrobe’s letter, are referred to as documentary evidence. Additionally, we also must look at fashionable practice of the time and the architectural evidence, such as the nail holes that date to before 1840, found during the architectural restoration. We look to the nail holes to tell us where on the walls there might have been something – a painting or a mirror – and how large it was.

If these walls could talk…but since they can’t, so we have to find the answers ourselves. When we look at the architectural evidence, we ask ourselves:
How many mirrors were hung on either side of the door over time?
Were the same mirrors repositioned or were there different mirrors at different times?
Were the mirrors a pair?  Were there two different mirrors of different sizes and shapes?
What do the holes say about the possible size of the mirrors? In particular, can they help us predict the height of the mirrors?
How were the mirrors hung?  How many brackets or other devices were involved in each “hanging” episode?
What can nail holes tell us about what hung over the fireplace mantel?

What did  Montpelier’s team of mirror investigators find? Did they answer any of these questions? Find out in an upcoming Presidential Detective Story post. Stay tuned!

1 John H. B. Latrobe to Charles Carroll Harper, Aug. 3, 1832, box 4, John H. B. Latrobe Family Papers, MS 525, Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore, Maryland.

We couldn’t find any evidence of paint or white wash on the walls. This means the Dining Room, like the Drawing Room, was probably papered. Visitor accounts tell us Dolley Madison served a variety of sumptuous meals there. They also say the Dining and Drawing Room walls boasted a variety of art. Incredibly, none of these accounts tells us anything about the walls under the art!

We know the Drawing Room definitely had wallpaper. During our search for wallpaper evidence in the Madisons’ home, we found two fragments of wallpaper above the Drawing Room’s triple-hung windows. Both were only 1/8 to 1/4 inch wide, or to put it another way, the size of this letter ‘o’ on your screen. Despite the size, we can tell the paper had a scarlet background and a design on top of a crimson flock, which looks and feels like velvet. The pieces were just too small to tell us anything about the pattern.

We can’t leave the walls bare, because we know that the Madisons didn’t. How, then, will we figure out what paper to use? In mid-March the curatorial team sat down with historic wallpaper and interior experts to narrow down the possibilities for wallpapers in the Dining and Drawing Rooms.

We know the paper shouldn’t pre-date 1812 because a major renovation took place between 1809 and 1812. Madison’s presidency was particularly challenging because of the War of 1812. Given the demands of the job, it is possible the Madisons didn’t redecorate the Dining and Drawing Rooms until circa 1817 to 1820, when they returned home to Montpelier. The experts looked for designs that were on the market during this date range. The scholars chose several possibilities and the samples of those are now on display in the Dining Room. The samples give us an idea of how each would look if we chose to paper the room entirely with that design.

We can’t know for sure which paper James and Dolley would have used, but we are doing our best to pick something that was available to them and fashionable for the period. We hope you visit to see the historical wallpaper samples. We want to hear what you think , so please leave a comment on the blog or the wall on our Facebook page. We hope you’ll check back with the blog to find out which paper is chosen and to learn more about our ongoing work in this Presidential detective story.

More than 200 people attended the February 21 opening. Emmy-award-winning journalist Juan Williams addressed the crowd. “This is a place of power…this is a place of life.…This is a place of teaching. This is a place of healing. This is a place of understanding. This is a place that can help us in terms of imagination…help understand what took place here… in terms of how we see each other across racial lines,” said Williams.

Workers laid the first tracks for the railroad line that runs past the Depot circa 1880. This was a time when trains were the fastest way to get anywhere, for both freight and passengers. In 1910, William duPont, owner of Montpelier, built the Depot to upgrade passenger and freight service. The Depot was constructed using plans from Southern Railway, with two waiting rooms – one for “white” passengers and one for “colored” passengers. Segregation was required by Virginia law.

In addition to serving passengers, the Depot was home to the Montpelier Station post office which served the local community. Although passenger and freight services declined over the years, the post office remained open. The 1960s saw the end of passenger service and regular freight service, and by 1974 the depot was closed. The post office remained; in 1974, the year the trains no longer stopped at Montpelier Station, you could still mail a letter there for only 10 cents for first-class postage.

In 2008, the Montpelier Foundation undertook a one-year renovation of the Depot. You can read about some of the stages of restoring the building in old posts on this blog. We restored the Depot to the way it was in the 1910s in order to document a time of legalized segregation in Virginia and throughout the United States.

Montpelier dedicated The Montpelier Train Depot: In the Time of Segregation to the memory of Russell Coffin Childs, a former Montpelier special projects director. It was his vision to restore the Montpelier Train Depot to educate the public about the “Jim Crow” era. Thanks to Childs’ vision and dedication, Montpelier will be able to share the truth of all of our American history with generations to come.

The Montpelier Train Depot: In the Time of Segregation will use the authentically restored 1910-era building to teach the public about the “Jim Crow” period of segregation in the space where it was practiced. The old segregated “colored” and “white” waiting rooms will show the reality of racism that African-American travelers confronted during this period, and let visitors examine first-hand the fallacy of the notion of “separate but equal.”

The Montpelier Train Depot will be dedicated in memory of Russell Coffin Childs, former Montpelier special projects director. It was Mr. Childs’ vision to restore the Montpelier Train Depot. Thanks to his dedication, the Montpelier Train Depot will forever be a place to educate future generations about the reality of segregation, its consequences for society, and the strength of our constitutional form of government which accommodates peaceful change.

Admission to the opening is free. Admission to the lectures and reception is $30 per person for members of the general public; $10 for Friends of Montpelier and members of the Orange County African American Historical Society. Please call (540) 672-2728 x200 or e-mail ssimpson@montpelier.org for reservations.

Stay tuned for our next post in which we will take a brief look at the history of the Montpelier Train Depot.

Lucia presented a romantic ideal of Dolley Madison by changing names, dates and the text of actual letters. Although Mary’s admiration of Dolley is apparent from her Memoirs, Lucia changed actual scenes of Dolley’s life and those changes are reflected in her editing of Mary’s Memoirs and her own published work. Together, these works and their creators make an interesting puzzle for documentary researchers at Montpelier.

Lucia and Mary approached their reminiscences of Dolley Madison differently to achieve their own objectives. Although Mary wanted to preserve Dolley’s privacy, she also wanted to leave a lasting legacy of her aunt. As a beloved niece and constant companion to Dolley, Mary brought an unique perspective to the Memoirs. Her accounts are divided into two manuscripts: the first focusing on Dolley’s childhood to the War of 1812; the second starting at James Madison’s presidency and ending with John Payne Todd’s death in 1852. As a witness to Dolley’s home and family life, Mary worked to faithfully record family genealogy, stories, and correspondence.

On the other hand, Lucia took Mary’s Memoir and heavily edited or changed the stories and letters to present a different, romanticized vision of Dolley. Lucia recreated Dolley’s image to fit the ideal of a notable figure for the 1880s, exaggerating stories and elaborating themes that Mary had glossed over.

Both memoirs contain stories from the life of Dolley Madison and transcriptions of letters she wrote and received. At Montpelier, we have access to some of Dolley’s original letters, so we were able to compare them to the transcriptions of those letters which Mary and Lucia had written.

Mary’s transcriptions are extremely accurate, which suggests she worked with the original letters, while Lucia appeared to have worked from Mary’s transcriptions. However, Lucia inserted or changed various parts of letters. Lucia also differed from Mary in her research. While it appears Mary drew from her own experiences, interviews with family and friends, and actual correspondence, Lucia chose to include information from other published works in her book. These works were published after Mary’s death and gave new insights into Dolley’s life.

Although both Mary and Lucia’s writings focused primarily on Dolley Madison’s life, they also provide insight into the authors and their times. Finally, both help us to see how Dolley Madison was remembered and mythologized in the decades after her death.

Montpelier recently acquired a variety of barrels that represent an assortment of what the Madisons might have kept on-hand. Like many of the objects in the mansion, there’s much more to the barrels than meets the eye.

Coopers at Colonial Williamsburg and Strawbery Banke custom made a total of eight barrels for Montpelier. Student Education Director Christian Cotz hit the road to pick up the custom orders in early December. Visitors can now see the barrels in the mansion cellars.

Barrels or casks are generic terms that describe ingredient containers during the Madisons’ time. They could have other names, however, depending on the ingredient and amount a given container held. Using these terms, here is what you can expect to see when you visit the cellars:

• 1 molasses hogshead

• 1 salt hogshead

• 2 flour barrels

• 2 port pipes

• 1 kilderkin (often used for beer)

• 1 wine barrel