University of Virginia Library

Professorship Declined

It was near the end of October before Jefferson took up his pen again to describe "what we
called the Central college, about a mile from the village of Charlottesville and 4. miles from
this place [Monticello], and have made some progress in the buildings." This time Jefferson
was writing to entice Nathaniel Bowditch to accept the chair of mathematics at the college,
soon to be a new state university. "The plan of building," said Jefferson according to a now
familiar theme, "is not to erect one single magnificent building to contain every body, and
every thing, but to make of it an Academical village . . . with kitchen, garden Etc. distinct
Dormitories for the students, not more than two in a room, & separate boarding houses for
dieting them by private housekeepers." Besides offering Bowditch a salary of $2,000,
Jefferson bragged about the area's soil, health, "genial climate," extremely cheap
"necessaries of life," religions, and the inhabitants, the "substantial yeomanry of farmers
(tobacco long since given up)." In short, Jefferson concluded, "our society is neither
scientific nor splendid, but independant, hospitable, correct and neighborly."[135] Bowditch
nevertheless declined the generous offer of a professorship, citing for a reason "several
important trusts (amounting to nearly half a million of dollars) undertaken for the children
of an ancient merchant late of this Town . . . My income from these various trusts &c.
exceeds $3,000, Considerable time is left to me to devote to those studies which have been
the delight of my leisure hours."[136]