University of Virginia Library

Richard Ware

Dr. Thomas Cooper, the Philadelphia scientist who later had a distinguished career as
professor and president at the University of South Carolina, ran a few errands in
Philadelphia for the college as a favor to his old friend, the retired sage of Monticello,
including an attempt to recruit some Philadelphia craftsmen to move down to Virginia.
Cooper's efforts proved successful on one account, for on 5 January he informed Jefferson
that he was sending him a man "whose honesty and industry I have entertained a good
opinion of from near 20 Years observation. He asks so many questions that I have persuaded
him to go to the place & look for himself, and make his own bargain. He is a Carpenter, &
can command workmen: he can also induce bricklayers & brickmakers to come, if he
determines to go himself: also a Tin man, & probably other trades: upon all this you will
make your own enquiries in your own way. I have said nothing to him about prices."[153]

The carpenter, it turned out, was Richard Ware, who visited the construction site in late
March armed with a letter of recommendation from four prominent Philadelphians as well
as one from Jefferson's architectural protegé Robert Mills, then in Baltimore. "We do not
hesitate" to state, wrote the four gentlemen, that Ware "has long been held in high estimation
as a workman of intelligence, Skill, and fidelity; that many of the handsomest and best
buildings of our city have been of his construction; and that we Should deem him in every
way worthy to be employed, and competent, as a carpenter, to assist in the contemplated
Structure."[154] Calling Ware a "respectable Master Carpenter," Mills noted that the
Philadelphian "bears with him recommendations from Gentlemen well known to you in
Philadelphia, with whose names I will cheerfully associate mine, as I have had business with
Mr. W— during my residence in Pha."[155] Ware liked what he saw in Albemarle and
offered to "undertake three portions mentioned in the advertisement & uppon the conditions
their specified at fifteen percent below the Book of Prices published by M Cary in
1812."[156] A fifteen percent discount off Jefferson's preferred price list coupled with the
assurance that he could bring a gang of workers from Philadelphia to build the east range
easily won a contract for Ware, although it would be the summer before Ware and his
workmen showed up for work at the university. Ware and his men executed the carpentry
and brick work for Pavilions II, IV, and VI, thirteen dormitories on the east lawn, and the
carpentry work for Hotel F.[157]