Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1962-02-22
The
Rambler
Speculotes on
Wushington's Return
BY GEORGE KENNEDY

AAC 10 VIC principal figure
in a pageant put on by the
Old Guard.
The date is March is, 1897,
the day that Washington,
with a large encourage in
Guiding Lafayette, returned
to Mount Vernon from Phila-
delphia after the completion
of his second presidential
term. They'll all be there,
Martha Washington and Mel
lie Gusts in costume, the
officers in uniform.
Washington had only about
a year and a half to live.
He died December II, 1899.
That was one of the few
sad things about Washing
tons life, that military and
political service kept him
away from Mount Vernon
for so many years.
Mount Vernon became his
in 1854. The next year he
was away in the west with
Gen. Braddock.
Then he had a period of 20
years in which he developed
the plantation and enlarged
the house. In ITS he went
to the Continental Congress
in Philadelphia which made
him commander in chief
and sent him to Boston.
He did not get back to
Mount Vernon until Deem
Der, 1888. In 1887 he spent
months in Philadelphia as
a member of the Consti-
tutional Convention. Early
in 1889 he was inaugurated
President in New York.
The Rambler fell to specu-
lating about what the real
George Washington would
think if he were tn return
today.
One thing is certain. He
would approve of Mount
Vernon as it enters its well
over 20Oth spring.
He loved the place. His VOL
luminous letters from head
quarters in the field include
many to his kinsmen and
plantation manager, Lund
Washington, about the care
of the place.
He wanted Clever" trees
(pruned to artificial shapes
along the walks. He wanted
"exotics" brought in from
the woods and planted about
the house. BY "exoticS" he
meant the Towering trees
native to the Virginia wood
land, the dogwood, the red
bud and the lilac.
He would be surprised at
the "clevernesS" of the trees
there today. Pear and apple
and Towering plum have
been trained in Gordon eff
fects to be part of fences and
espalier effects Growing flat
beside the walls). And he
would be- amazed at the
tulips, the first to bloom in
this area.
What would he think about
the world? It is possible that
he would be as amazed at
the switch of the principal
source of wealth from agri-
culture to commerce and in
dustry as we'll as modern
communications and trans
portation.
He would be a conservative,
of course, but a conservative
in the old English political
sense of being for the
maintenance of existing
institutions of both state
and church. He would have
nothing in common with
conservative business men
to say nothing of the So
called conservatives on the
far right. He would have
a hard time understanding
why people who want to de-
stroy the Supreme Court or
the governments principal
source of revenue, the income
tax are called conservatives
He probably would find
it difficult to talk to the
captains of industry because
they know little about agri-
culture, animal husbandry,
the deployment of troops in
the field or the hunting of
the fox.
Washington never made
from his Mount Yer
non plantation. His income
came from the plantations
on the York that came to
him when he married Martha
cambridge Gusts. His hopes
were in the western lands
awarded him for his military
service.
He conducted endless ex-
periments trying to improve
his sour Mount Vernon land,
fertilization with muck from
the river bottom, with leaf
mould, with horse and cattle
He fostered a big
operation of taking fish from
the river during the herring
and shad runs, sailing them
in barrels and selling them.
He switched crops from to-
bacco to small grains and
milled them on the place.