Marbles

Despite several claims to the contrary, we have no evidence of Thomas Jefferson's personal interest in the game of marbles or ownership of a collection of marbles. The first known appearance of this information is in 1972;^[1] it was repeated in Fred Ferretti's 1973 book The Great American Marble Book^[2] and in a subsequent article by Ferretti on marbles for the Encyclopedia Americana.^[3]

There are a number of letters where Jefferson refers to "marbles," (e.g. "I have not a scrip of a pen on the subject of the marbles you mention as arrived for me at Philada., neither invoice, nor advice nor letter of any sort."^[4]) and although these are references to mineralogical specimens, it is possible that these references may have contributed to the confusion on this topic.

Footnotes

1. ↑ Trudy Laing, "Don't Lose Your Marbles," Glass Magazine Vol. 1 No. 1, 1972.
2. ↑ Fred Ferretti, The Great American Marble Book (New York: Workman Publishing Co., 1973).
3. ↑ Encyclopedia Americana, 1989, s.v. "Marbles."
4. ↑ Thomas Jefferson to John Vaughan, 12 October 1825. File copy at Massachusetts Historical Society.

Further Sources

• Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest. "Site B" Online Archaeology Exhibit: Marbles. http://www.poplarforest.org/siteB/artifacttemplate.php?pick=Marbles