A room with small windows, a bed, a cradle and various children's toys
The recreated second-floor nursery at Monticello

Written evidence indicates that Jefferson specifically designated a room to serve as a nursery in the expanded Monticello in the 1790s. This became reality in 1809 when his daughter Martha Jefferson Randolph and her family moved to Monticello. Only the youngest children would have lived in the Nursery, adjacent to their mother’s room, eventually graduating to various sleeping arrangements throughout the upstairs. Enslaved nursemaids, including Priscilla Hemmings, frequently spent their days here watching over these young children.

-Monticello guide staff, 2017


Behind-the-scenes in the Grandchildren's Nursery