Robert Morris - Revision history

M-westerby at 13:37, September 27, 2021

2021-09-27T13:37:44Z

V-Federici at 09:04, August 6, 2020

2020-08-06T09:04:10Z

Bchristen at 19:13, October 5, 2018

2018-10-05T19:13:54Z

Bchristen at 19:13, October 5, 2018

2018-10-05T19:13:10Z

Bchristen:

2018-09-20T17:11:02Z

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E-athens at 15:47, February 6, 2018

2018-02-06T15:47:42Z

E-athens at 15:47, February 6, 2018

2018-02-06T15:47:11Z

E-athens at 14:59, February 6, 2018

2018-02-06T14:59:33Z

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E-athens at 18:11, January 31, 2018

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 '''Robert Morris''' (January 20, 1734&ndash;May 8, 1806), a merchant, financier, and land speculator, developed buildings and gardens in and around Philadelphia. He held important political offices before and after the Revolution; was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the United States Constitution; and earned the nickname “Financier of the American Revolution” through his contributions to the Continental Army and fledgling American economy.
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 ==Other Resources==
 [http://www.ushistory.org/presidentshouse/index.htm President’s House (Philadelphia) website]

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 ==History==
 [[File:1983.jpg|thumb|left|frameless|Fig. 1, Jeremiah Paul, ''Robert Morris’ Seat on Schuylkill'', July 20, 1794.]]
-At the age of thirteen, Morris emigrated from his native England to Maryland, where his father worked as a tobacco agent.<ref>Charles Rappleye, ''Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 7&ndash;9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> He later relocated to Philadelphia, eventually becoming a partner in a mercantile firm specializing in import and export trade with Europe, the West Indies, the Levant, and Africa. Some of the firm’s profits were made through the slave trade.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 9&ndash;14, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> With his fortunes on the rise, Morris established a country estate known as [[The Hills]] on the [[Schuylkill River]] and gained a reputation for lavish hospitality, hosting such prominent guests as [[George Washington]], whom he met in 1773 and entertained on numerous occasions.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 93, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> British troops demolished Morris’s country estate in November 1777, but otherwise his wealth seemed to increase during the war, leading to persistent accusations of profiteering.<ref>Ryan K. Smith, ''Robert Morris’s Folly: The Architectural and Financial Failures of an American Founder'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 22, 25, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ZKNMARKC, view on Zotero]; Rappleye 2010, 202, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]. </ref> Congress nevertheless appointed Morris superintendent of finance in 1781, a position second only to the President’s in terms of national importance.
+At the age of thirteen, Morris emigrated from his native England to Maryland, where his father worked as a tobacco agent.<ref>Charles Rappleye, ''Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 7&ndash;9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> He later relocated to Philadelphia, eventually becoming a partner in a mercantile firm specializing in import and export trade with Europe, the West Indies, the Levant, and Africa. Some of the firm’s profits were made through the slave trade.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 9&ndash;14, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> With his fortunes on the rise, Morris established a country estate known as [[The Hills]] on the [[Schuylkill River]] and gained a reputation for lavish hospitality, hosting such prominent guests as George Washington, whom he met in 1773 and entertained on numerous occasions.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 93, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> British troops demolished Morris’s country estate in November 1777, but otherwise his wealth seemed to increase during the war, leading to persistent accusations of profiteering.<ref>Ryan K. Smith, ''Robert Morris’s Folly: The Architectural and Financial Failures of an American Founder'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 22, 25, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ZKNMARKC, view on Zotero]; Rappleye 2010, 202, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]. </ref> Congress nevertheless appointed Morris superintendent of finance in 1781, a position second only to the President’s in terms of national importance.
-Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18—), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1:421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
+Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18—), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed George Washington that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1:421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
 Meanwhile, Morris was re-establishing [[The Hills]] as a showplace, creating a monumental [[greenhouse]] complex and extensive gardens known for citrus fruit and other exotic plants [Fig. 1]. A founding member of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture,<ref>''Minutes of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture: From Its Institution in February, 1785, to March, 1810'' (Philadelphia: John C. Clark & Son, 1854), 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/NABNPUQF view on Zotero].</ref> Morris experimented with the introduction of non-indigenous plant specimens and livestock at [[The Hills]], including “a little pig imported by Mr. Morris from the East Indies” in 1789; a pair of Merino sheep imported from Spain in 1792 (one of which he gave to [[Thomas Jefferson]] in 1795); and “Clover seed, Rye Grass, Beans and Peas . . . imported from Liverpool” in 1793.<ref>Thomas Jefferson, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. John Catanzariti, 41+ vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 28:375&ndash;76, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/H24SX77T view on Zotero]; Owen Tasker Robbins, “Toward a Preservation of the Grounds of Lemon Hill in Light of Their Past and Present Significance for Philadelphians” (masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 137, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero]; Jacob Hiltzheimer, ''Extracts from the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer of Philadelphia, 1765&ndash;1798,'' ed. Jacob Cox Parsons (Philadelphia: William F. Fell & Co., 1893), 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cultivated prestige at [[The Hills]] along with plants and animals. While in New York in May 1789, he asked his wife, Mary White Morris, to entertain some important new acquaintances embarking for Philadelphia: “I wish the Gentlmn. to see [[the Hills]] & the Ladies too if they are so inclined.” In August, Mary sent him a box of pineapples and other fruits from [[The Hills]], which he distributed to his associates in New York. “The raising of this very fine fruit makes me feel not a little proud,” he confessed.<ref>Smith 2014, 47, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>
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 ==Texts==
-* Morris, Robert, June 15, 1784, in a letter to [[George Washington]], describing his residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, PA (quoted in Washington 1992: 1:451&ndash;52)<ref>Washington 1992, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref>
+* Morris, Robert, June 15, 1784, in a letter to George Washington, describing his residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, PA (quoted in Washington 1992: 1:451&ndash;52)<ref>Washington 1992, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“My [[icehouse|Ice House]] is about 18 feet deep and 16 square, the bottom is a Coarse Gravell & the Water which drains from the Ice soaks into it as fast as the Ice melts, this prevents the necessity of a Drain which if the bottom was Clay or Stiff Loam would be necessary and for this reason the side of a Hill is preferred generally for digging an [[icehouse|Ice House]], as if needful a drain can easily be cut from the bottom of it, through the side of the Hill to let the Water run out. The [[Wall]]s of my [[icehouse|Ice House]] are built of Stone without Mortar (which is called Dry [[Wall]]) untill within a foot and a half of the Surface of the Earth when Mortar was used from thence to the Surface to make the top more binding and Solid. When this [[Wall]] was brought up even with the Surface of the Earth I stopped there and then dug the foundation for another [[Wall]], two foot back from the first and about two foot deep, this done the foundation was laid so as to enclose the whole of the [[Wall]]s built on the inside of the Hole where the Ice is put and on this foundation is built the [[Wall]]s which appear above ground and in mine they are about ten foot high. On these the Roof is fixed, these [[Wall]]s are very thick, built of Stone and Mortar, afterwards rough Cast on the outside. I nailed a Cieling of Boards under the Roof flat from Wall to Wall, and filled all the Space between that Cieling and the Shingling of the Roof with Straw so that the Heat of the Sun Cannot possibly have any Effect.
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 <gallery widths="170px" heights="170px" perrow="7">
-Image:1983.jpg|Jeremiah Paul, ''Robert Morris’ Seat on Schuylkill'', July 20, 1794.
+Image:1983.jpg|Jeremiah Paul, ''Robert Morris’ [[Seat]] on Schuylkill'', July 20, 1794.
 </gallery>

← Older revision		Revision as of 19:13, October 5, 2018
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−	* Grieve, George, describing Robert Morris’s residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, in a note to his translation of Chastellux’s ''Travels in North America,'' 1787 (Chastellux 1787: 1:203)<ref>François Jean Chastellux, Marquis de Chastellux, ''Travels in North America in the Years 1780, 1781, and 1782,'' 2 vols. (London: G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1787), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ITD6E8FB view on Zotero].</ref>	+	* Grieve, George, describing Robert Morris’s residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, PA, in a note to his translation of Chastellux’s ''Travels in North America,'' 1787 (Chastellux 1787: 1:203)<ref>François Jean Chastellux, Marquis de Chastellux, ''Travels in North America in the Years 1780, 1781, and 1782,'' 2 vols. (London: G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1787), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ITD6E8FB view on Zotero].</ref>

	:“The house the Marquis speaks of, in which Mr. Morris lives, belonged formerly to Mr. Richard Penn; the Financier has made great additions to it, and is the first who has introduced the luxury of [[hot house\|hot-houses]] and [[ice house\|ice-houses]] on the continent.”		:“The house the Marquis speaks of, in which Mr. Morris lives, belonged formerly to Mr. Richard Penn; the Financier has made great additions to it, and is the first who has introduced the luxury of [[hot house\|hot-houses]] and [[ice house\|ice-houses]] on the continent.”

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 At the age of thirteen, Morris emigrated from his native England to Maryland, where his father worked as a tobacco agent.<ref>Charles Rappleye, ''Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 7&ndash;9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> He later relocated to Philadelphia, eventually becoming a partner in a mercantile firm specializing in import and export trade with Europe, the West Indies, the Levant, and Africa. Some of the firm’s profits were made through the slave trade.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 9&ndash;14, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> With his fortunes on the rise, Morris established a country estate known as [[The Hills]] on the [[Schuylkill River]] and gained a reputation for lavish hospitality, hosting such prominent guests as [[George Washington]], whom he met in 1773 and entertained on numerous occasions.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 93, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> British troops demolished Morris’s country estate in November 1777, but otherwise his wealth seemed to increase during the war, leading to persistent accusations of profiteering.<ref>Ryan K. Smith, ''Robert Morris’s Folly: The Architectural and Financial Failures of an American Founder'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 22, 25, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ZKNMARKC, view on Zotero]; Rappleye 2010, 202, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]. </ref> Congress nevertheless appointed Morris superintendent of finance in 1781, a position second only to the President’s in terms of national importance.
-Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18--), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1:421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
+Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18—), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1:421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
 Meanwhile, Morris was re-establishing [[The Hills]] as a showplace, creating a monumental [[greenhouse]] complex and extensive gardens known for citrus fruit and other exotic plants [Fig. 1]. A founding member of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture,<ref>''Minutes of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture: From Its Institution in February, 1785, to March, 1810'' (Philadelphia: John C. Clark & Son, 1854), 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/NABNPUQF view on Zotero].</ref> Morris experimented with the introduction of non-indigenous plant specimens and livestock at [[The Hills]], including “a little pig imported by Mr. Morris from the East Indies” in 1789; a pair of Merino sheep imported from Spain in 1792 (one of which he gave to [[Thomas Jefferson]] in 1795); and “Clover seed, Rye Grass, Beans and Peas . . . imported from Liverpool” in 1793.<ref>Thomas Jefferson, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. John Catanzariti, 41+ vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 28:375&ndash;76, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/H24SX77T view on Zotero]; Owen Tasker Robbins, “Toward a Preservation of the Grounds of Lemon Hill in Light of Their Past and Present Significance for Philadelphians” (masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 137, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero]; Jacob Hiltzheimer, ''Extracts from the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer of Philadelphia, 1765&ndash;1798,'' ed. Jacob Cox Parsons (Philadelphia: William F. Fell & Co., 1893), 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cultivated prestige at [[The Hills]] along with plants and animals. While in New York in May 1789, he asked his wife, Mary White Morris, to entertain some important new acquaintances embarking for Philadelphia: “I wish the Gentlmn. to see [[the Hills]] & the Ladies too if they are so inclined.” In August, Mary sent him a box of pineapples and other fruits from [[The Hills]], which he distributed to his associates in New York. “The raising of this very fine fruit makes me feel not a little proud,” he confessed.<ref>Smith 2014, 47, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>

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 ==Notes==
 <references/>
 [[Category: People|Morris, Robert]]

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	[http://gwpapers.virginia.edu/documents/george-washington-to-robert-morris/ The Papers of George Washington]		[http://gwpapers.virginia.edu/documents/george-washington-to-robert-morris/ The Papers of George Washington]
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	==Notes==		==Notes==

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 —''Robyn Asleson''
 ==Texts==
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 :“I went . . . to visit Robert Morris’s [[greenhouse]] [''serre chaud''] near Philadelphia. It had very beautiful specimens of orange trees, lemon trees, and pineapples.”
 ==Images==
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 Image:1983.jpg|Jeremiah Paul, ''Robert Morris’ Seat on Schuylkill'', July 20, 1794.
-</gallery>
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 ==Other Resources==

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 At the age of thirteen, Morris emigrated from his native England to Maryland, where his father worked as a tobacco agent.<ref>Charles Rappleye, ''Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 7&ndash;9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> He later relocated to Philadelphia, eventually becoming a partner in a mercantile firm specializing in import and export trade with Europe, the West Indies, the Levant, and Africa. Some of the firm’s profits were made through the slave trade.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 9&ndash;14, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> With his fortunes on the rise, Morris established a country estate known as [[The Hills]] on the [[Schuylkill River]] and gained a reputation for lavish hospitality, hosting such prominent guests as [[George Washington]], whom he met in 1773 and entertained on numerous occasions.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 93, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> British troops demolished Morris’s country estate in November 1777, but otherwise his wealth seemed to increase during the war, leading to persistent accusations of profiteering.<ref>Ryan K. Smith, ''Robert Morris’s Folly: The Architectural and Financial Failures of an American Founder'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 22, 25, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ZKNMARKC, view on Zotero]; Rappleye 2010, 202, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]. </ref> Congress nevertheless appointed Morris superintendent of finance in 1781, a position second only to the President’s in terms of national importance.
-Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18--), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1: 421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
+Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18--), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1:421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cofounded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
 Meanwhile, Morris was re-establishing [[The Hills]] as a showplace, creating a monumental [[greenhouse]] complex and extensive gardens known for citrus fruit and other exotic plants [Fig. 1]. A founding member of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture,<ref>''Minutes of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture: From Its Institution in February, 1785, to March, 1810'' (Philadelphia: John C. Clark & Son, 1854), 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/NABNPUQF view on Zotero].</ref> Morris experimented with the introduction of non-indigenous plant specimens and livestock at [[The Hills]], including “a little pig imported by Mr. Morris from the East Indies” in 1789; a pair of Merino sheep imported from Spain in 1792 (one of which he gave to [[Thomas Jefferson]] in 1795); and “Clover seed, Rye Grass, Beans and Peas . . . imported from Liverpool” in 1793.<ref>Thomas Jefferson, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. John Catanzariti, 41+ vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 28:375&ndash;76, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/H24SX77T view on Zotero]; Owen Tasker Robbins, “Toward a Preservation of the Grounds of Lemon Hill in Light of Their Past and Present Significance for Philadelphians” (masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 137, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero]; Jacob Hiltzheimer, ''Extracts from the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer of Philadelphia, 1765&ndash;1798,'' ed. Jacob Cox Parsons (Philadelphia: William F. Fell & Co., 1893), 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cultivated prestige at [[The Hills]] along with plants and animals. While in New York in May 1789, he asked his wife, Mary White Morris, to entertain some important new acquaintances embarking for Philadelphia: “I wish the Gentlmn. to see [[the Hills]] & the Ladies too if they are so inclined.” In August, Mary sent him a box of pineapples and other fruits from [[The Hills]], which he distributed to his associates in New York. “The raising of this very fine fruit makes me feel not a little proud,” he confessed.<ref>Smith 2014, 47, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>
@@ Line 28: / Line 28: @@
-* [[Manasseh Cutler|Cutler, Manasseh]], July 13, 1787, describing [[The Hills]], estate of Robert Morris, Philadelphia, PA (1987: 1:256&ndash;57)<ref>Manasseh Cutler, ''Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler,'' ed. William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkin Cutler, 2 vols. (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1987), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ASAS6SD5 view on Zotero].</ref>
+* [[Manasseh Cutler|Cutler, Manasseh]], July 13, 1787, describing [[The Hills]], estate of Robert Morris, Philadelphia, PA (1987: 1:256&ndash;57)<ref>Manasseh Cutler, ''Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler,'' ed. William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkin Cutler, 2 vols. (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1987), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ASAS6SD5 view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“We continued our route, in view of the [[Schuylkill River|Schuylkill]], and up the river several miles, and took a view of a number of Country-[[seat]]s, one belonging to Mr. R. Morris, the American financier, and who is said to be possessed of the greatest fortune in America. His country-[[seat]] is not yet completed, but it will be superb. It is planned on a large scale, the gardens and [[walk]]s are extensive, and the villa, situated on an [[eminence]], has a commanding [[prospect]] down the [[Schuylkill River|Schuylkill]] to the Delaware.”

@@ Line 5: / Line 5: @@
 At the age of thirteen, Morris emigrated from his native England to Maryland, where his father worked as a tobacco agent.<ref>Charles Rappleye, ''Robert Morris: Financier of the American Revolution'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 7&ndash;9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> He later relocated to Philadelphia, eventually becoming a partner in a mercantile firm specializing in import and export trade with Europe, the West Indies, the Levant, and Africa. Some of the firm’s profits were made through the slave trade.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 9&ndash;14, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> With his fortunes on the rise, Morris established a country estate known as [[The Hills]] on the [[Schuylkill River]] and gained a reputation for lavish hospitality, hosting such prominent guests as [[George Washington]], whom he met in 1773 and entertained on numerous occasions.<ref>Rappleye 2010, 93, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> British troops demolished Morris’s country estate in November 1777, but otherwise his wealth seemed to increase during the war, leading to persistent accusations of profiteering.<ref>Ryan K. Smith, ''Robert Morris’s Folly: The Architectural and Financial Failures of an American Founder'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 22, 25, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ZKNMARKC, view on Zotero]; Rappleye 2010, 202, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]. </ref> Congress nevertheless appointed Morris superintendent of finance in 1781, a position second only to the President’s in terms of national importance.
-Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18--), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1: 421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7: 246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris co-founded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;220, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
+Morris purchased millions of acres in various states as speculative investments and acquired several properties in Philadelphia as family residences.<ref>Robert Morris, ''Account of Robert Morris’ Property'' (Philadelphia: King & Baird Printers, 18--), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7U6SFDE3 view on Zotero]; Edward Lawler Jr., “The President’s House in Philadelphia: The Rediscovery of a Lost Landmark,” ''The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography'' 126, no. 1 (January 2002): 19, 22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero]; Barbara A. Chernow, “Robert Morris: Genesee Land Speculator,” ''New York'' 58, no. 2 (April 1977): 197, 200&ndash;211, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]. </ref> In 1781 he bought one of the grandest houses in Philadelphia, centrally located on Market Street near the [[State House Yard]]. Built in the late 1760s, the house had been damaged by fire in 1780 and Morris immediately began renovations, adding innovative modern luxuries, such as a two-story [[bathhouse]], [[hothouse|hothouses]], and an [[icehouse]].<ref>Lawler 2002, 9&ndash;18, 20&ndash;22, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> The latter so impressed [[George Washington]] that in 1784 he asked Morris for detailed instructions as the basis for an [[icehouse]] at [[Mount Vernon]].<ref>George Washington, ''The Papers of George Washington,'' Confederation Series, 6 vols., ed. William Wright Abbot and Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992), 1: 421, 451&ndash;52, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref> Through the acquisition of several lots adjacent to his Market Street house, Morris created a garden of about half an acre where he hosted an aeronautic experiment in the spring of 1784, gathering spectators to witness the launch of an “Air Balloon made of Paper.”<ref>Francis Hopkinson to Thomas Jefferson, May 12, 1784, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. Julian P. Boyd, 41+ vols.(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), 7:246, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9HSMRI7H view on Zotero]; see also Lawler 2002, 18, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Morris co-founded the Society for the Improvement of Roads and Inland Navigation in 1789 and thereafter served as president of several pioneering [[canal]] companies.<ref>Smith 2014, 56, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Ronald E. Shaw, ''Canals For A Nation: The Canal Era in the United States, 1790&ndash;1860'' (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1990), 3&ndash;6, 20, 59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BDMA3SVQ view on Zotero]; John Lauritz Larson, ''Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States'' (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; John F. Bell, “Robert Fulton and the Pennsylvania Canals,” ''Pennsylvania History'' 9 (1942), 191, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/GRXII2HX view on Zotero].</ref>
-Meanwhile, Morris was re-establishing [[The Hills]] as a showplace, creating a monumental [[greenhouse]] complex and extensive gardens known for citrus fruit and other exotic plants [Fig. 1]. A founding member of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture,<ref>''Minutes of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture: From Its Institution in February, 1785, to March, 1810'' (Philadelphia: John C. Clark & Son, 1854), 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/NABNPUQF view on Zotero].</ref> Morris experimented with the introduction of non-indigenous plant specimens and livestock at [[The Hills]], including “a little pig imported by Mr. Morris from the East Indies” in 1789; a pair of Merino sheep imported from Spain in 1792 (one of which he gave to [[Thomas Jefferson]] in 1795); and “Clover seed, Rye Grass, Beans and Peas . . . imported from Liverpool” in 1793.<ref>Thomas Jefferson, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. John Catanzariti, 41+ vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 28: 375&ndash;76, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/H24SX77T view on Zotero]; Owen Tasker Robbins, “Toward a Preservation of the Grounds of Lemon Hill in Light of Their Past and Present Significance for Philadelphians” (masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 137, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero]; Jacob Hiltzheimer, ''Extracts from the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer of Philadelphia, 1765&ndash;1798,'' ed. Jacob Cox Parsons (Philadelphia: William F. Fell & Co., 1893), 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cultivated prestige at [[The Hills]] along with plants and animals. While in New York in May 1789, he asked his wife, Mary White Morris, to entertain some important new acquaintances embarking for Philadelphia. “I wish the Gentlmn. to see [[the Hills]] & the Ladies too if they are so inclined.” In August, Mary sent him a box of pineapples and other fruits from [[The Hills]], which he distributed to his associates in New York. “The raising of this very fine fruit makes me feel not a little proud,” he confessed.<ref>Smith 2014, 47, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>
+Meanwhile, Morris was re-establishing [[The Hills]] as a showplace, creating a monumental [[greenhouse]] complex and extensive gardens known for citrus fruit and other exotic plants [Fig. 1]. A founding member of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture,<ref>''Minutes of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture: From Its Institution in February, 1785, to March, 1810'' (Philadelphia: John C. Clark & Son, 1854), 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/NABNPUQF view on Zotero].</ref> Morris experimented with the introduction of non-indigenous plant specimens and livestock at [[The Hills]], including “a little pig imported by Mr. Morris from the East Indies” in 1789; a pair of Merino sheep imported from Spain in 1792 (one of which he gave to [[Thomas Jefferson]] in 1795); and “Clover seed, Rye Grass, Beans and Peas . . . imported from Liverpool” in 1793.<ref>Thomas Jefferson, ''The Papers of Thomas Jefferson,'' Main Series, ed. John Catanzariti, 41+ vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 28:375&ndash;76, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/H24SX77T view on Zotero]; Owen Tasker Robbins, “Toward a Preservation of the Grounds of Lemon Hill in Light of Their Past and Present Significance for Philadelphians” (masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 137, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero]; Jacob Hiltzheimer, ''Extracts from the Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer of Philadelphia, 1765&ndash;1798,'' ed. Jacob Cox Parsons (Philadelphia: William F. Fell & Co., 1893), 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> Morris cultivated prestige at [[The Hills]] along with plants and animals. While in New York in May 1789, he asked his wife, Mary White Morris, to entertain some important new acquaintances embarking for Philadelphia. “I wish the Gentlmn. to see [[the Hills]] & the Ladies too if they are so inclined.” In August, Mary sent him a box of pineapples and other fruits from [[The Hills]], which he distributed to his associates in New York. “The raising of this very fine fruit makes me feel not a little proud,” he confessed.<ref>Smith 2014, 47, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>
 In 1790, having persuaded Congress to make Philadelphia the temporary seat of the federal government until a new capital city could be erected on the banks of Potomac River, Morris volunteered his Market Street house to serve as the President’s official residence.<ref>Smith 2014, 10&ndash;20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Lawler 2002, 23, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/KJIF2I33 view on Zotero].</ref> Three years later, Morris made the fateful decision to commission the expatriate French engineer [[Pierre-Charles L’Enfant]] to design and build a magnificent new town house in Philadelphia. By 1796 the spiraling cost of [[Pierre-Charles L’Enfant|L’Enfant’s]] increasingly extravagant plans forced construction to halt, earning the half-finished palace the nickname “Morris’s Folly.”<ref>Smith 2014, 59&ndash;127, 164&ndash;82, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref> This expensive misadventure coincided with a mountain of failed land speculations and other entrepreneurial schemes and investments.<ref>Larson 2001, 23&ndash;25, 30, 32, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/RFZI3Z8X view on Zotero]; Chernow 1977, 212&ndash;220, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/U7BVI5RV view on Zotero]; Hiltzheimer 1893, 192&ndash;194, 204, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/7NU9RN8C view on Zotero].</ref> In defiance of his creditors, Morris holed up at [[The Hills]] from July 1797 to February 1798, before finally surrendering to a prison term of nearly four years.<ref>Smith 2014, 158&ndash;63, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero]; Robbins 1987, 153, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/2MIWTC48 view on Zotero].</ref> His extensive landholdings, including [[The Hills]], were sold piece by piece at a great loss in order to settle his debts.<ref>Smith 2014, 181&ndash;84, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4MAMWNRA view on Zotero].</ref>
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 ==Texts==
-* Morris, Robert, June 15, 1784, in a letter to [[George Washington]], describing his residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, PA (quoted in Washington 1992: 1: 451&ndash;452)<ref>Washington 1992, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref>
+* Morris, Robert, June 15, 1784, in a letter to [[George Washington]], describing his residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, PA (quoted in Washington 1992: 1:451&ndash;52)<ref>Washington 1992, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/G2R8EXJI view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“My [[icehouse|Ice House]] is about 18 feet deep and 16 square, the bottom is a Coarse Gravell & the Water which drains from the Ice soaks into it as fast as the Ice melts, this prevents the necessity of a Drain which if the bottom was Clay or Stiff Loam would be necessary and for this reason the side of a Hill is preferred generally for digging an [[icehouse|Ice House]], as if needful a drain can easily be cut from the bottom of it, through the side of the Hill to let the Water run out. The [[Wall]]s of my [[icehouse|Ice House]] are built of Stone without Mortar (which is called Dry [[Wall]]) untill within a foot and a half of the Surface of the Earth when Mortar was used from thence to the Surface to make the top more binding and Solid. When this [[Wall]] was brought up even with the Surface of the Earth I stopped there and then dug the foundation for another [[Wall]], two foot back from the first and about two foot deep, this done the foundation was laid so as to enclose the whole of the [[Wall]]s built on the inside of the Hole where the Ice is put and on this foundation is built the [[Wall]]s which appear above ground and in mine they are about ten foot high. On these the Roof is fixed, these [[Wall]]s are very thick, built of Stone and Mortar, afterwards rough Cast on the outside. I nailed a Cieling of Boards under the Roof flat from Wall to Wall, and filled all the Space between that Cieling and the Shingling of the Roof with Straw so that the Heat of the Sun Cannot possibly have any Effect.
@@ Line 23: / Line 23: @@
-* Grieve, George, describing Robert Morris’s residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, in a note to his translation of Chastellux’s ''Travels in North America,'' 1787 (Chastellux 1787: 1: 203)<ref>François Jean Chastellux, Marquis de Chastellux, ''Travels in North America in the Years 1780, 1781, and 1782,'' 2 vols. (London: G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1787), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ITD6E8FB view on Zotero].</ref>
+* Grieve, George, describing Robert Morris’s residence in Market Street, Philadelphia, in a note to his translation of Chastellux’s ''Travels in North America,'' 1787 (Chastellux 1787: 1:203)<ref>François Jean Chastellux, Marquis de Chastellux, ''Travels in North America in the Years 1780, 1781, and 1782,'' 2 vols. (London: G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1787), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ITD6E8FB view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“The house the Marquis speaks of, in which Mr. Morris lives, belonged formerly to Mr. Richard Penn; the Financier has made great additions to it, and is the first who has introduced the luxury of [[hot house|hot-houses]] and [[ice house|ice-houses]] on the continent.”
-* [[Rev. Manasseh Cutler|Cutler, Rev. Manasseh]], July 13, 1787, describing [[The Hills]], estate of Robert Morris, Philadelphia, PA (1987: 1:256&ndash;257)<ref>Manasseh Cutler, ''Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler,'' ed. William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkin Cutler, 2 vols. (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1987), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ASAS6SD5 view on Zotero].</ref>
+* [[Rev. Manasseh Cutler|Cutler, Rev. Manasseh]], July 13, 1787, describing [[The Hills]], estate of Robert Morris, Philadelphia, PA (1987: 1:256&ndash;57)<ref>Manasseh Cutler, ''Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler,'' ed. William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkin Cutler, 2 vols. (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1987), vol. 1, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/ASAS6SD5 view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“We continued our route, in view of the [[Schuylkill River|Schuylkill]], and up the river several miles, and took a view of a number of Country-[[seat]]s, one belonging to Mr. R. Morris, the American financier, and who is said to be possessed of the greatest fortune in America. His country-[[seat]] is not yet completed, but it will be superb. It is planned on a large scale, the gardens and [[walk]]s are extensive, and the villa, situated on an [[eminence]], has a commanding [[prospect]] down the [[Schuylkill River|Schuylkill]] to the Delaware.”