Restoration puts James Madison back into Montpelier

ByABC News
September 11, 2008, 11:54 PM

ORANGE, Va. -- Restorers have lopped off two wings, obliterated 14 bathrooms, re-created two staircases and, overall, reduced by more than half the size of Montpelier, President James Madison's lifelong home here in the lush foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

On Wednesday, the scaled-down Georgian mansion two hours southwest of Washington will be ready for its close-up.

The five-year, $24 million restoration has returned the stately home to the way it appeared during the fourth U.S. president's retirement years. Proponents of the project say it is a fitting tribute to a Founding Father who lacks a national monument, despite being considered the principal author of the Constitution.

Madison grew up in the house his father commissioned in 1760. He spent his retirement years here with his wife, Dolley. And he died in his first-floor study in 1836.

In 1901, industrialist William duPont bought Montpelier and gradually expanded it from 22 to 55 rooms. His daughter, Marion duPont Scott, inherited the pink-stucco house and raised thoroughbred horses on the estate until her death in 1983. She left it to the National Trust for Historic Preservation and requested that the group return the house to its Madison-era appearance.

To the delight of the architectural historians working here, the duPonts were big on recycling; many of the components of the Madison home remained under expansions that took the house from 12,000 square feet to 36,000 square feet. Restorers looked for "ghost" discoloration on floors to indicate the location of original walls. They studied extensive notes from Madison's builder, James Dinsmore, exacting down to the yardage of the molding he used. And they found clues in unlikely spots, such as the mouse nest that yielded scraps of damask and silk from the Madison household.

In determining whether the restoration were even feasible, Albany, N.Y.-based architect Mark Wenger says his team was mindful that the duPont home had its own importance in the social history of Virginia.