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September 4-13, 2009 with Barbara Oberg, General Editor of the Papers of Thomas Jefferson.

Ask the raveled inhabitant of any nation, 'In what country on earth would you rather live?' Certainly in my own, where all my friends, my relations, and the earliest & sweetest affections and recollections of my life. 'Which would be your second choice?' France.

— Thomas Jefferson

Unbeknownst to many Princetonians, a team of University researchers has been steadily at work for many years in the depths of Firestone Library on a singular task: to prepare the authoritative and comprehensive edition of the correspondence and papers of our nation's third president, Thomas Jefferson. Careful research and collaborative scholarship produced the first volume of The Papers of Thomas Jefferson in 1950, setting new standards for the organization and editorial presentation of historical documents. The thirty-fourth volume was published in 2008, but with 70,000 documents including correspondence and papers, the full history has not yet been told.

Barbara Oberg, Lecturer with the rank of Professor in the History Department and General Editor of The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, invites you to visit Mr. Jefferson's France under the guidance of his own correspondence and diaries. Discuss the life and times of Jefferson and how his residence in France as America’s minister plenipotentiary to the Court of Louis XVI just before the French Revolution shaped Jefferson’s ideas and work at America’s founding. Investigate the gardens and cafes of Paris, the architecture and Roman ruins of Nice, Orange, Nîmes, and Avignon, and the vineyards of Provence, where he enjoyed one of his favorite pursuits—wine tasting. And because of Princeton's special relationships, gain exclusive access to sites associated with Jefferson and America's other founding fathers.

About the Study Leader
Barbara Oberg, Lecturer with the rank of Professor in the History Department and General Editor of The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, will serve as study leader for this Journey.

A graduate of Wellesley College, Oberg received MA and PhD degrees from the University of California, Santa Barbara. A documentary editor for most of her professional life, she is a historian of the colonial period and the early Republic. Co-author of Benjamin Franklin, Jonathan Edwards, and the Representation of American Culture and Federalists Reconsidered, Dr. Oberg was the Editor-in-Chief of the Benjamin Franklin Papers and a senior research scholar in the history department at Yale University for 12 years prior to coming to Princeton in 1999.

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