#parsonweems

By: Lisa Timmerman, Executive Director

By all accounts, Mason Locke Weems was a shrewd salesman as he traveled up and down Virginia selling his books. Roads were certainly a concern of early Americans in the 1790s as the conditions frequently and significantly delayed travel. Historical letters abound bemoaning the roads around Dumfries as weather, season, temperature, and river levels all had to be accounted before when planning an excursion. Weems petitioned Virginia’s General Assembly on 12/16/1797 with a creative solution.

“The petition of Mason Locke Weems, humbly shewth, That the delay of the Mail, and the great risques which often alarm and which sometimes have actually destroyed the lives and property of Travellers on the post road from Fredericksburg to Dumfries, for want of bridges over the deep and rapid runs of Potomak and Acquia, are to be conditioned as great public evils; and that your petitioner of the most valuable books, the circulation of which he concieves [sic] will greatly redound to gracious permission, to undertake a lottery for the disposal of books which he will furnish to the fortunate adventurers in said lottery, at the Philadelphia retail prices, and from the profits of which books that vended, he will contribute one thousand dollars for the purpose of erecting over the aforesaid dangerous runs of Potomak & Acquia, two strong and sufficient bridges, of season’d oak frames well tard, and secured from the inclemencies of the Weather. Your Petitioner therefore humbly prayeth that an act may pass to authorize such a lottery and to appoint commissioners to raise by lottery the sum of one thousand dollars, for the purpose of building the aforesaid bridges, and your Petitioner will as in duty bound pray &c.”

(Fry, Joshua.  A map of the most inhabited part of Virginia containing the whole province of Maryland with part of Pensilvania, New Jersey and North Carolina. [1775], Library of Congress, http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.gmd/g3880.ct000370)

While the good Parson certainly condemned vices such as drinking and gambling in his works, lotteries held a slightly different connotation in the late 1700s. Lotteries were crucial to the very first years of the Jamestown colony when the Virginia Company held a lottery in 1612 to raise additional funding for the struggling colonists. Thomas Sharplisse, a London tailor, won the grand prize of four thousand crowns with two Anglican churches receiving smaller fortunes. After covering the costs of the lotteries, the Virginia Company directed the remaining revenue to their desperate colonists. Early Americans continued to rely upon these “public benefits,” as the administrators of the lotteries used careful phrasing to gain public support and funds. Many Virginia planter patriarchs, such as George Washington, participated in lotteries for personal and public benefits. William Smith wrote to George Washington on 08/13/1784 asking for his help in disseminating tickets for funding Washington College. While he had circulated a subscription letter to possible donors, he also wanted to offer a lottery. “With the Advice of Govr Paca & others of the Visitors, we have also a Lottery on Foot, which may be at least an excusable Means of drawing some Aid from some, whose public Spirit might not otherwise induce them to subscribe. Enclosed is the Scheme of the Lottery, which we have Reason to hope may be full by Novr the Time mentioned.” Washington agreed noting David Ardell would carry out the distribution. “I do not know where two or three hundred could be better placed in Alexandria, & if you will send him that number, he has promised me that his ex[er]tion for the sale of them shall not be wanting.” The result? Out of the 10,000 tickets at four dollars a piece offered by The Washington College, 3,187 won prizes – 3,000 paid eight dollars and the other 187 up to four dollars. Archibald Thweatt made a similar suggestion to Thomas Jefferson on 09/24/1817 after receiving a subscription letter from him for Jefferson’s “Central College” in Charlottesville.

However, careful phrasing and good motives did not stop corruption and fraud. Britain banned private lotteries in 1769, but that did not stop public lotteries from resuming years later. Purchasers felt confident that their money overall helped society and allowed them brief entertainment with this game of chance. When King George III prohibited lotteries in almost all colonies, tensions immediately increased as colonists used lotteries as a way to avoid taxes. It should be noted that the English State Lottery, run by the British, remained legal with serious modifications to allow more money to remain with the British collectors. Lotteries remained in favor until around the 1830s when lottery scams, continued religious outcry (Quakers were notable very early dissenters), and social reform movements changed Americans opinions.

Weems’ 1797 petition came at a time when lotteries were still favorable in Virginia and across the country. His emphasis on books and the desire to make traveling safer not only appealed to those in favor of supporting education, it also spoke to better commerce and networking with easier transportation and travel. However, there would be no special lottery for our Potomac and Aquia rivers. The Virginia General Assembly rejected his request. Nevertheless, he purchased our humble museum the following year in 1798 as he continued risking his life to the “great public evil” of Virginia – our roads.

(Sources: Weems, Mason Locke. Petition, 1797. LVA: Legislative Petitions Digital Collection; Laskow, Sarah. Colonial America was Built on Lottery Revenue. Atlas Obscura, https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/early-american-lottery-ticket-colonial; Sweeney, Matthew. The Lottery Wars: Long Odds, Fast Money, and the Battle Over an American Institution. London: Bloomsbury, 2009; “Archibald Thweatt to Thomas Jefferson, 24 September 1817,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-12-02-0033. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Retirement Series, vol. 12, 1 September 1817 to 21 April 1818, ed. J. Jefferson Looney. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014, pp. 41–42.]; “To George Washington from William Smith, 13 August 1784,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/04-02-02-0037. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Confederation Series, vol. 2, 18 July 1784 – 18 May 1785, ed. W. W. Abbot. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992, pp. 37–38.]; “From George Washington to William Smith, 25 August 1784,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/04-02-02-0053. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Confederation Series, vol. 2, 18 July 1784 – 18 May 1785, ed. W. W. Abbot. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1992, p. 57.])