From Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Claxton, 9 June 1805
To Thomas Claxton
Washington June 9. 05
Th: Jefferson to mr Claxton.
As we shall move into the Mamoth room within 2. or 3. days we shall be in immediate want of chairs for it. if therefore you could send a couple of dozen round immediately it would be well. a decent lanthorn is wanting for the middle of the passage upstairs. such as those in the Hall below stairs would be best. also about half a dozen semi-vase lamps to hang against the walls in the passages & stairways. our painter took to drinking a day or two after you went away & never returned. Capt Tingey furnished some others two days ago & they are going on well. the floor cloth for the hall is prepared & will be painted immediately in the Capitol. Accept my best wishes.
PoC (MHi); endorsed by TJ.
Mamoth room: that is, the East Room of the President’s House, where the “Mammoth Cheese” had resided. Presented to TJ on New Year’s Day 1802, the cheese seems to have made its last appearance at the president’s 1805 New Year’s Day reception, when it was served with cake and punch (William Parker Cutler and Julia Perkins Cutler, Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler, LL.D., 2 vols. [Cincinnati, 1888; repr., Athens, Ohio, 1987], 2:180; Vol. 36:246-9).