Historic Michie Tavern is one of the oldest homesteads remaining in Virginia.  It was originally located on a well-traveled stagecoach route some 17 miles northwest of the present site.  To accommodate the many travelers seeking food and shelter at his home, William Michie opened his dwelling as an "Ordinary" in 1784.

Michie (pronounced Micky) Tavern's museum hostess will tell you about young William.  His father, "Scotch John” Michie, was deported to Virginia in 1716 after taking part in the Scottish Jacobite Rising.  When John arrived in Virginia he began acquiring land; ultimately he handled more than 11,500 acres.  The land on which his son would eventually build Michie Tavern was acquired from Major John Henry, father of Patrick, another rebel against England.

William Michie also played a role in the struggle against England.  He was part of the Continental army that wintered with Washington at Valley Forge.  He signed the Albemarle Declaration of Independence in 1779.  It was after the Revolutionary War that William Michie obtained a license to operate his "Ordinary."

After the guide's introduction you will make your way through the tavern.  Each room has a recorded narration that portrays 18th-century tavern life through living history interpretation.  Visitors feel like they are listening in on colonial conversations.   The tavern has  about 50 items that once belonged to the Michie family.  The first room on the tour is the gentlemen's parlor with its adjoining tap room.  The tap bar is a very small enclosure, so built as to bar the public from its access.  The tavern-keeper became known as the bar tender---a phrase still widely used.

From the gentlemen's parlor you'll move across the hall to the ladies' parlor.  After the Revolutionary War road conditions and travel by coach improved.  Female travelers were no longer an oddity and it was in the proprietor's best interest to set aside a special room for women. The woodwork and furnishings are more elaborate here.

The upstairs ballroom served many functions including additional sleeping space, a place for church worship, dancing lessons and school.  Entertainers, traveling doctors and dentists would set up “shop” in this room.  It is the thought of so many long-ago balls, however, that strikes the most romantic chord. It was here, legend proclaims, that the first waltz was danced in the colonies.  Although no surviving account can document this story, old-timers claim the event was recorded in the margins of the tavern log book that mysteriously disappeared in the 1950s.  The story proclaims one of Jefferson's daughters had just returned from France where she had learned a "radical" new dance step. She danced it gaily in the arms of a dashing officer.  Onlookers were shocked and her chaperone quickly escorted her from the floor.  According to reports, she was harshly scolded.

Back downstairs you will see the keeping hall where food was kept warm before serving.  This room holds a fine selection of spinning equipment.  One special piece is a yarn winder which was invented to count thread.  A small wooden peg (known as the weasel) pops loudly after each revolution of the wheel (known as the monkey).  The "monkey" chases the "weasel" as in the nursery rhyme, Pop Goes the Weasel.  Other handy kitchen items include the hand-carved cheese press, apple peeler, cole slaw shredder and French-fried potato cutter.

The narration continues as you tour the dependencies---kitchen, necessary, springhouse, well house and smokehouse.  If you have problems with steps you may want to skip these buildings.  Your tour ends beneath the tavern in the wine cellar that now houses the Virginia Wine Museum. After your tour you may continue to the "Ordinary" and enjoy a colonial buffet.  Michie's hospitality didn't end with the 18th century.  The "Ordinary" still serves fried chicken, blackeyed peas, stewed tomatoes, cole slaw, southern beets, green bean salad, potato salad, corn bread, biscuits and apple cobbler.  Lunch is available from 11:30 A.M. to 3:00 P.M.  daily in four dining rooms and an outdoor courtyard.

The thread of preservation continues with the Sowell (pronounced Soul) House, an early 19th- century structure that was reconstructed on the Michie Tavern site. Tours of this house focus on the architectural development of the house and the way that it reflects events in the life of the Sowell family---both personal and national.  Before leaving you should also tour the Meadow Run Grist Mill  which houses the General Store.  The mill was moved 50 miles to this new location.  It is an appropriate addition because the Michie family owned and operated a mill and general store.  Their family history is further preserved through the interpretation. The tavern was relocated at this site in the 1920s and the move itself became a historic event.  The Michie Tavern is significant as an example of the early preservation movement.

Michie Tavern is open 9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. with the last tour beginning at 4:20 P.M.  Admission is charged and includes both the tavern and grist mill.

Directions:  From I-95 in the Richmond area take I-64 west to the Charlottesville area.  From I-64 take Exit 121A, Route 20.  Just past the Thomas Jefferson Visitors Bureau, turn left on Route 53.  Michie Tavern is on the right just before the entrance to Monticello; both are well marked.