Standing in George Washington’s study at Mount Vernon, his Virginia estate, I was unexpectedly overcome by emotion. It was there that he would dress at 4:30 in the morning so as not to disturb wife Martha upstairs, perhaps getting down to the business of running his farm at a small desk with its fan chair. (You pedaled it and a fan moved back and forth overhead, the technology of the day.) In the corner stood a handsome, polished secretary.
Read MoreCharles Wilson Peale’s “Col. George Washington” (1772), oil on canvas. It’s on loan to Mount Vernon from Washington and Lee University.