Thomas Jefferson was born April 13, 1743 in Goochand County (later Albemarle County), Virginia. He had six sisters and one brother. Jefferson went to boarding school from ages 9 to 14. At William and Mary College, in Virginia, he studied literature, Greek, Latin, French, Spanish and Italian. He became a lawyer in 1767.

Before Thomas Jefferson was President he wrote The Declaration of Independence in 1776 and was Governor of Virginia, Ambassador to France and later Vice President under John Adams. He believed that people's rights came before government's rights. Jefferson said, "the best government is the least government." He was the youngest delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. When he went to France he helped the French win the Revolutionary war.

Thomas Jefferson met Martha Skelton in 1770. She was a young widow with an infant son named Matthew. They were very much in love and were married on January 1, 1772. They had six children in all, only two girls lived to be adults. They lived on Monticello, the estate Jefferson designed near Charlottesville, Virginia. 

In 1803 during his Presidency, Jefferson purchased land from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains. It was called the Louisiana Purchase and almost doubled the size of our country. When Thomas Jefferson was President he sent two men, Lewis and Clark, to explore the area west of the Mississippi River. Lewis and Clark found animals and plants they did not know about and were completely new to them. He also planned, designed, and supervised the construction of the University of Virginia.