Washington [15]
Whether Mary was persuaded by reasonable arguments, or simply didn’t wish to part with her robust eldest son around the farm, is impossible to know. One can say with certainty that it was the first of many times she seemed to measure her son’s worth not by what he might accomplish elsewhere but by what he could do for her, even if it meant thwarting his career. She would always be strangely indifferent toward his ambitions, making decisions about him from a purely self-interested standpoint. On the other hand, she was a single mother, clearly valued George’s abilities as the eldest son, and deemed him a necessary substitute for the missing father.
The following year, when George was fifteen, his family underwent a period of extreme financial stringency that ended his education. During a severe cash crunch in later life, he wrote that “with much truth I can say, I never felt the want of money so sensibly since I was a boy of 15 years old.”15 With his mother having ruled out a seaman’s life, George opted to become a surveyor. Throughout his career, he would cherish real estate as an almost foolproof investment that always appreciated in value. Indeed, he could already see that most, if not all, of the major Virginia fortunes had arisen from rampant land speculation. Surveying was a well-trodden path for rising young men, and not only because surveyors could book rich fees as settlers sprawled into the western wilderness. While acting as agents for others, young surveyors with an eye on the main chance could scout choice properties for themselves. Such work could eventually elevate young men hampered by meager capital into the elite club of well-off planters.
Surveying suited Washington’s talents perfectly. He was proficient in math, exacting in approaching problems, and fond of the outdoors. His father had left behind a complete set of surveying instruments, and George ran his first lines at Ferry Farm. By October 1747 he had netted three pounds and two shillings by apprenticing himself to a local surveyor, and he initiated the habit of recording his expenses and revenues with scrupulous care. George Washington was always a man who monitored his every move. He regarded his knowledge of math and surveying as preliminary steps toward becoming a top-notch planter, observing that nothing was more “necessary to any person possessed of a large landed estate, the bounds or some part or other of which are always in controversy.”16 For the rest of his life, Washington was stamped by his practical experience as a surveyor. At Mount Vernon, he had an irresistible penchant for carrying a compass and performing his own measurements. Even when he toured the thirteen states as first president, he methodically recorded the topographical features of places, as if he remained a working surveyor. Whether as planter or president, his study was liberally supplied with maps and charts.
Young Washington’s emergence as a surveyor had a fortuitous start. In 1746 Baron Fairfax, the absentee proprietor of the Northern Neck, visited Virginia to canvass his vast domain and stayed at Belvoir. Portraits show a shrewd, worldly man with a jowly face and intelligent eyes. He had the ultimate power to sell and lease all lands in the Northern Neck. Apparently pleased by what he saw, this veteran foxhunter decided to erect a hunting lodge for himself, known as Greenway Court, in the Shenandoah Valley. This quickened the development of his western lands, producing