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Acknowledgments
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z I began to think about t he Virginia elite in a serious way in the 1960s, but administrative responsibilities kept me from working systematically on the project until the late 1980s. The need for such a study grew out of my work on planter indebtedness and the Revolution in Virginia. Many of the wealthy carried a heavy debt into the Revolution and did not recover from it once the war was over. Their political role was also diminished. Because the elite had dominated Virginia society for so lon g, I wanted to find out more about them and how they attained this position and lost it. In the process of this work, I have acquired substantial debts myself. Without the help of many people I would not have been able to complete this study. Thad Tate and Don Higginbotham read all of the manuscript with friendly and careful eyes as it e merged. Unfortunately Don died before he w as able to se e the final result. John Hemphill and John Selby read substantial portions before their deaths and provided the insight that can only come from serious scholars of eighteenth-century Virginia. Owen Ireland, Warren Billings, Ira Berlin, Ronald Hoffman, Kevin Hardwick, Camille Wells, Calhoun Winton, and Jack P. Greene, as well as Jean Russo, Lois Carr, and George Callcott, read one or more chapters to my great benefit. Others who helped in various supportive ways are Jeffrey Evans, the late Henrietta Goodwin and t he late Jane Carson, John C. Dann, W. W. A bbot, R ebecca Wrenn, A ngie Hogan, Rich ard Holway, and Mark Mones. Portions of t he study were presented to t he Washington Area Early American Seminar at the University of Maryland, from which I received helpful comments. And, finally, none of this would have been possible without the support of the one to whom this book is dedicated. Three sabbatical leaves and a General Research Board award from the University of Maryland–College Park, as well as a Mellon summer research grant from the Virginia Historical Society, provided me wit h the time to com plete the research. Most of t he research was done a t the then Research Library of Acknowledgments x A cknowledgments the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, the College of William and Mary, the Library of Virginia, the Virginia Historical Society, the University of Virginia, and the Manuscript Division of t he Library of Cong ress. The staffs of t hose institutions were generous with their time and hel p. I shou ld especially mention the late Edward M. Riley, who headed the then Research Library of Colonial Williamsburg and the late William M. E. Rachal of the Virginia Historical Society. The dates in this book are the New Style that the English adopted in 1752. All B ritish m anuscript m aterial, u nless ot herwise note d, is a vailable on t he Virginia Colonial Records Project microfilm, which can be obtained from the University of V irginia Library, the Library of V irginia, the Virginia Historical Society, and the John D. Rockefeller Library of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. [35.168.113.41] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 13:50 GMT) A “ Topping P eople” Locations of Virginia’s twenty-one leading families. (Map by Rebecca Wrenn) To view this image, please refer to the print version of this book ...