Mount+Vernon

=**Mount Vernon**=

Washington wanted to enjoy a life as planter and politician. He owned the Mount Vernon plantation and was elected into the Virginia House of Burgesses, a colonial legislature. The Custis family was wealthy and Washington would live more of the aristocratic lifestyle. One of his favorite activities was fox hunting. The major Virginia cash crop was tobacco. The tobacco market was unpredictable. Planters often traded for British goods by paying in tobacco. Washington kept himself out of debt by diversifying his crop. By 1766, he switched Mount Vernon's cash crop from tobacco to wheat, which could be sold in the colonies. He also diversified his operations to flour milling, fishing, horse breeding, spinning, and weaving. He expressed opposition to the Stamp Act of 1765, the first direct tax on the colonies. He would also oppose the Intolerable Acts passed in 1774 to punish Massachusetts after the Boston Tea Party. Washington would be selected as a delegate to the First Continental Congress.


 * Mount Vernon Today**

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