Thomas Jefferson's Desk, 1776

Thomas Jefferson's Desk, 1776
Crafted in Philadelphia, PA

National Museum of American History (Smithsonian), Washington, DC.

This portable writing box was designed by Jefferson and built for him in May 1776 by Philadelphia cabinetmaker Benjamin Randolph. Among it's first uses was the writing of the Declaration of Independence, which he composed in June, while serving in Continental Congress.

Jefferson used this laptop desk throughout his life. It has a locking drawer on the side for paper, pens, and inkwell. The adjustable bookrest is double-hinged; it folds out to provide an extended surface for writing.

By attacking slavery more fiercely than ever before, Revolutionary Americans freed tens of thousands of slaves. But the Revolution’s libertarian and egalitarian message had perverse consequences. It forced those Southerners who chose to retain slavery to fall back on the alleged racial deficiencies of blacks as a justification for an institution that hitherto they had taken for granted and had never before needed to justify. The anti-slavery movement that arose out of the Revolution inadvertently produced racism in America.

— Gordon S. Wood
Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789–1815 (2009)