Madison Administrations - Early Life
Early Life
James Madison Jr., the fourth president of the United States, was born on March 16, 1751. He was raised on his paternal grandparents' plantation at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia. This would be his official home for the rest of his life and would come to be known as Montpelier. The Montpelier plantation produced tobacco and grains. It consisted of about four thousand to five thousand acres and about one hundred slaves.
Madison was the eldest of seven surviving children born to James Madison Sr. (1723–1801) and Eleanor (Nelly) Rose Conway Madison (1731–1829). James himself was a small and somewhat sickly child. He was subject to seizures through much of his life. By adulthood, he had grown to only about 5 feet 4 inches tall and weighed about 100 pounds. His father was the largest landowner in the county and a man of influence in local affairs, serving variously as county lieutenant, sheriff,...
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