September 24, 2024–May 2025
When the Marquis de Lafayette returned to the United States in 1824, the Revolutionary War hero was treated as a celebrity. Proportional to the size of the United States at the time, he was bigger than the Beatles or Taylor Swift. He was greeted with parades and parties everywhere he went, and he was beloved across divisions of class, gender, ethnicity, and race. In honor of the 200th anniversary of his Farewell Tour, this exhibit celebrates Lafayette’s legacy through the souvenir items produced to commemorate the visit as well as Winterthur’s own history of collecting objects honoring him.