Archaeological investigations that began in the 1970's revealed the roles of blacks in the operation of this major Virginia plantation complex, with more than a score of houses, light industrial buildings and yards associated with a enslaved African American population, which at its peak numbered more than fifty servants and laborers.
No other excavations in the Commonwealth have provided such a wealth of information on slave life on a Virginia plantation as the work on what was known as Mulberry Row.
Monticello was designated a National Historic Landmark in December 1960.