Monroe Street is named after James Monroe (born in Westmoreland County, Virginia, April 28, 1758; died July 4, 1831), who was the fifth President of the United States (1817-1825).
Monroe's administration was noted for the acquisition of Florida (1819); the Missouri Compromise (1820), in which Missouri became a slave state; and the Monroe Doctrine (1823), which declared U.S. opposition to European interference in the Americas.
Although Monroe sought a gradual end to slavery and advocated re-settling freed slaves in Africa or the Carribean, he operated his thriving Highland plantation at his 3,500-acre estate in Virginia with slave labor.