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Featured Exhibition
Our Commonwealth
This signature exhibition provides an in-depth, multi-sensory journey through the five major regions of Virginia and features stories and artifacts from across the state to reveal that place is not only about geography, but also the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves.
Featured Events
Featuring award-winning speakers, tours, and family activities for all ages and interest levels.
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Member Monday at the Museum: Apollo
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Stories at the Museum: Apollo
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Spring Into Space
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Lecture:
The Burning Land
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First Fridays at VMHC
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Chasing Space: A Virginia Astronaut's Journey
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Partner Event:
New Views of the Universe
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Curator Conversations:
War Art by Civil War Soldiers
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Lecture:
Confessions of a Southern Church
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Lecture:
Virginians in the West Indies Expedition
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First Fridays at VMHC
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Collections Up Close:
Photography in Virginia
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Movie Mythbusting:
Hidden Figures
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Lecture:
Turning Fact into Fiction
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First Fridays at VMHC
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Featured Collections Items
The VMHC has a collection of more than 9 million items. Here are just a few them (please note that not all of them may be on display to the public). Search the Library or Museum Objects Collections databases to learn more.
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Tennis Items, Arthur Ashe
Tennis racquet,bag, and wrist band, all belonged to Arthur Ashe.
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Drawing, Natural Bridge
Pastel drawing depicting Natural Bridge in Snow by George Brewerton in 1872.
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Painting, George Washington
Portrait in oils of George Washington by Charles Peale Polk, nephew of Charles Willson Peale, whose 1787 portrait of the general was the basis for this image.
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Bowie Knife
Bowie knife taken from John Brown at Harper's Ferry in 1859 by J.E.B. Stuart.
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Desk circa 1780-1805
Chippenale slant-front desk with bracket feet, Eastern Virginia, probably Richmond, based on Williamsburg prototype.
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U.S. Navy WAVES Uniform
Complete WAVES uniform from World War II worn by Nancy E. Bailey (Bon Cogsdale).
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Equal Suffrage League of Richmond Photograph
1915 Photograph show a group of women gathered in Capitol Square holding large banners which read "Equal Suffrage League and Richmond, Virginia" and "Votes for Women."
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Program, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1962
Program from the Virginia State Unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference meeting, includes a black and white photograph of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and five signatures (clockwise from
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Photographic print, No. 3, Pocahontas [train], barrels by Shawsville on its night run to Cincinnati, 1955
Image depicting Norfolk and Western Train No. 3, the Pocahontas, in a shroud of exhaust with 13 cars of Christmas mail and passengers.
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Tintype Portrait of Robert Thaxton
Tintype portrait of Pvt. Robert Thaxton, a Confederate soldier killed at the battle of Chancellorsville, Virginia, in May 1863.
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![Silver medal inscribed on obverse, " The King of" and on the reverse "Machotick," [Machodoc], with both sides engraved with flowers and cornucopia.](/sites/default/files/styles/col_4_fp_landscape_480x360_/public/Collection%20Item_IndianBadge_Machotick.1965.12_front_H3.jpg.webp?itok=CSNA-w91 "Medal, Indian badge")
Medal, Indian Badge
A 1661 act of the Virginia General Assembly forced the Chief of the Machodoc—and all the leaders and warriors of Virginia’s Indegenous people-to wear these badges while in English settlements.
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The Story of Virginia: Highlights from the Virginia Museum of History & Culture
The Story of Virginia tells a fascinating story, sharing more than four hundred evocative objects from the Virginia Museum of History & Culture. The Commonwealth is not merely a chapter of U.S. history; it is at the epicenter of its most pivotal moments.
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Determined: The 400-Year Struggle for Black Equality
This book addresses the urgent need for a greater understanding of systemic racism in America through a concise and accessible survey of Black history in Virginia, from the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in 1619 to the groundswell of racial justice protests in 2020.
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Dressing Downton Catalogue
The costumes in the exhibition Dressing Downton: Changing Fashion for Changing Times come from the wildly popular British period drama Downton Abbey, a co-production of Carnival Films and PBS's Masterpiece, a winner of numerous awards, including recognition for outstanding costume design.
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AMERICAN HERITAGE® Chocolate Tasting Square
Celebrate and share chocolate's timeless story with this unique, small-batch chocolate experience. Inspired by authentic recipes from the 1750s, AMERICAN HERITAGE Chocolate connects us to people, places, and traditions both OLD and NEW.
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Cry Havoc!: The Crooked Road to Civil War, 1861
Nelson Lankford, author of Richmond Burning, chronicles the eight critical weeks that began with Lincoln's inauguration through the explosion at Fort Sumter and the president's fateful response to it.
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FDR at War Boxed Set
In Nigel Hamilton's definitive three-volume history that FDR did not live to write: the story of World War II from his perspective, showing his mastery of strategy, his vision, and how he overcame resistance from Churchill and his own generals to set the course for victory. Mantle of Command, Commander in Chief, and War and Peace have been celebrated as “masterly” (The Wall Street Journal).
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Two Souls Indivisible: The Friendship That Saved Two POWs in Vietnam
The intense connection, powerfully reported by James S. Hirsch, would sustain both men through the war and throughout their lives. Inspiring, heartbreaking, remarkable, and never more timely, Two Souls Indivisible shows how good people can achieve greatness in the most hellish of circumstances.
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Arthur Ashe: A Life
By Raymond Arsenault, this is the first comprehensive, authoritative biography of American icon Arthur Ashe -the Jackie Robinson of men's tennis -a pioneering athlete who, after breaking the color barrier, went on to become an influential civil rights activist and public intellectual.
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Good to Great to Gone: The 60 year rise and fall of Circuit City
For almost 50 years, Circuit City was able to successfully navigate the constant changes in the consumer electronics marketplace and meet consumer demand and taste preferences. Following the company’s decline and ultimate demise in 2009 after his departure, former CEO Alan Wurtzel shares the rare perspective of a company insider in the role of an outsider looking in.