The search results below contain listings from our website. To search our library and museum collections catalogs, please visit the Collections page.
Time Period
1623 to 1763
Image
![byrd.jpg byrd.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/byrd.jpg.webp?itok=tpaDoOLl)
The colony prospered. Tobacco—grown by indentured servants and enslaved Africans—sustained the economy. The first popularly elected legislative body in the New World was established. Following the failed Indian uprising in 1622 and on orders from London, the native peoples were “removed” and reduced in number to 3,000 by a “War of Extermination.” During the next hundred years, the remainder of Virginia’s population expanded a hundred fold. Social inequalities, however, and frontier conflicts with the French and with Indians made this distant dominion increasingly difficult to govern from London.
Time Period
1825 to 1860
Image
![VAConvention.1957.39.jpg VAConvention.1957.39.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/VAConvention.1957.39.jpg.webp?itok=-hQ07SAZ)
The decades following the presidency of Virginian James Monroe (1817–1825) saw populations shift, the economy expand, and attitudes about slavery harden. More and more families migrated from the soil-depleted Tidewater and Piedmont, while new and diverse peoples in the Shenandoah Valley prospered. The beginnings of the Industrial Revolution encouraged the growth of industry, urban centers, and “internal improvements” (transportation by road, rail, and canal). Those “improvements”––funded by taxes––became a subject of political debate. Slavery was as vehemently attacked by abolitionists as it was defended by proponents.
Exhibition
Determined
Image
![Two Black students protest school closures in Farmville, Virginia Two Black female students protesting school closures by marching with posters](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/Farmville%2BProtest%20%28002%29_1920x1440.jpg.webp?itok=4gqp-b6Y)
This exhibition examined the long history of black Americans in North America as they have fought for freedom, equal...
Exhibition
Founding Frenemies
Image
![Exhibition display from Founding Frenemies Manuscripts and a feather pen on a table with an exhibit label showing a Twitter post](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/768x576-Founding-Frenemies-Preview_013.jpg.webp?itok=y29yaWri)
This exhibition explored Alexander Hamilton’s relationships with the founding generation of Virginians through rare...
Exhibition
John Marshall
Image
![Portrait of John Marshall Portrait of John Marshall - Marshall has grey hair, glasses positioned on top of his head and wears a black jacket with white necktie](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/JohnMarshall.1988.8_2_1920x1440.jpg.webp?itok=OLR-MU5t)
Highlighting objects like his Law Commonplace Notebook, spectacles and inkwell, writing desk, and even his hair, this...
Exhibition
Oh, Shenandoah
Image
![Long Branch Plantation, Clarke County Long Branch Plantation, Clarke County](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/3-Long-Branch-Plantation-Clarke-County-Millwood_Web.jpg.webp?itok=U-h11ed6)