The search results below contain listings from our website. To search our library and museum collections catalogs, please visit the Collections page.
Article Set - Intro
The Portent: John Brown's Raid in American Memory
Image
![PIPPIN_John Brown Going to His Hanging.jpg PIPPIN_John Brown Going to His Hanging.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/PIPPIN_John%20Brown%20Going%20to%20His%20Hanging.jpg.webp?itok=ZyxhIwHl)
John Brown remains one of the most controversial figures in our history. To destroy the institution of slavery, he firmly believed there was only one possible course of action. He saw what he thought was the ultimate wrong and tried in the only way he could imagine to right it. Which John Brown should we remember? The crusader for abolition or the bloodthirsty terrorist? Is it possible to list him among the great pantheon of American heroes, or do we still recoil from the image of his attack on an American military installation, an action that can be described by no term other than treason?
Exhibition
The Private Jefferson
Image
![jefcrop.jpg jefcrop.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/jefcrop.jpg.webp?itok=6WhGHf4C)
The Private Jefferson: From the Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society features Thomas Jefferson's...
Time Period Chapter
The Revolutionary Era in Virginia
Image
![DanielMorganSword.1935.9.A.jpg DanielMorganSword.1935.9.A.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/DanielMorganSword.1935.9.A.jpg.webp?itok=oTt9KzVW)
Virginia—the largest and most populous colony—played a major role in winning independence and determining the values and...
Exhibition
The Story of Virginia
Image
![Story of Virginia Exhibition detail Story of Virginia Gallery in VMHC. View shows colonial portraits in background and glass cases in foreground](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/SOV-Forward-Options-005_1920x1440.jpg.webp?itok=qhYuv9bO)
This exhibition interprets 16,000 years of Virginia history and features more than 500 artifacts, maps, letters, and...
Time Period Chapter
The Struggle for Equality
Image
![hill_teaser.jpg hill_teaser.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/hill_teaser.jpg.webp?itok=NPQ9uZMj)
The American concept that all people are equal and all have unalienable rights was introduced by Virginians George Mason...
Exhibition
The Virginia Watercolor Society’s 41st Annual Exhibition
Image
![Watercolor Society Texture.jpg Watercolor Society Texture.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/Watercolor%20Society%20Texture.jpg.webp?itok=K8NCsNUP)
The VMHC hosted the 41st annual juried exhibition of the Virginia Watercolor Society (VWS) featuring more than 80...
Exhibition
Toys of the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s
Image
![Gumby and Pokey Gumby and Pokey figurines](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/229_MHC-TOYS_2014_EDIT_1920x1440.jpg.webp?itok=G_y_-hVh)
Through this exhibition, visitors experienced the toys and their stories through three imagined living rooms that...
Exhibition
Violins of Hope
Image
![Photograph of violin-maker Moshe Weinstein and his wife Zehava (Courtesy of Amnon and Avshalom Weinstein) Photograph of violin-maker Moshe Weinstein and his wife Zehava (Courtesy of Amnon and Avshalom Weinstein)](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/Violins%20of%20Hope_Violin%20Makers.jpg.webp?itok=228i1oOI)
Violins of Hope features a selection of seven violins from a collection of more than sixty that survived the Holocaust...
Time Period Chapter
Virginia and the Planter Class
Image
![LucyRandolphBurwell.1951.35.jpg LucyRandolphBurwell.1951.35.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/LucyRandolphBurwell.1951.35.jpg.webp?itok=vtU35bjy)
Governor William Berkeley set out to imitate the society of inequality of wealth and education that he knew in England.
Time Period Chapter
Virginia and Women’s Suffrage
Image
![LetWomenVote.2005.444.15.jpg LetWomenVote.2005.444.15.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/LetWomenVote.2005.444.15.jpg.webp?itok=JCoTTShJ)
Despite the socio-political changes that occurred during Reconstruction, women at the dawn of the twentieth century...
Article Set - Intro
Virginia House
Image
![Visit_VirginiaHouse_Landing.jpg Visit_VirginiaHouse_Landing.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/Visit_VirginiaHouse_Landing.jpg.webp?itok=jArJv7-a)
Formerly an English manor house, Virginia House was relocated to Richmond in 1925.
Article Set - Intro
Virginia's Colonial Dynasties
Image
![VHE_Dynasties_MaryWillingByrd.1996.174.1.jpg VHE_Dynasties_MaryWillingByrd.1996.174.1.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/VHE_Dynasties_MaryWillingByrd.1996.174.1.jpg.webp?itok=azbFZvpP)
In the colonial period, portraiture proved to be a particularly useful tool in establishing and preserving family status. This exhibit presents twenty-four portraits from the Virginia Historical Society's collection. Early Virginia portraits reveal much about the families that commissioned them, as well as how these Virginians valued how they were perceived by others.
Time Period Chapter
Virginia’s Traffic in the Atlantic World
Image
![SlaveShackles.1997.89.jpg SlaveShackles.1997.89.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/SlaveShackles.1997.89.jpg.webp?itok=VQYbsOGc)
Tobacco proved to be good as gold for Virginians. Wealth from its sale and easy navigation of the colony’s rivers...
Time Period Chapter
Wandering, Foraging, and Farming
Image
![Cole.2000.100.2.detail.jpg Cole.2000.100.2.detail.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/Cole.2000.100.2.detail.jpg.webp?itok=19wqWBUb)
Over more than 16,000 years, Indians in Virginia transitioned from nomadic bands of hunter gatherers to sedentary...
Time Period Chapter
War on the Home Front
Image
![0.50Confederate.2010.40.23.jpg 0.50Confederate.2010.40.23.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/fp_landscape_768x576/public/0.50Confederate.2010.40.23.jpg.webp?itok=kzi4PlXz)
For some, the war brought deprivation, horror, and loss right to their very doorsteps.