The search results below contain listings from our website. To search our library and museum collections catalogs, please visit the Collections page.
Article
Abolitionist Pitcher
Image
Learn about how this pitcher based on Uncle Tom's Cabin was used as propoganda in the mid-1800s.
Article
Affidavit, 1693
Image
This affidavit informs the governor that Frank, a man of African descent enslaved by Henry Gibbs, has been jailed on...
Article
Arthur Ashe Jr.’s Family Tree: Tracing the Blackwell Family to 1735
Image
See a rare family tree, drawn by hand on canvas, tracing Arthur Ashe, Jr.’s family.
Article
Booker T. Washington
Image
Booker T. Washington (1856–1915) was born enslaved on April 5, 1856, in Franklin County, Virginia. After emancipation...
Article
Christmas Cards
Image
Christmas cards are ephemeral, and this essence is the very reason they can be of interest to researchers. Scholars...
Article
Colonial Cookbooks
Image
Food and dining were integral to social life in the eighteenth century, particularly among the upper class. The gentry...
Article
Education in Virginia
Image
The Virginia Constitution of 1869, passed during Reconstruction, established a statewide system of free public schools...
Article
Elizabeth Keckley
Image
Born a slave in Dinwiddie County, Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley (1818–1907) purchased her freedom in 1855 and supported...
Article
Equal Suffrage League of Virginia
Image
Learn about how the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia helped women gain the right to vote.
Article
Freedmen's Schools
Image
In the antebellum South, African Americans were generally prevented from receiving education. After Appomattox...
Article
Henkel Press
Image
In 1806, two young men, Ambrose Henkel and his brother Solomon, started one of the first German language presses in the...
Article
Jim Crow to Civil Rights in Virginia
Image
Following the Civil War, black Virginians struggled to assert their independence and make freedom meaningful. In the...
Article
Maggie Lena Walker
Image
Maggie Lena Walker (1864–1934) was the daughter of Elizabeth Draper, a former kitchen slave and then cook in the Civil...
Article
Mary-Cooke Branch Munford
Image
Learn how Mary-Cooke Branch Munford helped improve education in Virginia.
Article
Olaudah Equiano
Image
Snatched from his Ibo village in Nigeria at the age of eleven, Equiano (c. 1745-1797) was transported to Barbados...
Article
Oysters in Virginia
Image
Learn about the history of oyster in Virginia's food culture, tourism, and economy.
Article
Proud American Day program
Image
Learn about the beginning of Black History Month.
Article
The Resurrection of Henry "Box" Brown
Image
Learn about Henry "Box" Brown and one of the most memorable escapes from enslavement.
Article
Thomas Jefferson and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom
Image
Jefferson sent a paper to the Virginia Convention of 1774, later published as A Summary View of the Rights of British...
Article
Tom Molineaux
Image
Born into enslavement on a Virginia plantation, Tom Molineaux (1784–1818) fought fellow enslaved people while plantation...