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Geography & Environment

Geography has played a pivotal role in the evolution of Virginia’s politics, society and economy.  A mild climate and navigable rivers first attracted Indigenous peoples and later provided European settlers access to ports and harbors from which to export coal and lumber from the Shenandoah Valley and Appalachian Plateau.

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16,000 BCE to 1622 CE
A Land of Opportunity: Creating Virginia
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1623 to 1763
A Distant Dominion
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1764 to 1824
From British Colony to American State
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1825 to 1860
Challenge of a New Century
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1861 to 1876
Civil War and Reconstruction
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1877 to 1924
Virginia in the New South
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1925 to Today
Dynamic Dominion

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