Browse Items (21 total)

The legislation authorizing Virginia’s first statewide public school system in 1870 required that schools be racially segregated. The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) upheld southern segregation laws as long as facilities…

World War II fundamentally altered the workforce of the United States as the nation shifted from a peacetime consumer-focused economy to one centered on war production. While industries shifted their production lines to munitions and supplies for the…

During World War II, Black Americans took the opportunity to point out the hypocrisy of engaging in a war effort to save democracy abroad while maintaining segregation laws at home. Spurred by the national newspaper, Chicago Defender, the Black…

Based in New York, N.Y., 1942-1946. Artists for Victory, Inc. was a non-profit organization of more than ten thousand artists formed to assist in the war effort. Their activities included a British-American goodwill exhibition, sponsorship of…

Virginia did not have a statewide system of public schools until after the Civil War. Before this, private academies and common schools were all that existed, but the Virginia General Assembly did authorize a “literary fund” that supplied counties…

From September 1939 to December 1941, the United States was not officially at war with any of the Axis powers. While the government provided to the Allies through programs such as Lend-Lease, Americans generally held a strong isolationist sentiment…

On April 14, 1945, U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was buried in Hyde Park, New York, following funeral services at the White House. Roosevelt had been elected four times to the office of president, a feat never matched, and one that is now…

Lynchburg native Desmond T. Doss (1919–2006) was the first conscientious objector to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. A conscientious objector is one who is opposed to serving in the armed forces and/or bearing arms on the grounds of moral…

Indigenous peoples, including Virginia Indian tribes, were not considered American citizens even after ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment. Between 1880 and 1920, many tribes established their own schools, as Black citizens did, likely for…

Skyline Drive is the main road that traverses the length of Shenandoah National Park. Shenandoah National Park was created in 1926 to preserve the beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains for recreational use and for future generations. The creation of…