Browse Items (42 total)

CONTENT WARNING: Materials in the Library of Virginia's collections contain historical terms, phrases, and images that are offensive to modern readers. These include demeaning and dehumanizing references to race, ethinicity, and nationality; enslaved…

In 1716, by order from Lord Fairfax, Virginia Governor Alexander Spotswood led an expedition over the Blue Ridge Mountains into the Shenandoah Valley. Spotswood traveled with a group of gentlemen, servants, American Indians, and rangers over the Blue…

This document is a proclamation written by King Charles I on January 6, 1630 (1631 by the New Style Calendar), in the hopes of regulating the tobacco trade between England and the British colonies. As the British presence in America grew, it swiftly…

This engraving, attributed to Harry C. Mann, depicts the burning of Jamestown during Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676.Bacon’s Rebellion was named after its leader, Nathaniel Bacon, who was an outspoken opponent of Governor Sir William Berkeley. While the…

Following American Independence, key political leaders in Virginia pursued the disestablishment the Church of England as the state church of the young state. Initially introduced in 1776 by George Mason in the Virginia Declaration of Rights,…

Maggie Lena Walker was an Black woman banker, business leader, and civic leader and was the first woman to establish and become the president of a bank in the United States. Walker was born in 1864 in Richmond, Virginia. Her mother Elizabeth Draper…

The Federal Reserve System was signed into law on December 23, 1913 by President Woodrow Wilson and was sponsored by Virginia State Senator Carter Glass. In 1914 the city of Richmond was selected to be the home to one of the 12 central bank locations…

On November 7, 1774, residents of York boarded the British ship Virginia and dumped two half-chests of tea into the York River. The first Virginia Revolutionary Convention that met in August of that year had adopted a resolution to refuse to purchase…

The 1936 election came on the heels of FDR's second New Deal. This second round of programs included the Social Security Act and the Works Progress Administration. The Democratic Congress also passed tax revision, raising tax rates for those with…

The success of Southwest Virginia's coalfields—lying in Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Tazewell, and Wise Counties—is inexorably linked to the expansion of railroads and to northern capital. After the Civil War, rail companies expanded…