VMHC Lectures

On September 27, 2018, William I. Hitchcock delivered a banner lecture,“The Age of Eisenhower: America and the World in the 1950s.” Once thought to be a mediocre president, Dwight Eisenhower is today widely considered one of our finest leaders. Presidential historians now rank Eisenhower fifth on the list of great presidents. In his latest book, William Hitchcock explains why. Drawing on newly dec...

On October 10, 2018, John M. Barry delivered the banner lecture, “The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History” A century ago—at the height of World War I—history’s most lethal influenza virus erupted in an army camp in Kansas, moved east with American troops, then exploded, killing as many as 100 million people worldwide. The disease claimed more lives in twenty-four weeks...

On September 6, 2018, Craig Bruce Smith delivered the banner lecture, “Virginian Honor: The Ethics of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.” Despite being born into different generations and regions, fellow Virginians George Washington and Thomas Jefferson believed honor was central to the American Revolution, the new nation, and daily life. While both writing to their nephews, Washington insist...

On August 23, 2018, A. Wilson Greene delivered a banner lecture, “‘A Perfect Hell of Blood’: The Battle of the Crater.” Although the Petersburg Campaign lasted 292 days in 1864–65, one day stands out above all others: July 30, 1864. On that infamous Saturday, the Union army exploded 8,000 pounds of black powder beneath a Confederate bastion, destroying it along with more than 300 southern soldiers...

On August 2, 2018, David Cox delivered a banner lecture, “‘Keep It a Holy Thing’: Lee Chapel’s Greatest Challenge.” The chapel that Robert E. Lee built on the campus of what was then Washington College in Lexington, Virginia, almost did not survive to its 150th anniversary this year. In the early 1920s, an energetic president wanted to tear it down to create a vast monumental building to honor his...

On July 12, 2018, Kitty Snow delivered the banner lecture, “From Richmond to France: Images and Stories of Richmond and Her World War I Soldiers.” When America entered the Great War in 1917, many of Richmond’s “soldier boys” had never been out of the city, much less the country. Most went to Camp Lee and then boarded ships for France. One of those young men was Leon Stilson. His father, streetcar...

On June 14, 2018, Ellen Schall Agnew delivered a Banner Lecture, “Farm to Easel: Queena Stovall’s Evolution as an Artist.” Self-taught Virginia artist Emma Serena “Queena” Stovall started painting and was “discovered” in 1949 at the age of sixty-two. Over the next two decades she recorded on canvas in meticulous detail the rural life, labors, activities, and people surrounding her home near the Bl...

On June 26, 2018, John Ferling delivered a Banner Lecture, “Jefferson, Paine, and Monroe: The American Revolution’s Authentic Revolutionaries.” He discussed American history and his book, "Apostles of Revolution: Jefferson, Paine, Monroe and the Struggle Against the Old Order in America and Europe." Some American revolutionaries in 1776 desired little domestic change and some who thought t...

On May 31, 2018, the Honorable John Hager delivered a Banner Lecture, “Best Seat in the House.” Since being struck by polio in 1973, John Hager has enjoyed life as a participatory sport — in the game, not on the sidelines. Life for him has been whole and exciting by doing not observing, and his “up close and personal” involvement with so many individuals, organizations, and groups has been enrichi...

On May 22, 2018, Lord Alan Watson delivered a Banner Lecture about his book, “Churchill’s Legacy: Two Speeches to Save the World.” Having first helped bring victory to the Allies in 1945, Winston Churchill went on to preserve the freedom of the world by gaining the support of the United States in the restoration of Europe. In Fulton, Missouri, Churchill alerted America to the reality of ‘Uncle Joe...

On May 16, 2018, Bobby Ukrop and his coauthors participated in a moderated discussion about their book, “The Diamond—Miracle on the Boulevard.” Born out of crisis, the community-wide effort to build the region’s sparkling jewel, “The Diamond,” showed what could happen with regional cooperation, a public-private partnership, and grassroots support of the citizenry. The Diamond opened on April 17, 1...

On May 9, 2018, Dr. Paul Finkelman and Dr. Edward L. Ayers engaged in a conversation about Dr. Finkelman’s latest book, “Supreme Injustice: Slavery in the Nation’s Highest Cour" and the entanglements that alienated three major justices from America’s founding ideals and embedded racism ever deeper in American civic life. The three most important Supreme Court Justices before the Civil War―Chie...

On May 1, 2018, Francis Gary Powers, Jr., presented a Banner Lecture about his book, “Letters from a Soviet Prison: A Son’s Search for the Truth.” For the past twenty-five years, Francis Gary Powers, Jr., has lectured on, taught, and researched the Cold War; in particular the U-2 Incident of May 1, 1960, in which his father was shot down while flying a CIA U-2 spy plane over the former Soviet Unio...

Experience a heaping helping of culinary history in our April 6, 2018 Banner Lecture by Toni Tipton-Martin about her book, “Inside the Jemima Code: The Joy of African American Cooking.” Overshadowed by the demeaning stereotype of an illiterate “Aunt Jemima," this lecture transforms America’s most maligned kitchen servant into an inspirational and powerful model of culinary wisdom and cultural...

On March 8, 2018, Kat Imhoff delivered at Banner Lecture entitled "Dolley Madison and the Politics of Gracious Hospitality" at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture As America’s first First Lady, Dolley Madison was instrumental in creating a new Republican template for style, etiquette, and social interaction that defined Washington, D.C.’s social-political culture in the early nine...

On March 22, 2018 , Gregory J. Hansard delivered Banner Lecture at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture entitled “‘Haven of Safety’: The Kaiser’s Courteous Pirates in Hampton Roads.” During World War I, two German surface raiders sought harbor to make repairs at Hampton Roads after sinking 25 merchant ships. British and French ships nearby kept them from leaving Newport News, so more than...

Fifty years ago, cutting-edge science intersected with human drama and changed the course of medical history. The Medical College of Virginia in Richmond was situated squarely in the path of the race to the first successful human heart transplant. And now, it’s history. On March 14, 2018, at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture, a panel of VCU Health transplant surgeons discussed Donald Mc...

On February 1, 2018, Glenn F. Williams delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Lord Dunmore’s War: Last Indian Conflict of the Colonial Era.” This lecture explained the causes and conduct of the last Indian War that took place before the start of the American War for Independence. Set during what some would call the “Quiet Time,” many historians pay it little attention or misinterpret its historical...

On January 11, 2018, Alan Pell Crawford delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Mark Twain, FFV? America’s Most Beloved Author and the Old Dominion.” Reports of Mark Twain’s death were “greatly exaggerated” more than once. The more famous report was from when he was living in London in 1897. But it happened again a decade later when he had come to Virginia on yacht that was enshrouded in fog off Hamp...

On February 22, 2018, Lynn Rainville delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Doing Their Bit: The Surprising Role of Virginians in the Great War.” In this illustrated lecture, Lynn Rainville revealed the crucial roles that Virginians played in the Great War. These individuals ranged from drafted soldiers to politicians (including Staunton native, Woodrow Wilson) and from locally born horses to their...

On February 15, 2018, Brian Horrigan spoke at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture about the exhibition "WW1 America" during the WWI America Exhibition Exclusive Member Preview. The content and opinions expressed in these presentations are solely those of the speaker and not necessarily of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

On January 25, 2018, Jonathan W. White delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Our Little Monitor: The Greatest Invention of the Civil War.” On March 9, 1862, the USS Monitor met the CSS Virginia in battle in Hampton Roads, Virginia—the first time ironclad vessels would engage each other in combat. For four hours the two ships pummeled one another as thousands of Union and Confederate soldiers and ci...

On October 5, 2017, Gregory Wilson delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Toxic Dust: The History and Legacy of Virginia’s Kepone Disaster.” In July 1975, news broke about workers at Life Science Products Company in Hopewell poisoned while making the pesticide Kepone, the brand name of chlordecone. Further investigations showed Life Science had contracted with Allied Chemical, a larger firm with a p...

On December 7, 2017, Alyson Lindsey Taylor-White delivered a Banner Lecture entitled “Shockoe Hill Cemetery: A Richmond Landmark's History.” In 1822, Richmond’s Common Council faced a grave dilemma, literally. The nation, the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the capital city of Richmond were in the grips of a severe economic depression, one of the young nation’s first. It was not a good time for...

On November 2, 2017, Brian Burns delivered a Banner Lecture at the Virginia Historical Society entitled “Richmond’s Gilded Age: The Grit Behind the Glitz.” In the aftermath of the Civil War, Richmond entered the Gilded Age seeking bright prospects while struggling with its own past. During a labor convention in conservative Richmond, white supremacists prepared to enforce segregation at gunpoint....