http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/img/EV_Logo_sm.gif This is the url http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org The first and ultimate online reference work about the Commonwealth /Dyer_Carrie_Victoria_1839-1921 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:28:11 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Dyer_Carrie_Victoria_1839-1921 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:28:11 EST]]> /Duncan_Pauline_Adelaide_Haislip_1888-1973 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:25:18 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Duncan_Pauline_Adelaide_Haislip_1888-1973 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:25:18 EST]]> /Fay_Lydia_Mary_ca_1804-1878 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:22:26 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Fay_Lydia_Mary_ca_1804-1878 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:22:26 EST]]> /Dean_Jennie_Serepta_1848-1913 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:21:13 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Dean_Jennie_Serepta_1848-1913 Fri, 17 May 2013 09:21:13 EST]]> /Colonial_Virginia Thu, 16 May 2013 14:50:38 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Colonial_Virginia Thu, 16 May 2013 14:50:38 EST]]> /Bowser_Rosa_L_Dixon_1855-1931 Tue, 14 May 2013 10:48:12 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Bowser_Rosa_L_Dixon_1855-1931 Tue, 14 May 2013 10:48:12 EST]]> /Adams_Pauline_1874-1957 Fri, 10 May 2013 13:42:45 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Adams_Pauline_1874-1957 Fri, 10 May 2013 13:42:45 EST]]> /Charity_Ruth_LaCountess_Harvey_Wood_1924-1996 Fri, 10 May 2013 10:16:47 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Charity_Ruth_LaCountess_Harvey_Wood_1924-1996 Fri, 10 May 2013 10:16:47 EST]]> /Bland_Anna_Bennett_d_1687 Thu, 09 May 2013 10:27:36 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Bland_Anna_Bennett_d_1687 Thu, 09 May 2013 10:27:36 EST]]> /Bailey_Odessa_Pittard_1906-1994 Wed, 08 May 2013 15:00:35 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Bailey_Odessa_Pittard_1906-1994 Wed, 08 May 2013 15:00:35 EST]]> /Cox_Lucy_Ann_White_d_December_17_1891 Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:17:43 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Cox_Lucy_Ann_White_d_December_17_1891 Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:17:43 EST]]> /Cockacoeske_d_by_July_1_1686 Fri, 19 Apr 2013 14:06:45 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Cockacoeske_d_by_July_1_1686 Fri, 19 Apr 2013 14:06:45 EST]]> /Chalmers_Anna_Maria_Mead_1809-1891 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 14:32:38 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Chalmers_Anna_Maria_Mead_1809-1891 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 14:32:38 EST]]> /Butt_Martha_Haines_1833-1871 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 12:46:02 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Butt_Martha_Haines_1833-1871 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 12:46:02 EST]]> /Brock_Sarah_Ann_1831-1911 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 11:03:47 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Brock_Sarah_Ann_1831-1911 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 11:03:47 EST]]> /Blaikley_Catherine_Kaidyee_ca_1695-ca_1771 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:28:35 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Blaikley_Catherine_Kaidyee_ca_1695-ca_1771 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:28:35 EST]]> /Berkeley_Frances_Culpeper_Stephens_b_ap_1634-ca_1695 Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:06:20 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Berkeley_Frances_Culpeper_Stephens_b_ap_1634-ca_1695 Frances Culpeper Stephens Berkeley, best known as Lady Frances Berkeley, was the wife of Sir William Berkeley, the long-serving governor of the Virginia colony and whose authority was challenged so dramatically by his wife's relative Nathaniel Bacon. After arriving in Virginia with her parents about 1650, Frances Culpeper first married Captain Samuel Stephens, who became governor of the Albemarle settlements in present-day North Carolina. Upon Stephens's death, his wife inherited his large estate and soon married the Virginia governor, taking up residence at his estate, Green Spring, and vigorously supporting him during Bacon's Rebellion during the summer of 1676. Lady Berkeley pleaded her husband's case before King Charles II in 1676 but when she returned to Virginia the next year, it was with Governor Berkeley's replacement, Herbert Jeffreys. After Berkeley's death in 1677, Lady Berkeley became a leader of the so-called Green Spring faction, a powerful political group often at odds with the new governor. She married the colony's treasurer Philip Ludwell, but by the 1680s, her political influence had waned, despite Ludwell's service as deputy governor of North Carolina and South Carolina. Lady Berkeley died about 1695.
Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:06:20 EST]]> /Ann_fl_1706-1712 Mon, 15 Apr 2013 13:51:29 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Ann_fl_1706-1712 Mon, 15 Apr 2013 13:51:29 EST]]> /Disfranchisement Thu, 04 Apr 2013 15:57:43 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Disfranchisement Thu, 04 Apr 2013 15:57:43 EST]]> /Maggie_Lena_Walker_1864-1934 Fri, 15 Feb 2013 09:13:07 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Maggie_Lena_Walker_1864-1934 Fri, 15 Feb 2013 09:13:07 EST]]> /Randolph_Martha_Jefferson_1772-1836 Wed, 06 Feb 2013 15:36:30 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Randolph_Martha_Jefferson_1772-1836 Martha Jefferson Randolph was the daughter of Thomas Jefferson and the wife of Thomas Mann Randolph, who served as governor of Virginia from 1819 to 1822. She grew up at Monticello and spent time in Williamsburg, Richmond, and Philadelphia before accompanying her widowed father to Paris, France, where she attended the Abbaye Royale de Panthemont, a prestigious convent school. After she returned to Virginia, she married and bore twelve children, eleven of whom survived to adulthood. Although she was the daughter of a president, the wife of a governor, and arguably the most highly educated woman in Virginia, Randolph's life was in many ways representative. Widely admired for her intelligence, sociability, and conversational skills, she was an exemplar of genteel white womanhood who was said to possess a "perfect temper" and who immersed herself in the trials and joys of marriage, motherhood, and plantation life. Randolph and her children lived mainly at Monticello, although her husband owned the nearby plantation Edgehill. Occasionally during her father's presidency, and throughout his retirement, she acted as hostess. Her presence reinforced Jefferson's image as a devoted family man with a stable domestic life, though fulfilling this role in her father's life may have exacerbated her already strained marriage. Both father and husband struggled and ultimately failed to remain solvent. After their deaths in 1826 and 1828, respectively, Randolph lived with her married children. She died at Edgehill on October 10, 1836.
Wed, 06 Feb 2013 15:36:30 EST]]> /Witchcraft_in_Colonial_Virginia Tue, 29 Jan 2013 13:58:11 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Witchcraft_in_Colonial_Virginia Tue, 29 Jan 2013 13:58:11 EST]]> /Brent_Margaret_ca_1601-1671 Tue, 29 Jan 2013 11:53:19 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Brent_Margaret_ca_1601-1671 Tue, 29 Jan 2013 11:53:19 EST]]> /Hemings_Sally_1773-1835 Thu, 06 Dec 2012 14:44:47 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Hemings_Sally_1773-1835 Thu, 06 Dec 2012 14:44:47 EST]]> /Civil_War_Widows Tue, 04 Dec 2012 08:27:09 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Civil_War_Widows Civil War widows in Virginia are defined as women married to Confederate soldiers who died during the American Civil War (1861–1865). The numbers of these women are difficult to determine—historians estimate between 4,000 and 6,000—but their characteristics are clearer. They were relatively young and their marriages had been relatively brief; if they had children, they were still too young to be of help in supporting the family. About half of all widows remarried during or after the conflict, with the youngest ones the most likely to do so; however, because of the war's toll on young men, they were substantially more likely to marry men who were much older or younger than themselves. Few of these women worked, but beginning in 1888, some were eligible for a state pension that provided the minimal support of $30 per year.
Tue, 04 Dec 2012 08:27:09 EST]]> /Mourning_During_the_Civil_War Tue, 04 Dec 2012 08:24:08 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Mourning_During_the_Civil_War Mourning is the process of grieving the death of a loved one. In the mid-nineteenth century, middle- and upper-class Americans observed an elaborate set of rules that governed behavior following the death of a spouse or relative. The astronomical rate of death during the American Civil War (1861–1865) often hindered the mourning process, transformed the ways in which individuals and communities responded to death, and heightened women's public role in mourning traditions.
Tue, 04 Dec 2012 08:24:08 EST]]> /Richmond_During_the_Civil_War Thu, 29 Nov 2012 15:01:29 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Richmond_During_the_Civil_War Thu, 29 Nov 2012 15:01:29 EST]]> /Cline_Patsy_1932-1963 Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:45:03 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Cline_Patsy_1932-1963 Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:45:03 EST]]> /Cooper_Susannah_Sanders_d_after_9_June_1751 Mon, 19 Nov 2012 17:06:11 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Cooper_Susannah_Sanders_d_after_9_June_1751 Mon, 19 Nov 2012 17:06:11 EST]]> /Burwell_Lucy_1683-1716 Fri, 16 Nov 2012 14:33:53 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Burwell_Lucy_1683-1716 Fri, 16 Nov 2012 14:33:53 EST]]> /American_Civil_War_and_Virginia_The Tue, 06 Nov 2012 16:52:10 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/American_Civil_War_and_Virginia_The Tue, 06 Nov 2012 16:52:10 EST]]> /Pocahontas_d_1617 Thu, 01 Nov 2012 15:14:05 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Pocahontas_d_1617 Thu, 01 Nov 2012 15:14:05 EST]]> /Barrett_Kate_Waller_1858-1925 Thu, 13 Sep 2012 14:34:15 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Barrett_Kate_Waller_1858-1925 Kate Waller Barrett was a prominent physician, social reformer, humanitarian, and leader of the National Florence Crittenton Mission, a progressive organization established in 1883 to assist unmarried women and teenage girls who either had children or were trying to leave prostitution.
Thu, 13 Sep 2012 14:34:15 EST]]> /Gibson_Irene_Langhorne_1873-1956 Thu, 30 Aug 2012 16:54:23 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Gibson_Irene_Langhorne_1873-1956 Irene Langhorne Gibson, a native of Danville, Virginia, chaired the Child Planning and Adoption Committee of New York's State Charities Association for twenty-five years. She founded the New York branch of the Southern Women's Educational Alliance, was a member of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children, and helped found and was a director of the Protestant Big Sisters, on whose board she served for many years. Though she was a politically active and influential spokeswoman throughout her life, she may best be known as the incarnation of the Progressive Era's model "New Woman"—the "Gibson Girl," a social and fashion template created and popularized by her famous illustrator husband, Charles Dana Gibson.
Thu, 30 Aug 2012 16:54:23 EST]]> /Parishes_and_Tithes_1643 Thu, 17 May 2012 13:26:28 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Parishes_and_Tithes_1643 In its March 1643 session, the General Assembly repealed all former laws and passes a series of new laws that helped to clarify the intentions of its previous legislation. In this first act, the assembly explains the powers and obligations of the parish vestry and dictates taxes to be paid and the people—including enslaved African women—considered tithable, or eligible to be taxed. Some spelling has been modernized.
Thu, 17 May 2012 13:26:28 EST]]> /_Concerning_secret_Marriages_1657-1658 Mon, 14 May 2012 10:55:50 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_Concerning_secret_Marriages_1657-1658 In this law, "Concerning secret Marriages," passed in its 1658 session, the General Assembly addressed the problem of indentured servants having children and marrying. For masters, this resulted in a loss of the women servants' labor, for which the law attempted to provide compensation. The act revises one passed during the 1643 session. Some spelling has been modernized.
Mon, 14 May 2012 10:55:50 EST]]> /Campbell_Christiana_ca_1722-1792 Fri, 04 May 2012 14:05:03 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Campbell_Christiana_ca_1722-1792 Christiana Campbell was a tavern-keeper in Williamsburg from 1755 until the late 1770s. Campbell, who was raised in Williamsburg, opened her tavern to support herself and her two daughters after her husband died in 1752. For more than twenty years she ran one of Williamsburg's most successful businesses. On the eve of the American Revolution (1775–1783), the colony's leaders periodically met at Campbell's tavern to discuss their connections with England and whether they should seek independence. Campbell evidently closed her tavern in the late 1770s, and, at some point after October 8, 1787, relocated to Fredericksburg, where she died in 1792.
Fri, 04 May 2012 14:05:03 EST]]> /Women_During_the_Civil_War Tue, 03 Apr 2012 17:03:08 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Women_During_the_Civil_War Although women were not permitted to bear arms on the battlefront, they made invaluable contributions to and were deeply affected by the American Civil War (1861–1865). This was particularly true of women living in Virginia, since they witnessed more battles than did the women of any other state engaged in the conflict. The removal of hundreds of thousands of men from their homes, farms, and businesses necessitated the vastly increased participation of women, both black and white, in areas that they had been previously discouraged, if not forbidden, from pursuing. Differences of race and class, however, sometimes sharply divided their views and experiences. Some devoted everything they had to the service of the Confederacy, while others openly rebelled against it. The end of the war brought the collapse of both the Confederate government and slave society, and while freedom created a new commonality between the races and between women and men, it challenged them to redefine themselves and their society. In the words of diarist Lucy Buck from Front Royal, "We shall never any of us be the same as we have been."
Tue, 03 Apr 2012 17:03:08 EST]]> /Law_Regulating_Marriage_of_Indentured_Servants_1642-1643 Tue, 03 Apr 2012 14:55:12 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Law_Regulating_Marriage_of_Indentured_Servants_1642-1643 In this law, passed in the session of March 2, 1642/43 (Old Style), the General Assembly addressed the problem of indentured servants having children and marrying. For masters, this resulted in a loss of the women servants' labor, for which the law attempted to provide compensation. The law was revised during the 1657/58 session.
Tue, 03 Apr 2012 14:55:12 EST]]> /General_Court_Hears_Case_on_Witchcraft_1626 Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:10:20 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/General_Court_Hears_Case_on_Witchcraft_1626 The following is a transcript of the proceedings of the General Court, meeting in Jamestown on September 11, 1626. The court heard evidence against Joan Wright of Surry County, who was accused by her neighbors of practicing witchcraft. She was acquitted in, perhaps, the earliest allegation of witchcraft on record against an English settler in North America. Some spelling has been modernized and contractions expanded.
Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:10:20 EST]]> /_Women_servants_gott_with_child_by_their_masters_after_their_time_expired_to_be_sold_by_the_Churchwardens_for_two_yeares_for_the_good_of_the_parish_1662 Tue, 03 Apr 2012 11:18:39 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_Women_servants_gott_with_child_by_their_masters_after_their_time_expired_to_be_sold_by_the_Churchwardens_for_two_yeares_for_the_good_of_the_parish_1662 In this law, "Women servants gott with child by their masters after their time expired to be sold by the Churchwardens for two yeares for the good of the parish," passed in its December 1662 session, the General Assembly addressed the problem of indentured servants having children by their masters.
Tue, 03 Apr 2012 11:18:39 EST]]> /_Against_ffornication_1661-1662 Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:38:05 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_Against_ffornication_1661-1662 In this law, "Against ffornication," passed in its March 1662 session, the General Assembly addressed the problem of indentured servants having sex that produced pregnancies that, in turn, cost masters money and labor.
Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:38:05 EST]]> /The_Deaths_of_Elizabeth_Abbott_and_Elias_Hinton_1624 Wed, 28 Mar 2012 10:18:53 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/The_Deaths_of_Elizabeth_Abbott_and_Elias_Hinton_1624 In these depositions, delivered to the General Court on October 10, 1624, various indentured servants, masters, and other witnesses testify about the deaths of two servants—Elizabeth Abbott and Elias Hinton—at the hand of their master and mistress, John and Alice Proctor. Some spelling has been modernized and contractions expanded.
Wed, 28 Mar 2012 10:18:53 EST]]> /Ladies_Memorial_Associations Thu, 08 Mar 2012 15:56:38 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Ladies_Memorial_Associations Ladies' Memorial Associations were locally organized groups of southern white women who, following the American Civil War (1861–1865), tracked down the scattered remains of Confederate soldiers and reinterred them in Confederate cemeteries. Following Robert E. Lee's surrender in April 1865, more than 260,000 Confederate war dead were buried throughout the South, a majority of them in Virginia. Most of these soldiers would not be returned home; instead, they eventually would be placed in Confederate cemeteries. But these cities of the dead were not to be furnished by the federal or state governments; neither were they to be organized by Confederate veterans. Instead, the associations created Confederate cemeteries, which served as final resting places for approximately 80 percent of the fallen soldiers.
Thu, 08 Mar 2012 15:56:38 EST]]> /_An_Acte_against_Conjuration_Witchcrafte_and_dealing_with_evill_and_wicked_Spirits_1604 Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:03:26 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_An_Acte_against_Conjuration_Witchcrafte_and_dealing_with_evill_and_wicked_Spirits_1604 In this act, "An Acte against Conjuration Witchcrafte and dealing with evill and wicked Spirits," passed by Parliament in the session that began on March 19, 1603, and ended July 7, 1604, the English government, not for the first time, outlawed witchcraft. It was the this law, however, that authorities used to prosecute accused witches in Virginia. Some contractions have been expanded. The last witchcraft trial in the mainland colonies took place in 1730, and Parliament repealed the law in 1736. Some spelling has been modernized and contractions expanded.
Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:03:26 EST]]> /The_Case_of_Grace_Sherwood_1706 Thu, 23 Feb 2012 15:52:25 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/The_Case_of_Grace_Sherwood_1706 The following is a transcript of the proceedings of the Princess Anne County Court as it hears the case, in 1706, of Grace Sherwood on the charge of witchcraft. Some spelling has been modernized and contractions expanded. The case is heard first in the county court, then in the General Court, and finally is removed back to the county court. There is the suggestion that it was once more heard by the General Court, but the courts records for that period are missing. Whatever the case, Sherwood is known to have survived her legal ordeal. Some spelling has been modernized and contractions expanded.
Thu, 23 Feb 2012 15:52:25 EST]]> /Bread_Riot_Richmond Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:12:46 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Bread_Riot_Richmond The Richmond Bread Riot, which took place in the Confederate capital of Richmond on April 2, 1863, was the largest and most destructive in a series of civil disturbances throughout the South during the third spring of the American Civil War (1861–1865). By 1863, the Confederate economy was showing signs of serious strain. Congress's passage of an Impressment Act, as well as a tax law deemed "confiscatory," led to hoarding and speculation, and spiraling inflation took its toll, especially on people living in the Confederacy's urban areas. When a group of hungry Richmond women took their complaints to Virginia governor John L. Letcher, he refused to see them. Their anger turned into a street march and attacks on commercial establishments. Only when troops were deployed and authorities threatened to fire on the mob did the rioters disperse. More than sixty men and women were arrested and tried, while the city stepped up its efforts to relieve the suffering of the poor and hungry.
Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:12:46 EST]]> /United_Daughters_of_the_Confederacy Thu, 02 Feb 2012 09:59:22 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/United_Daughters_of_the_Confederacy The United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) was formed in 1894 to protect and perpetuate Confederate memory following the American Civil War (1861–1865). According to the group's founding documents, it sought "to fulfill the duties of sacred charity to the survivors of the war and those dependent upon them … to perpetuate the memory of our Confederate heroes and the glorious cause for which they fought." Through chapters in Virginia and other southern states (and even a handful in the North), members directed most of their efforts toward raising funds for Confederate monuments, sponsoring Memorial Day parades, caring for indigent Confederate widows, sponsoring essay contests and fellowships for southern students, and maintaining Confederate museums and relic collections. The context of these efforts was the Lost Cause interpretation of the Civil War, which emphasized states' rights and secession over slavery as causes of the war and was often used to further the goals of white supremacists in the twentieth century. The organization continues to perform memorial work, its national headquarters located in the former Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia.
Thu, 02 Feb 2012 09:59:22 EST]]> /Vobe_Jane_by_1733-1787 Tue, 31 Jan 2012 16:47:07 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Vobe_Jane_by_1733-1787 Jane Vobe operated taverns in Williamsburg (1751–1785) and in Manchester, in Chesterfield County (1786–1787). Little is known of Vobe's life beyond what historians have gleaned from extant records, but her business was one of Williamsburg's most successful. In 1765 a French traveler recorded in his diary that Vobe's establishment was "where all the best people" stay; six years later, Vobe closed her tavern and opened another in 1772 in a different location in the Virginia capital. Politicians and military men often gathered at her tavern to discuss events related to the American Revolution (1775–1783). George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Nelson, and the Baron von Steuben were among her customers. After the Virginia capital moved to Richmond and the Revolution ended, Vobe relocated to Manchester, where she managed a tavern until her death in 1787.
Tue, 31 Jan 2012 16:47:07 EST]]> /Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:15:46 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a landmark piece of national legislation, not only for the civil rights movement but for the emerging women's movement of the 1960s. It officially outlawed discrimination in public accommodations and employment and established the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission to enforce those provisions. In contrast to earlier civil rights measures, it included a ban on employment discrimination on the basis of gender, as well as race, color, and religion, making it the most comprehensive civil rights bill in American history and giving the revived women's movement new legal—and moral—weight. Yet, in an ironic twist, the legislation banned gender discrimination only because of the efforts of Howard W. Smith, U.S. representative from Virginia, a leader of the Conservative Coalition in Congress, and an opponent of civil rights. His tireless attempts to defeat the bill—including adding "sex" as grounds for illegal discrimination, which he believed would guarantee the bill's failure—resulted in a more expansive bill passing.
Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:15:46 EST]]> /Aggie_Mary_fl_1728-1731 Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:02:12 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Aggie_Mary_fl_1728-1731 Mary Aggie was a slave who became a principal in a court case that changed Virginia's statute law. Although unsuccessful in suing for her freedom in 1728, she demonstrated her belief in Christianity to the satisfaction of the presiding judge, Lieutenant Governor William Gooch. In 1730 she was convicted by the York County court of oyer and terminer of stealing from her owner, which ordinarily would have doomed her to death or severe corporal punishment. In 1731, however, Gooch had her case sent to the General Court, where he hoped she could secure the benefit of clergy, a privilege in English law dating back centuries in which literate persons could escape death or the severest penalties for first convictions on most capital offenses. Before a final verdict could be rendered, on May 6, 1731, Gooch and the governor's Council pardoned Aggie on the condition that she would be sold out of the colony. The General Assembly referred to Aggie's cases in passing a law on July 1, 1732, that allowed virtually all Virginians to plead benefit of clergy except in certain cases, a privilege that continued for another sixty years.
Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:02:12 EST]]> /Johnston_Mary_1870-1936 Wed, 18 Jan 2012 09:58:32 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Johnston_Mary_1870-1936 Mary Johnston was a novelist, historian, playwright, suffragist, and social advocate, as well as the first woman to top best-seller lists in the twentieth century. Her second and most famous novel, To Have and to Hold (1900), broke existing publishing records by selling 60,000 copies in advance and more than 135,000 copies during its first week of publication. A romantic tale of colonial Virginia, the book proved to be the biggest popular success between the publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1852 and Gone With the Wind in 1936. A pair of early motion pictures dramatized the book. Two other novels, Audrey (1902) and Sir Mortimer (1904), were also commercial successes, although Johnston's popularity waned later in her career. In fact, Johnston's social activism may be of more lasting importance than her literary output. She was an early member of the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia, she depicted the horrors of lynching in her 1923 story "Nemesis," and she supported a number of other reformist causes. Her reputation as a writer, however, has been partially restored in recent years.
Wed, 18 Jan 2012 09:58:32 EST]]> /Van_Lew_Elizabeth_L_1818-1900 Wed, 12 Oct 2011 13:34:14 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Van_Lew_Elizabeth_L_1818-1900 Elizabeth Van Lew was a Richmond Unionist and abolitionist who spied for the United States government during the American Civil War (1861–1865). Leading a network of a dozen or so white and African American women and men, she relayed information on Confederate operations to Union generals and assisted in the care and sometimes escape of Union prisoners of war being held in the Confederate capital. Van Lew, who worked with invisible ink and coded messages, has been called "the most skilled, innovative, and successful" of all Civil War–era spies. While some historians have claimed that she was open about her Unionist politics, deflecting suspicion by behaving as if she were mentally ill, others have argued that these "Crazy Bet" stories are a myth. After the war, Van Lew served as postmaster of Richmond during the administration of U.S. president Ulysses S. Grant, one of the generals to whom she had once fed information.
Wed, 12 Oct 2011 13:34:14 EST]]> /Spencer_Anne_1882-1975 Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:42:52 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Spencer_Anne_1882-1975 Anne Spencer was a poet, a civil rights activist, a teacher, a librarian, and a gardener. While fewer than thirty of her poems were published in her lifetime, she was an important figure of the black literary movement of the 1920s—the Harlem Renaissance—and only the second African American poet to be included in the Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry (1973). Noted for iambic verse preoccupied with biblical and mythological themes, Spencer found fans in such Harlem heavyweights as James Weldon Johnson, who commented on her "economy of phrase and compression of thought." In addition to her writing, Spencer helped to found the Lynchburg chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She was also an avid gardener and hosted a salon at her Lynchburg garden, which attracted prominent figures of the Harlem Renaissance. Her former residence is now a museum that is open to the public.
Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:42:52 EST]]> /Davis_Varina_1826-1906 Thu, 09 Jun 2011 09:37:48 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Davis_Varina_1826-1906 Varina Howell Davis was the second wife of Confederate president Jefferson Davis and the First Lady of the Confederacy during the American Civil War (1861–1865). She was manifestly ill-suited for this role because of her family background, education, personality, physical appearance, and her fifteen-year antebellum residence in Washington, D.C. (She once declared that the worst years of her life were spent in the Confederate capital at Richmond while the happiest were in Washington.) A native of the urban South, she always preferred the city to the country, and after her husband died in 1889, she moved to New York, where she resided until her death in 1906.
Thu, 09 Jun 2011 09:37:48 EST]]> /Sapphira_and_the_Slave_Girl_1940 Mon, 06 Jun 2011 14:19:05 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Sapphira_and_the_Slave_Girl_1940 Sapphira and the Slave Girl (1940) is the last novel by Willa Cather and the Virginia-born writer's only book set entirely in the state. Based on an incident in Cather's own family, in which her maternal grandmother helped a slave escape in 1856, the novel details the complicated marriage of Henry and Sapphira Colbert, who operate a mill and small farm in Back Creek outside Winchester in the years before the American Civil War. Sapphira wrongly suspects that one of her slaves, Nancy, is in an intimate relationship with her husband, and manipulates those around her to exact revenge. Henry and the couple's daughter, Rachel, intervene by helping Nancy flee to Canada. At the time of its release, Sapphira and the Slave Girl was praised by the New York Times for examining "the question of slavery without any portentous fanfare," but in the years since, the book has not been widely read. Most critics have charged Sapphira with being racist and overly nostalgic, while a few have defended it as a brilliant inversion of old stereotypes and a coded exploration of sexual desire.
Mon, 06 Jun 2011 14:19:05 EST]]> /Clark_Adèle_1882-1983 Tue, 17 May 2011 16:24:45 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Clark_Adèle_1882-1983 Adèle Clark was a founding member of the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia, nineteen years the chair of Virginia's League of Women Voters, dean of women at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, New Deal–era field worker, and an accomplished artist and arts advocate. Clark called politics and art her "creative spirits," and she exemplified the crucial role women played in the social reform movements of the twentieth century, applying her sharp intellect, artistic skills, and fiery determination to championing both women and the arts.
Tue, 17 May 2011 16:24:45 EST]]> /Lost_Cause_The Mon, 09 May 2011 09:35:42 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Lost_Cause_The The Lost Cause is an interpretation of the American Civil War (1861–1865) that seeks to present the war, from the perspective of Confederates, in the best possible terms. Developed by white Southerners, many of them former Confederate generals, in a postwar climate of economic, racial, and gender uncertainty, the Lost Cause created and romanticized the "Old South" and the Confederate war effort, often distorting history in the process. For this reason, many historians have labeled the Lost Cause a myth or a legend. It is certainly an important example of public memory, one in which nostalgia for the Confederate past is accompanied by a collective forgetting of the horrors of slavery. Providing a sense of relief to white Southerners who feared being dishonored by defeat, the Lost Cause was largely accepted in the years following the war by white Americans who found it to be a useful tool in reconciling North and South. The Lost Cause has lost much of its academic support but continues to be an important part of how the Civil War is commemorated in the South and remembered in American popular culture.
Mon, 09 May 2011 09:35:42 EST]]> /Boyle_Sarah_Patton_1906-1994 Tue, 26 Apr 2011 11:39:01 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Boyle_Sarah_Patton_1906-1994 Sarah Patton Boyle was one of Virginia's most prominent white civil rights activists during the 1950s and 1960s and author of the widely acclaimed autobiography The Desegregated Heart: A Virginian's Stand in Time of Transition (1962). Her desegregation efforts began in 1950 when she wrote to Gregory Swanson welcoming him as the University of Virginia's first black law student. Through her experience with Swanson, her views on desegregation evolved from being a proponent of gradual desegregation to a leading and often controversial white voice for immediate desegregation in public schools and in higher education. Her 1955 article for the Saturday Evening Post, titled "Southerners Will Like Integration," prompted a fierce backlash that included having a cross burned in her Charlottesville yard. Boyle did not moderate her views, however, and worked closely with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), earning praise from Martin Luther King Jr., Lillian Smith, and others, as well as numerous awards and a measure of national fame. The intensity of her political involvement triggered a deep depression, however, and she eventually became disillusioned with the civil rights movement, retiring from activism in 1967. In 1983, she authored a memoir that contemplated her experience dealing with age discrimination.
Tue, 26 Apr 2011 11:39:01 EST]]> /Woman_Suffrage_in_Virginia Thu, 07 Apr 2011 13:01:54 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Woman_Suffrage_in_Virginia The woman suffrage movement, which sought voting rights for women, began in Virginia as early as 1870. In 1909, its most vocal supporters organized around the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia, which joined with national groups in an effort to change state and local laws and pass an amendment to the United States Constitution. The Nineteenth Amendment, which gave women the right to vote, was passed in Congress in 1919 and ratified by the states a year later. Virginia, however, delayed its ratification until 1952. By then, women had been voting and, slowly, winning elected office in the state for more than 30 years.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 13:01:54 EST]]> /Valentine_Lila_Meade_1865-1921 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:54:05 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Valentine_Lila_Meade_1865-1921 Lila Meade Valentine was a suffragist, education reformer, and public-health advocate. During her abbreviated life, she played a vital role in creating and running organizations that improved the health-care and public school systems of her native city of Richmond. Valentine also became an ardent supporter of woman suffrage early in the 1900s, cofounding the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia and serving as an active member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. A talented organizer and an eloquent speaker, Valentine led efforts on behalf of suffrage that came to fruition in 1920, when the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, giving women the right to vote.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:54:05 EST]]> /Thompson_Ida_Mae_1866-1947 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:52:30 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Thompson_Ida_Mae_1866-1947 Ida Mae Thompson was an important figure in Virginia's woman suffrage movement, not for her political work but for her recordkeeping. First as a member of the Equal Suffrage League, the organization that led the effort to win women the right to vote, and then as a member of the League of Women Voters, Thompson collected and preserved the movement's history.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:52:30 EST]]> /Smith_Howard_Worth_1883-1976 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:43:49 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Smith_Howard_Worth_1883-1976 Howard W. Smith, a Virginia Democratic congressman, was one of America's most powerful politicians from the New Deal to the Great Society. A master obstructionist who chaired the House Rules Committee, he used his power to fight the liberal agendas of presidential administrations from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Lyndon B. Johnson. He was particularly concerned about the influence of Communists and wrote the Alien Registration Act of 1940, legislation that eventually paved the way for government targeting of radicals during the Cold War. He also saw Communism at the heart of the civil rights movement and attempted to kill the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by introducing an amendment to include women under its provisions. Ironically, this helped the measure pass and stands as an important part of Smith's legacy.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:43:49 EST]]> /Seawell_Molly_Elliot_1860-1916 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:42:28 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Seawell_Molly_Elliot_1860-1916 Molly Elliot Seawell was the author of forty books, including regional fiction, romances, books for boys (primarily nautical stories), and nonfiction. She also penned political columns for newspapers in Washington, D.C., and New York. Socially conservative, she opposed the growing woman suffrage movement, and her consistent depictions of African Americans as servants and slaves—while acceptable to and endorsed by much of her white readership at that time—reflected her belief that blacks were inferior and peripheral members of society. Despite her social views, critics often described her books, many of which were reviewed in the New York Times, as "sweet" or "wholesome." Though her books boasted vividly drawn characters, they did not pursue the themes and styles of literary realism that characterized the more progressive literary trends of her time. Seawell, however, remained a single woman and worked as a prolific writer who supported her household by her various publications.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:42:28 EST]]> /Roberts_Ruby_Altizer_1907-2004 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:41:00 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Roberts_Ruby_Altizer_1907-2004 Ruby Altizer Roberts is the author of two collections of poetry, three memoirs, a children's book, and a genealogy. She was named Virginia's first female poet laureate in 1950 and, until 1994, was the only woman to have held the post. In addition, Roberts edited the poetry journal The Lyric from 1952 until 1977. In 1961 she received an honorary doctor of humanities degree from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, and in 1992, the General Assembly designated her Poet Laureate Emerita of Virginia.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 12:41:00 EST]]> /Munford_Mary-Cooke_Branch_1865-1938 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:49:08 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Munford_Mary-Cooke_Branch_1865-1938 Mary-Cooke Branch Munford was an advocate of woman suffrage, interracial cooperation, education, health, and labor reforms. Armed with a pedigree that connected her to some of the wealthiest families of Virginia, she threw herself into such "unfeminine" pursuits as education reform and civil rights. She helped to found the Richmond Education Association, was the first woman to serve on the city's school board, was a member of the University of Virginia's Board of Visitors, and was the first woman to serve on the College of William and Mary's Board of Visitors. Munford also served on the board of the National Urban League, was a founding member of the Virginia Inter-Racial League, and became a trustee at the historically black Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:49:08 EST]]> /Morgan_v_Virginia Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:45:42 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Morgan_v_Virginia Morgan v. Virginia is an often-overlooked landmark case of the civil rights movement. Decided on June 3, 1946, nearly a decade before Rosa Parks challenged segregated seating on a public bus in Montgomery, Alabama, the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in this case struck down Virginia's law requiring racial segregation in interstate public transportation.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:45:42 EST]]> /Mason_Lucy_Randolph_1882-1959 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:43:40 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Mason_Lucy_Randolph_1882-1959 Lucy Randolph Mason was a social liberal and prominent labor activist who took advantage of a genteel southern pedigree in order to promote the aggressive Congress of Industrial Organizations throughout the South from the 1930s to the 1950s.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:43:40 EST]]> /Henderson_Helen_Timmons_1877-1925 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:29:55 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Henderson_Helen_Timmons_1877-1925 Helen Timmons Henderson, from the town of Council in Buchanan County, served in the Virginia House of Delegates (1924–1925), one of the first two women elected to that body (the other was Norfolk's Sarah Lee Fain). She die before having the opportunity to run for a second term.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:29:55 EST]]> /Fain_Sarah_Lee_1888-1962 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:23:37 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Fain_Sarah_Lee_1888-1962 Sarah Lee Fain was one of the first two women elected to serve in the Virginia General Assembly following ratification in 1920 of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which gave American women the right to vote. When she took her seat as a delegate from Norfolk in January 1924, Fain and her legislative colleague Helen Timmons Henderson, of Buchanan County, became pioneers whose presence in the Virginia State Capitol signaled the start of women's full participation in the political life of the state. Virginia changed slowly, however, and six more decades would pass before women served in the state's legislature in appreciable numbers.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:23:37 EST]]> /Equal_Suffrage_League_of_Virginia_1909-1920 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:21:59 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Equal_Suffrage_League_of_Virginia_1909-1920 The Equal Suffrage League of Virginia was an organization of white women dedicated to securing for women the right to vote. Aligned with the national woman suffrage movement, the league worked for more than ten years lobbying the public and the General Assembly alike, until its efforts paid off when three-fourths of the United States state legislatures ratified the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920. The league failed, however, to persuade the Virginia General Assembly, which did not vote to ratify until 1952.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:21:59 EST]]> /Cooperative_Education_Association Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:03:39 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Cooperative_Education_Association The Cooperative Education Association was organized in 1904 to advocate for public education reform in Virginia. The group was part of the larger, national Progressive movement, which generally pushed for workers' rights, women's rights, and more efficient government. The cooperative saw itself representing all citizens of Virginia, "whether living in the city or the country, whether white or black," and was an outgrowth of the Richmond Education Association, founded in 1900 by Lila Meade Valentine and dedicated to education reform. The idea behind the cooperative was to extend the group's successes in Richmond to the rest of the state.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:03:39 EST]]> /Agnew_Ella_Graham_1871-1958 Thu, 07 Apr 2011 10:18:43 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Agnew_Ella_Graham_1871-1958 Ella G. Agnew was a prominent educator and social worker who advanced employment opportunities for women early in the 1900s long before there was a woman's liberation movement. She served as the first president of the Virginia Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs and worked in the national office of the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA). During the Great Depression, Agnew directed women's relief activities in Virginia.
Thu, 07 Apr 2011 10:18:43 EST]]> /Lee_Mary_Anna_Randolph_Custis_1807-1873 Wed, 06 Apr 2011 16:42:57 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Lee_Mary_Anna_Randolph_Custis_1807-1873 Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee was an artist, author, and early antislavery activist. The great-granddaughter of Martha Washington, she enjoyed virtually unequalled social status throughout her life. Tutored in history and philosophy, she became acquainted with the early republic's leaders, who visited her father's estate, Arlington. Following her mother's lead, she fought slavery, and helped to ease the lives of her own family's slaves. Her uncle's death in 1830 prompted a religious awakening, and marriage the next year to Robert E. Lee put her in the position of being an army wife, a somewhat uncomfortable role for someone of her background. She followed her husband to his various outposts, sketching her travels and becoming an artist of some note. While her connection to Lee did not immediately augment her social standing, when he led the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War (1861–1865), she was accorded further deference. Mary Custis Lee had not supported secession, but she was a devoted Confederate, her grace under pressure making her a symbol of quiet strength in wartime Richmond. At the end of her life, she was embittered by the Union occupation of her beloved Arlington and felt betrayed by her family's former slaves. She died in 1873.
Wed, 06 Apr 2011 16:42:57 EST]]> /Harland_Marion_1830-1922 Tue, 05 Apr 2011 12:55:42 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Harland_Marion_1830-1922 Marion Harland was a writer of novels, short stories, biographies, travel narratives, cookbooks, and domestic manuals whose career stretched across seven decades of sectional conflict and great change in American life. Harland chronicled much of that change, penning novels that suggested her own divided loyalties between North and South before establishing herself as an expert and often a sly and sarcastic commentator on the domestic arts of homemaking.
Tue, 05 Apr 2011 12:55:42 EST]]> /Ford_Antonia_1838-1871 Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:58:21 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Ford_Antonia_1838-1871 Antonia Ford was a Confederate spy during the American Civil War (1861–1865), credited with providing the military information gathered from her Fairfax Court House home during the First Battle of Manassas (1861) and in the two years following. In October 1861, Confederate cavalry general J. E. B. Stuart issued an order declaring her an honorary aide-de-camp. The document was used against Ford in 1863, however, when she was accused of spying for John Singleton Mosby, whose partisan rangers famously captured the Union general Edwin H. Stoughton in his headquarters. Mosby later denied that Ford ever spied for him. After several months in prison, Ford was released and married one of her captors, Union major Joseph C. Willard. Ford stopped spying, Willard resigned from the army, and they returned to managing the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., and had three children.
Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:58:21 EST]]> /Stuart_Flora_Cooke_1836-1923 Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:37:56 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Stuart_Flora_Cooke_1836-1923 Flora Cooke Stuart was the wife of Confederate general J. E. B. Stuart and the daughter of Union general Philip St. George Cooke. She met Stuart, a dashing subordinate of her father, while living in the Kansas Territory in the 1850s, and after marrying, the two settled in Virginia. Secession, however, split their family, with Cooke, a respected cavalryman, remaining in the United States Army and Stuart eventually becoming chief of cavalry of the Army of Northern Virginia. "He will regret it but once & that will be continually," Stuart said of his father-in-law's decision; he even renamed his and Flora's months'-old son, Philip St. George Cooke Stuart, after himself, James Ewell Brown Stuart Jr. During the American Civil War (1861–1865), Flora Stuart spent as much time as possible in camp with her husband, and chafed at the generous attention he received from admiring women in Virginia and across the South. When Stuart died after being wounded at the Battle of Yellow Tavern (1864), she donned mourning garb and wore it for the remaining fifty-nine years of her life. During that time, she served as headmistress of a women's school in Staunton that was subsequently named for her. She later moved to Norfolk, where she died in 1923.
Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:37:56 EST]]> /Pickett_LaSalle_Corbell_1843-1931 Tue, 05 Apr 2011 10:44:50 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Pickett_LaSalle_Corbell_1843-1931 LaSalle Corbell Pickett was a prolific author and lecturer, and the third wife of George E. Pickett, the Confederate general best known for his participation in the doomed frontal assault known as Pickett's Charge during the American Civil War (1861–1865). After her husband's death in 1875, she traveled the country to promote a highly romanticized version of his life and military career that was generally at odds with the historical record. George Pickett emerged from the war with a strained relationship with Robert E. Lee—whom he partly blamed for the destruction of his division at Gettysburg (1863)—and accused of war crimes. But in his wife's history, Pickett and His Men (1899), this not-always-competent soldier was transformed into the ideal Lost Cause hero, "gallant and graceful as a knight of chivalry riding to a tournament." This image largely stuck in the American consciousness, leaving historians to spend much of the next century attempting to separate Pickett from his myth.
Tue, 05 Apr 2011 10:44:50 EST]]> /Burial_of_LatanAC._The Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:32:59 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Burial_of_LatanAC._The The Burial of Latané was one of the most famous Lost Cause images of the American Civil War (1861–1865). Painted by Virginian William D. Washington in Richmond in 1864, the work shows white women, slaves, and children performing the burial service of a cavalry officer killed during J. E. B. Stuart's famous ride around Union general George B. McClellan's army during the Peninsula Campaign in 1862. The incident first inspired a poem and then the painting, which became a powerful symbol of Confederate women's devotion to the Confederate cause.
Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:32:59 EST]]> /Boyd_Belle_1844-1900 Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:13:15 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Boyd_Belle_1844-1900 Belle Boyd was one of the most famous Confederate spies during the American Civil War (1861–1865), repeatedly and under dangerous circumstances managing to relay information on Union troop strengths and movements to Confederate commanders in the field. According to Confederate general Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, the intelligence she provided helped the general to win victories in the Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1862. Authorities suspected her of being a spy almost from the start, and the Union imprisoned her multiple times, but Boyd was a master of manipulation. Her ability to exploit a soldier's sense of chivalry and the Victorian male's natural deference to "ladies" became legendary and may help explain why so many of the war's best spies were women. In 1864, she fled to London, England, where she married one of her captors and later penned a memoir, Belle Boyd in Camp and in Prison (1865), that detailed her exploits and attracted international attention.
Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:13:15 EST]]> /Giovanni_Nikki_1943- Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:48:21 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Giovanni_Nikki_1943- Nikki Giovanni is a poet, civil rights activist, and outspoken social critic—particularly on issues of gender and race—who uses her poetry as a vehicle for political commentary. Her self-published first volume of poems, Black Feeling, Black Talk (1968), declared an affinity to the Black Power of Malcolm X and dismissed the nonviolence of Martin Luther King Jr. "We ain't got to prove we can die," she wrote. "We got to prove we can kill." While her militancy has tempered with the years, her commitment to the importance of individual black voices in opposition to what she perceives to be the powerful and corrupting influence of the "white race" has not wavered. Giovanni's fame and influence, meanwhile, have grown. Currently, she is a University Distinguished Professor of English at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (or Virginia Tech), where she spoke prominently following the April 2007 shooting in which a Tech student murdered thirty-two people.
Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:48:21 EST]]> /Magill_Mary_Tucker_1830-1899 Wed, 22 Sep 2010 16:03:24 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Magill_Mary_Tucker_1830-1899 Mary Tucker Magill was a Virginia educator and author whose work portrays the generation of Virginians who endured the hardships of defeat following the American Civil War (1861–1865) and looked ahead to the next century by embracing innovative ideas on health and well-being. Magill wrote two conservative textbooks on Virginia history and a forward-thinking manual of exercises for women. She was also a novelist and short-story writer whose fiction, like her historicism, depicted an idealized version of plantation life in the Old South.
Wed, 22 Sep 2010 16:03:24 EST]]> /Byrne_Leslie_1946- Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:53:38 EST http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Byrne_Leslie_1946- Leslie Byrne was the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress from Virginia, serving as a Democrat for one term, from January 3, 1993, until January 3, 1995. Byrne emerged as a skilled fund-raiser and hard-nosed campaigner, but her tenure in Congress was marked by Democratic defeats over health care issues and her own sometimes difficult relationships with fellow representatives. In addition to her term in Congress, Byrne served in the House of Delegates (1986–1992) and the Senate of Virginia (2000–2003). She also served as the White House Director of Consumer Affairs under U.S. president Bill Clinton.
Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:53:38 EST]]>