VMHC Lectures

Few figures from the American past are better known than the young Powhatan woman who has come down to us as “Pocahontas.” Her fame began in her own lifetime and has endured for more than 400 years.

Pocahontas: Her Life, Legend, and Legacy was a half-day symposium held at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture on November 14, 2018 with the intention of telling the story of Pocahontas from the English and Native American perspectives. Distinguished national and international speakers led discussions on what Pocahontas has come to represent as a cross-cultural ambassador, the role of religion and faith in her story, and the myths and realities that surround her.

Shown here is Session 3: Pocahontas – Legacy, Myths, Realities and Relevance.

Moderator Chief Emeritus Kenneth Adams led the discussion with panelists Chief Stephen Adkins, Rt. Rev. Carol Gallagher, Chief Robert Gray, John Pagano, Dr. William M. S. Rasmussen, Chief Anne Richardson, Dr. Helen C. Rountree, and Rev. Canon Chris Stone.

This groundbreaking program not only honors the Indian Tribes in Virginia who were responsible through peaceful treaties and collaboration with the early settlers to establish the foundation of our country, but it also acknowledges the heritage and identity of indigenous peoples who have often been overlooked in history. The symposium was cosponsored by the Virginia Museum of History & Culture and the 2019 Commemoration, America Evolution.

The content and opinions expressed in these presentations are solely those of the speaker and not necessarily of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

Few figures from the American past are better known than the young Powhatan woman who has come down to us as “Pocahontas.” Her fame began in her own lifetime and has endured for more than 400 years.

Pocahontas: Her Life, Legend, and Legacy was a half-day symposium held at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture on November 14, 2018 with the intention of telling the story of Pocahontas from the English and Native American perspectives. Distinguished national and international speakers led discussions on what Pocahontas has come to represent as a cross-cultural ambassador, the role of religion and faith in her story, and the myths and realities that surround her.

Shown here is Session 2: Pocahontas – Religion and Faith.

Moderator Chief Anne Richardson led the discussion with panelists Rt. Rev. Carol Gallagher and Rev. Canon Chris Stone.

This groundbreaking program not only honors the Indian Tribes in Virginia who were responsible through peaceful treaties and collaboration with the early settlers to establish the foundation of our country, but it also acknowledges the heritage and identity of indigenous peoples who have often been overlooked in history. The symposium was cosponsored by the Virginia Museum of History & Culture and the 2019 Commemoration, America Evolution.

The content and opinions expressed in these presentations are solely those of the speaker and not necessarily of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

Few figures from the American past are better known than the young Powhatan woman who has come down to us as “Pocahontas.” Her fame began in her own lifetime and has endured for more than 400 years.

Pocahontas: Her Life, Legend, and Legacy was a half-day symposium held at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture on November 14, 2018 with the intention of telling the story of Pocahontas from the English and Native American perspectives. Distinguished national and international speakers led discussions on what Pocahontas has come to represent as a cross-cultural ambassador, the role of religion and faith in her story, and the myths and realities that surround her.

Shown here is Session 1: Pocahontas – Ambassador of Cross Culture Understanding.

Moderator Chief Stephen Adkins led the discussion with panelists Chief Robert Gray, John Pagano, Dr. William M. S. Rasmussen, and Dr. Helen C. Rountree.

This groundbreaking program not only honors the Indian Tribes in Virginia who were responsible through peaceful treaties and collaboration with the early settlers to establish the foundation of our country, but it also acknowledges the heritage and identity of indigenous peoples who have often been overlooked in history. The symposium was cosponsored by the Virginia Museum of History & Culture and the 2019 Commemoration, America Evolution.

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 October 30, 2018, James M. Scott delivered the banner lecture, “Rampage: MacArthur, Yamashita, and the Battle of Manila.”

General Douglas MacArthur, driven from the Philippines under the cover of darkness at the beginning of World War II, famously vowed to return. This is the untold story of his homecoming. The twenty-nine-day battle to retake Manila resulted in the catastrophic destruction of the city and a rampage by Japanese soldiers and marines that terrorized the civilian population. Landmarks were demolished, houses torched, suspected resistance fighters were tortured and killed, countless women raped, and their husbands and children murdered in a massacre as heinous as “The Rape of Nanking.” Based on extensive research, war crimes testimony, after action reports, and survivor interviews, Rampage recounts one of the most heartbreaking chapters of the Pacific war.

A former Nieman Fellow at Harvard, James M. Scott is the author of Target Tokyo, which was a 2016 Pulitzer Prize finalist and was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus, The Christian Science Monitor and The Fort Worth Star-Telegram. His other works include The War Below and The Attack on the Liberty, which won the Rear Admiral Samuel Eliot Morison Award. His newest book is entitled Rampage: MacArthur, Yamashita, and the Battle of Manila.

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 October 17, 2018, James Horn delivered the J. Harvie Wilkinson, Jr. Lecture, “1619: Jamestown and the Forging of American Democracy.”

Along the banks of the James River, Virginia, during an oppressively hot spell in the middle of summer 1619, two events occurred within a month of each other that would profoundly shape the course of history. In the newly built church at Jamestown, the General Assembly—the first gathering of a representative governing body in America—came together at the end of July. Several weeks later, a battered privateer entered the Chesapeake Bay carrying the first African slaves to land on mainland English America. In 1619, historian James Horn sheds new light on the year that gave birth to the great paradox of our nation: slavery in the midst of freedom. This portentous year marked both the origin of the most important political development in American history, the rise of democracy, and the emergence of what would in time become one of the nation's greatest challenges: the corrosive legacy of racial inequality that has afflicted America since its beginning.

Dr. James Horn is President of the Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation (Preservation Virginia) at Historic Jamestowne. Previously, he served as Vice President of Research and Historical Interpretation at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Saunders Director of the International Center for Jefferson Studies at Monticello, and before that taught for twenty years at the University of Brighton, England. He has held fellowships at the Johns Hopkins University, the College of William and Mary, and Harvard University, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. A leading expert on early Virginia, Dr. Horn is the author of numerous articles and books including A Land as God Made It: Jamestown and the Birth of America; A Kingdom Strange: The Brief and Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke; and 1619: Jamestown and the Forging of American Democracy, which has just been published.

The content and opinions expressed in these presentations are solely those of the speaker and not necessarily of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

As a statesman, diplomat, secretary of state, and chief justice, no one in the founding generation had a more enduring impact on our country’s government and judicial system than John Marshall, and no one did more to preserve the delicate unity of the fledgling union. From 1776 to his death in 1835, Marshall was at the center of every key event in the nation’s history both at home and abroad. 

Raised in a log cabin on the western frontier of Virginia, he had little formal education and none of the advantages of the other great Virginians, yet he developed a talent for self-invention that served him well in office. On October 11, 2018, Joel Richard Paul, author of the critically acclaimed "Without Precedent: Chief Justice John Marshall and His Times," delivered a banner lecture on John Marshall’s pivotal role in the founding of our republic.

Joel Richard Paul is a professor of constitutional and international law at the University of California Hastings Law School in San Francisco. He has also taught on the law faculties of University of California Berkeley, Yale University, University of Connecticut, Leiden University, and American University. Paul is the author of several other books, including "Unlikely Allies: How a Merchant, a Playwright, and a Spy Saved the American Revolution," which he has turned into a musical.

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 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 declassified documents and thousands of pages of unpublished material, The Age of Eisenhowertells the story of a masterful president guiding the nation through the great crises of the 1950s, from McCarthyism and the Korean War through civil rights turmoil and Cold War conflicts. Hitchcock offers a portrait of a skilled leader who found a middle path through the bitter partisanship of his era. At home, he affirmed the central elements of the New Deal, such as Social Security; fought the demagoguery of Sen. Joseph McCarthy; and advanced the agenda of civil rights for African-Americans. Abroad, he ended the Korean War and avoided a new quagmire in Vietnam. Yet he also charted a significant expansion of America’s missile technology and deployed a vast array of covert operations around the world to confront the challenge of Communism. As he left office, he cautioned Americans to remain alert to the dangers of a powerful “military-industrial complex” that could threaten their liberties. Eisenhower was a gifted leader, a decent man of humble origins who used his powers to advance the welfare of all Americans. Now more than ever, Americans have much to learn from Dwight Eisenhower.

Dr. William I. Hitchcock is a professor of history at the University of Virginia and a faculty fellow at the Miller Center for Public Affairs. He is the author or editor of six previous books, including The Struggle for Europe: The Turbulent History of a Divided Continent 1945 to the Present; The Bitter Road to Freedom: A New History of the Liberation of Europe, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; and The Age of Eisenhower: America and the World in the 1950s.

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 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 than AIDS has claimed in thirty-seven years, and more than the Black Death killed in a century. But this was not the Middle Ages, and 1918 marked the first collision between modern science and epidemic disease.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER:

John M. Barry is an award-winning and New York Times best-selling author whose book The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History was named the year’s outstanding book on science or medicine by The National Academies of Science’s in 2004.

After weaving together a dramatic story of triumph amid tragedy in the face of a global pandemic, Barry will join a panel of specialists from the VCU School of Medicine who will discuss the role they are playing today in the research, treatment, and prevention of infectious diseases.

MODERATOR:

Peter Buckley, M.D. – Dean, VCU School of Medicine, Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs, VCU Health System

PANEL MEMBERS:

John M. Barry – Distinguished Scholar at Tulane's Bywater Institute and adjunct professor at the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine

Gonzalo Martin Llorens Bearman, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.P., F.S.H.E.A., F.I.D.S.A. – Chair, Division of Infectious Diseases, VCU School of Medicine, Richard P. Wenzel Professor of Internal Medicine Hospital Epidemiologist, VCU Health System

Michael Donnenberg, M.D. – Senior Associate Dean for Research and Research Training, VCU School of Medicine, Professor of Internal Medicine and of Microbiology and Immunology

This program is made possible by a generous grant from the Virginia Sargeant Reynolds Foundation and is cosponsored with the MCV Foundation.

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 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 insisted “let honor & probity be your polar star,” and Jefferson instructed, “Never suppose that in any possible situation or under any circumstances that it is best for you to do a dishonourable thing.” They each felt this ideal was so essential that it needed to be imparted to the next generation. But what did they mean by honor?

Drawn from his new book "American Honor: The Creation of the Nation’s Ideals during the Revolutionary Era," Craig Bruce Smith explores the ethical roots of Washington and Jefferson’s thinking. He shows two distinct paths to prominence in early America and presents how honor was formed from the battlefields to academia to the presidency.

Dr. Craig Bruce Smith is an Assistant Professor of History and the Director of the History Program at William Woods University. He specializes is in early American cultural and intellectual history during the long eighteenth century and the Age of Revolution and has broader interests in colonial America, the early republic, leadership, the Atlantic world, military history, and the American Founders.

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 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. The subsequent federal assaults, however, proved a dismal failure, squandering a very real possibility of driving the Army of Northern Virginia out of Petersburg. Three determined Confederate counterattacks ensured southern victory that day, but those triumphant assaults possessed a dark side: the unprecedented massacre of black Union soldiers. A. Wilson Greene, whose new book, A Campaign of Giants: The Battle for Petersburg, covers the first six weeks of the Petersburg Campaign, discusses the battle of the Crater, explores the nature of Confederate general William Mahone’s attacks, and offers insights into the motivation for the atrocities that followed.

A. Wilson Greene is the former president of the Pamplin Historical Park and National Museum of the Civil War Soldier and the author of The Final Battles of the Petersburg Campaign: Breaking the Backbone of the Rebellion; Civil War Petersburg: Confederate City in the Crucible of War; and A Campaign of Giants—The Battle for Petersburg, Volume 1: From the Crossing of the James to the Crater.

The content and opinions expressed in these presentations are solely those of the speaker and not necessarily of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.