During World War II, various USOs were established across Virginia. The United Service Organizations is a nonprofit organization that provides military service members and their…
Lauren CaravatiMay 7, 2025
Editors Note: Yesterday, March 23rd, marked the five-year anniversary of then-Governor Northam's closure of in-person education due to Covid-19. We've chosen to take this time…
Roger ChristmanMarch 24, 2025
Throughout the ten plus years of our crowdsourcing project, Making History: Transcribe, we have had many conversations with our volunteers about emerging technologies and whether…
Jessi BennettMarch 19, 2025
In the summer of 1826, Nelly and her two daughters Harriet and Juno took advantage of a rare opportunity. While their enslavers, Notley Williams and…
Lydia NeurothFebruary 26, 2025
In previous blog posts and during events discussing the Virginia WWII Separation Notices collection, I've provided some background on the history of this collection and…
Lauren CaravatiFebruary 19, 2025
In early December, I traveled to Southwest Virginia to continue our work digitizing “Free Negro Registers” for Virginia Untold. We’ve previously written about our digitization…
Lydia NeurothJanuary 22, 2025
While yearbooks might conjure up thoughts of graduation, summer, and the end of the school year - snow days are a very common topic. The…
Jessi BennettJanuary 13, 2025
Virginia Chronicle, the Library of Virginia’s freely accessible database of historic newspapers, has surpassed the 4.5-million-page mark with new additions spanning over 250 years now…
Kelley EwingJanuary 6, 2025
Editor's Note: This blog came about as staff members explored some of the old gift catalogs in our collection. We know that during the holiday…
Cara GriggsDecember 23, 2024
The population in Norfolk, Portsmouth, and the greater Hampton Roads area greatly increased during World War II. Individuals and families moved to the area for…
Lauren CaravatiNovember 6, 2024
Around the year 1826, the Virginia State Library and Archives (now Library of Virginia) began collecting transcriptions of original papers in the Public Records Office…
Amanda MorrellNovember 4, 2024
African American Genealogist Selma Stewart can remember the time she came to the Library of Virginia to view the “Free Negro Registers” in person in…
Lydia NeurothOctober 30, 2024
In September of 2019, the Library of Virginia combined two previous blogs to create The UncommonWealth. Over 1,400 posts and 780,000 views later we have…
Library of VirginiaOctober 11, 2024
Like Jonathan Ramey of Scott County, Virginia, whose story we previously explored on UncommonWealth, brothers James and William Temple of Bath County joined the trek…
Callie FreedOctober 4, 2024
