Posts – Page 17 – The UncommonWealth

The Stacks

The Case of the Phantom Article: Libraries and ChatGPT

Last month, my colleague Dave Grabarek approached me with a puzzling reference question. A researcher had gotten in touch to request an academic journal article…

Rebecca SchneiderJuly 5, 2023

Horse Thief!

According to a mysterious document in the Library’s holdings, an interstate crime ring consisting mostly of Virginians operated from Maryland to South Carolina in the…

Bill BynumJuly 3, 2023

Archives Conservation Digital Projects

Virginia Untold: Looking Back and Moving Forward

Editor's Note: Neither Virginia Untold nor Virginia Untold Project Manager Lydia Neuroth is going anywhere, but as we transition out of our two-year NHPRC grant…

Lydia NeurothJune 28, 2023

Virginia Authors

New Books – June 2023

The Library of Virginia's first-floor lobby and Exhibition Gallery are open Monday-Saturday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The second-floor Reading Rooms are open Tuesday-Friday, 9:00…

Donna PletcherJune 26, 2023

Archives Conservation

Records Room Road Trips: Day Trippers

Travel for Library of Virginia Circuit Court Records Program (CCRP) consulting archivists begins to taper off when the grants are announced, which this past year…

Eddie WoodwardJune 21, 2023

Digital Projects Education & Programming Newspapers

Making Connections with the Past

Tamika Y. Nunley’s new book The Demands of Justice: Enslaved Women, Capital Crime, and Clemency in Early Virginia explores the impact of Virginia’s judicial system…

Library of VirginiaJune 19, 2023

“Operating for Gold”: Gold Mining in Nineteenth-Century Virginia

The California Gold Rush of 1849 is a universal topic of study in courses surveying U.S. history, but what is commonly known about gold mining…

Caroline CollinsJune 14, 2023

Public Libraries

The Great Gatsby Gala

On Saturday, April 22nd, Virginia Beach Public Library’s (VBPL) Meyera E. Oberndorf Central Library transformed into Jay Gatsby’s West Egg mansion to host the Great…

Guest ContributorJune 12, 2023

How Not to Be a Confederate Soldier: Civil War Writs of Habeas Corpus from Richmond City and Petersburg

Why didn’t men fight in the Civil War? It’s not the most popular question that gets brought up during discussions of America’s bloodiest war, but…

McKenzie LongJune 7, 2023

Archives Manuscripts & Special Collections

Revolutionary Provenance: Washington’s Letter and Cornwallis’ Cup at the Library of Virginia

Every record and artifact at the Library of Virginia not only tells a story, but also has a story. The latter is referred to as…

Kenneth ForestJune 5, 2023

Digital Projects Manuscripts & Special Collections

The Rise and Fall of the Five-and-Dime

Do you love a good Target run? The bright, poppy-red branding throughout the store, the practicality of picking up a few groceries, a prescription, a…

Kimberly WolfeJune 2, 2023

Archives Conservation

Records Room Road Trips: Westmoreland, Richmond and Louisa

As one of two Circuit Court Records Program (CCRP) consulting archivists, CCRP travel for the upcoming grant cycle season began for me in February 2023.…

Tracy HarterMay 31, 2023

Virginia Authors

New Books – May 2023

The Library of Virginia's first-floor lobby and Exhibition Gallery are open Monday-Saturday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The second-floor Reading Rooms are open Tuesday-Friday, 9:00…

Donna PletcherMay 29, 2023

Archives Conservation

There and Back Again: The Return of Liber A to Prince William County

The story of Prince William County’s first deed book begins nearly three centuries ago. On May 14, 1731, during the fourth year of the reign…

Greg CrawfordMay 26, 2023

Archives Manuscripts & Special Collections

Evidence of the Armenian Genocide at the Library of Virginia

Between the spring of 1915 and the fall of 1916, between 664,000 and 1.2 million Armenians within the Ottoman Empire died.1 The Armenian Genocide and…

Cara GriggsMay 24, 2023