Part two of our Jim Crow Virginia 1900-1945 begins with “Blue Laws and Black Codes” that focuses on Virginia law as a link between social and racial conflict and change. “Making Whiteness” discusses the culture of segregation imposed after racial progress in Reconstruction. “Separate and Unequal” discusses the connection between public school campaigns and racism...
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We begin our look at Jim Crow New South Virginia 1900-1945 with “Struggle for Mastery” investigating the disenfranchisement of the African American. “Managing White Supremacy” shows the role of Anglo Saxon Clubs and the redefinition of one-drop racism. “Harry Byrd” explains the forty-year dominance of the Democratic Organization under one man, while “Norfolk” surveys the...
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We begin our blog on Gilded Age Virginia 1880-1900 with “Promise of the New South” for the non-elite amidst rapid industrialization, and “Paradox of Southern Progressivism” to explain the rise of urban upper middle class reformers, beginning with prohibition efforts in the late 1800s. “Appalachia” focuses on the predominantly white yet still bi-racial region including...
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In our blog on Reconstruction in Virginia part two, we begin looking at the passage of the 14th amendment in the former Confederate states in”No Easy Walk to Freedom”. The development of social, economic and political community in black Hampton, Virginia is described in “Freedom’s First Generation”. And race as a social construction is explored...
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We begin Reconstruction in Virginia part one with a survey of the period, 1863-1877 in “Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution”. Virginia’s Reconstruction was extended by Readjusters to 1883 as described in “Two Paths to the New South”. The politics of race in post emancipation Virginia is studied in “Before Jim Crow”. “Shattered Nation” investigates the intellectual...
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Our third blog on the Civil War in Virginia considers a biographical focus, social history and local histories during the Civil War. Starting with Confederate General “Robert E. Lee”, the review is paired with bibliographical references to five other prominent Civil War Virginians. “Southern Lady, Yankee Spy” is both biography and social history. Individual biographies are...
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We begin our first of three blogs on the Civil War in Virginia with reviews on five books in print and listing seven out of print books available online. Additional reviews on books about the Civil War are available at Antebellum, Civil War and Reconstruction under the subheading “Wars in Virginia, 1820-1883”. “Battle Cry of Freedom”...
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This second revised blog on “Secession comes to Virginia” begins with a review of the “Roots of Secession” in slave-holding Virginia. “Road to Disunion” investigates the divisions among Southerners. “Apostles of Disunion” describes the appeals of the Deep South commissioners to border state secessionist conventions, “Showdown in Virginia” relates the delegate debate in convention, and...
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We look at the social history of the New Nation from perspectives of Virginia migration among whites and blacks in “Bound Away”. A structural analysis of the Constitution and its pro-slavery uses by Courts and Congresses in the New Nation is considered in “Slavery and the Founders”. “Plowshares into Swords” looks at the development of...
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For those interested in the political and social history of Civil War home front Virginia, four books are recommended. Unionists, Secessionists, free blacks and slaves are studied in “Old Southampton”, from the sectional crisis through the conflict and into Reconstruction. The black Virginian experience in the Civil War, whether slave or free, for blue or...
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