FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New exhibit on founding of Newport News to open in February at Main Street Library

Exhibit traces Old Dominion Land Company's history

A new exhibit opening at Main Street Library fully tells, for the first time, the founding of Newport News by the Old Dominion Land Company.

A new Main Street Library exhibit on the founding of Newport News by the Old Dominion Land Company features this 1919 photo of troops marching down Washington Avenue after returning home from war.

“There is no better place in the country for a city,” said Collis P. Huntington in 1837 when he first visited the area of present-day Newport News as a peddler selling watches. Huntington then went on to make his vision of building a city here become reality.

Huntington began buying up farmland of the southern Virginia Peninsula during the 1870s, and in 1880, he created the Old Dominion Land Company. Within 20 years, the company built roads and communities, and created one of the world’s great maritime cities.

“I find it most impressive it has only been about 130 years since the Land Company bought the land, built the shipyard and coal piers, connected the city to the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway and built a city,” said Judy Condra, coordinator for a new exhibit on the city’s founding at Main Street Library. “A lot was accomplished in a very short amount of time. The Land Company had a vision when they came, and they executed it.”

This remarkable story of the founding of Newport News by the Old Dominion Land Company is being told for the first time through the Land Company records that are housed in the Main Street Library’s Virginiana Room.

“With funding from the Library’s Herbert H. Neisser Fund and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, we were able to do the research and build the traveling exhibit, along with an online version connected to the Library System’s website,” said Condra. “This is a great addition to our local history.”

The exhibit contains a range of detailed records from the Land Company including photographs, maps, blueprints, documents, and postcards. It also includes a panel on African-American life in Newport News between 1880 and 1930.

“The Old Dominion Land Company was fair in their donations of land to the community,” said Condra. “In an era of segregation they gave equally to blacks and whites.”

The exhibit opening will be celebrated from 7-8:30 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 26, at Main Street Library in Newport News, with keynote speeches by Dr. Julie Richter, history lecturer at the College of William and Mary, and Dr. Michael Hucles, associate professor of African-American history at Old Dominion University.

“This is an exciting exhibit, because it highlights key events in the history of Newport News and the role that the Old Dominion Land Company played in the city’s development,” said Richter. “In addition, the exhibit will help draw attention to the amazing collection of materials in the Virginiana Room at the Main Street Library. And the online exhibit will allow students and scholars to research the history of Newport News.”

 The exhibit’s opening also includes dramatic readings of letters from the exhibit, a performance of period music by the Peninsula Youth Orchestra and refreshments. Attendees will receive a 12-page keepsake program that includes a history of the Land Company records, historical images of the city and a bibliography.

The opening, as well as the exhibit, are free and open to the public, and no registration is required. Following the opening, the exhibit will be available for viewing at Main Street Library from March 12 to April 9, and at various locations following.

The exhibit also will be available beginning Feb. 26 on the Library System’s website, www.nngov.com/library.

For more information, please contact Main Street Library’s Virginiana Room at 757-591-4858.

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