20+ Museums & Historic Sites to Learn About Virginia’s Black History

The Commonwealth’s history is filled with important, complicated, and often painful stories of notable Black individuals and communities that shaped Virginia as well as the entire United States. Visit a few of these powerful museums and historic sites to learn about Virginia’s nearly 400 years of Black history. 

Central Virginia

Black History Museum & Cultural Center of Virginia, Richmond

This museum explores the history of Black individuals and communities in Virginia and beyond. Located in the Jackson Ward neighborhood, BHMVA also celebrates the historic and cultural contributions of Black Virginias by fostering a sense of unity and pride. 

The Richmond Slave Trail, Richmond

A self-guided walking trail spread throughout the city, the Richmond Slave Trail chronicles the history of Africans who were taken from their homes and forcibly brought to Virginia to be sold. This historic trail includes notable locations like Lumpkin's Jail and First African Baptist Church. 

Maggie Walker National Historic Site, Richmond

Tour the former home of famous Richmonder Maggie Walker, the first known woman to own a bank in the United States. The site allows visits to explore Walker's entrepreneurial legacy as well as her private life.

Virginia Civil Rights Memorial, Richmond

Outside of the Virginia State Capitol Building is the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial, a bronze and marble sculpture of Barbara Johns and other students who led a strike to protest their racially segregated school. Their protest led all the way to the Supreme Court and the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case, which found that "separate but equal" education policies were unconstitutional.

James Madison's Montpelier, Montpelier Station

Grapple with the institution of slavery in America during James Madison’s lifetime and hear the stories of the enslaved people that lived on the grounds of Montpelier told by their living descendants when you tour the site’s special exhibit, "The Mere Distinction of Colour."  

Monticello, Charlottesville

Learn about Sally Hemings’ life and identity as an enslaved woman on Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello estate, including her strength and courage to strive for the freedom of her children from the shackles of slavery, at the groundbreaking exhibition "The Life of Sally Hemings." 

Robert Russa Moton Museum, Farmville

You'll find the Robert Russa Moton Museum in the former R.R. Moton High School of Farmville. As the site of the first non-violent student demonstration in the United States, Moton directly led to the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case, which ruled that segregation of schools based on race was unconstitutional.

The Legacy Museum of African American History, Lynchburg

The Legacy Museum of African American History features exhibits about Central Virginia’s Black history, from the first enslaved people that arrived in 1619 to present-day figures and events that have shaped the Commonwealth and the entire country. 

Southern Virginia

Danville Museum of Fine Arts & History, Danville

See how Danville garnered national attention for its Civil Rights demonstrations at the Danville Museum of Fine Arts & History. The permanent exhibit "The Movement: Danville's Civil Rights" lets visitors explore how the Danville Christian Progressive Association marched, argued, and fought for equal rights. The demonstrations included a 1960 sit-in at a segregated library—now the site of the museum itself. 

FAHI African American History Museum, Martinsville

Exhibits showcase over 100 years of Black history in Martinsville and surrounding Henry County, as well as exhibits on a national level. 

Coastal Virginia

Hampton University, Hampton

Founded in 1868 as an educational institution for newly emancipated Black citizens, Hampton University is the site of six National Historic Landmarks, including the Emancipation Oak, where former enslaved people gathered to hear President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation read for the first time in the area. 

Fort Monroe, Fort Monroe

Nicknamed Freedom’s Fortress, Fort Monroe is a Union-built fort that provided a safe haven for thousands of enslaved people during the Civil War. 

Black Soldiers Memorial, Norfolk

The Black Soldiers Memorial in Norfolk honors the Black American Union soldiers that fought in the Civil War.

Freedom Park, Williamsburg

This 600-acre public park is also home to one of the nation's earliest free Black settlements, founded in 1803. Explore three recreated cabins which include items authentic to the period and stop by the Interpretive Center to see artifacts and learn more history. 

First Baptist Church of Williamsburg, Williamsburg 

This historic church was organized in 1776 as a place for enslaved and free Black people to worship. Take a guided tour to learn how the congregation's secretive gathering in a clearing in the woods grew and changed over the centuries. 

Jamestown Settlement, Williamsburg

Jamestown Settlement, which includes a reenactment village of the original settlement first built by colonists, includes a museum with exhibits and galleries that prominently feature Black history stories of the era. Highlights include films about Nathaniel Bacon and stories of the first recorded West Central African people to arrive in 1619.

American Revolution Museum at Yorktown, Yorktown

Just down the road from the Jamestown Settlement, the American Revolution Museum at Yorktown has several exhibits, films, and programs about the first African people to come to American shores in 1619 and the role of their descendants in the Revolutionary War. Catch "Liberty Fever," a film about five Black Americans who lived during the American Revolution, including the hero Billy Flora who participated in the Battle of Great Bridge in 1775.

Colonial Williamsburg, Williamsburg

With nearly 60% of Black Americans living in Chesapeake during the Revolutionary era, Colonial Williamsburg is an important location when it comes to Black history. Learn about the enslaved people that worked the plantations and farms in the region when you visit the Slave Quarter at Carter's Grove in Colonial Williamsburg. 

Chesapeake Bay

Stratford Hall, Stratford

The Stratford Hall exhibit "Stratford at the Crossroads: Atlantic Cultures & Creation of America" focuses on material culture, colonization, colonial women, and historic preservation efforts at Stratford Hall. The exhibition contains 18th-century maps, archaeological artifacts found on the property, West African objects that survived the journey across the Atlantic, and much more.

Look into the audio tour, "The Crossroads: African and African American Life at Stratford," for the history and cultures of the enslaved Africans and African Americans who lived and labored at Stratford from 1738 to 1865. 

Northern Virginia

Alexandria Black History Museum, Alexandria

This Northern Virginia Black history museum documents the important contributions of Black Americans living in the region from 1749 to the present day. 

Freedom House Museum, Alexandria

Located in the former headquarters of the largest domestic slave trading company in the United States, the Freedom House Museum shares the painful stories of thousands of men, women, and children who passed through the site on their way to lives of hard labor and bondage on the large plantations of the Deep South.

Alexandria Library, Alexandria

Take in the site of one of the earliest civil rights sit-ins at the former Barrett Branch of the Alexandria Library. On August 21, 1939, Black attorney Samuel Tucker, a native Alexandrian, organized a group of five fellow Black men to visit the all-white branch and apply for library cards. They were denied and arrested for civil disobedience after sitting down to read. 

Tinner Hill Monument, Falls Church

Erected by the Tinner Hill Heritage Foundation in 1999, this fifteen-foot pink granite Roman archway honors the men and women of the historic Tinner Hill neighborhood, founders of the Falls Church  chapter of the NAACP and the organization’s first rural chapter in the United States.

Right the Record Walking Tour, Culpeper

Take a self-guided walking tour through Culpeper's Black history, brought to life by historian Zann Nelson and the African American Heritage Alliance. The tour includes six spots concentrated on East Davis Street, including the office of the town's first African American doctor and the Jennings Lunch and Pool Room, where many Black community members gathered during the Jim Crowe Era. 

George Washington’s Mount Vernon, Mount Vernon

Covering the lives of nineteen enslaved individuals that lived at Mount Vernon, the "Lives Bound Together" exhibit sheds light on Washington’s views toward slavery that led to him enslaving people, but also adding a provision to eventually free them in his will.

Fredericksburg Civil Rights Trail, Fredericksburg

Trace the path of history on the Fredericksburg Civil Rights Trail, which includes more than 20 stops to learn about the places and people that played a part of the Civil Rights Movement. The trail is split in two parts—a 2.6-mile walking tour through Fredericksburg’s historic downtown district and a 1.9-mile driving tour that includes stop on the University of Mary Washington campus, Shiloh Cemetery, and the Dorothy Hart Community Center. 

Shenandoah Valley

Josephine City Historic District, Berryville

Learn about the history of Black communities in Clarke County with a visit to this historic district. Stop by the Josephine School Community Museum, open Sunday afternoons and by appointment. The original school building dates back to 1882 and was renovated and reopened as a museum in 2003. 

Virginia Mountains

Booker T. Washington National Monument, Hardy

Honoring the birthplace of Booker T. Washington, America’s most prominent Black educator, orator, and statesman of the late 1800s-1900s, the Booker T. Washington National Monument includes a Visitor’s Center with exhibits on Washington’s life and legacy, as well as a living history farm where visitors can learn about farm life in Civil War Virginia.

Harrison Museum of African American Culture, Roanoke

Housed in Roanoke's Center of the Square, the Harrison Museum is a cultural and educational institution that preserves and interprets Black American history, specifically the history of the Roanoke Valley and the surrounding areas. 

Southwest Virginia

St. Luke and Odd Fellows Hall, Blacksburg

Built in 1905, St. Luke and Odd Fellows Hall is the only building remaining from New Town, a historic African American community in Blacksburg that thrived until the late 1960s. As one of the only places Black people were allowed to congregate outside of local churches, St. Luke and Odd Fellows Hall was the centerpiece of social gatherings, including dinners, dances, fashion shows, bingo parties, mock weddings, Easter egg hunts, and ball games. Now a museum, the lodge highlights the significant contributions of African Americans to the town of Blacksburg through an exhibit titled “From Civil War to Civil Rights.”

Appalachian African American Cultural Center, Pennington Gap

The Appalachian African American Cultural Center gives a rare glimpse at Appalachian Black history, featuring exhibits on the limits of rural education and cultural aspects of life for Black Americans raised in Southwest Virginia over the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries. 

Learn more about these notable Black history destinations from historian Lauranett Lee and extend your journey with even more Black History sites around the Commonwealth.