Virginia, state of the south-central United States. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean (E), North Carolina and Tennessee (S), Kentucky and West Virginia (W), and Maryland and the District of Columbia (N and NE).

Facts and Figures

Area, 40,817 sq mi (105,716 sq km). Pop. (2000) 7,078,515, a 14.4% increase since the 1990 census. Capital, Richmond. Largest city, Virginia Beach. Statehood, June 25, 1788 (10th of the original 13 states to ratify the Constitution). Highest pt., Mt. Rogers, 5,729 ft (1,747 m); lowest pt., sea level. Nickname, Old Dominion. Motto, Sic Semper Tyrannis [Thus Always to Tyrants]. State bird, cardinal. State flower, dogwood. State tree, dogwood. Abbr., Va.; VA

Geography

The most northerly of the Southern states, Virginia is roughly triangular in shape. The small section of the state that, along with Maryland and Delaware, occupies the Delmarva peninsula between Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean is separated from the main part of Virginia and is called the Eastern Shore. The coastal plain or tidewater region of E Virginia, generally flat and partly swampy, is cut by four great tidal rivers—the Potomac (forming most of the border with Maryland and beyond which also lies Washington, D.C.), the Rappahannock, the York, and the James—all of which empty into Chesapeake Bay. In the tidewater region stretch vast forests of pine and hardwood, highlighted in early spring by flowering redbud and dogwood.

In the west the tidewater region rises to c.300 ft. (90 m) at the fall line (passing through Richmond) and gives way to the Piedmont—rolling, generally fertile country that broadens gradually as it extends south to the North Carolina line. Rising abruptly in the western Piedmont is the Blue Ridge range, carpeted with bluegrass and ablaze in spring with rhododendron and mountain laurel; the Blue Ridge rises to the state's highest peak, Mt. Rogers (5,720 ft/1,743 m). Between the Blue Ridge and the Allegheny Plateau, both part of the Appalachian range, lies the valley and ridge province. One of the most prominent of these valleys is the Valley of Virginia; another is the rich and historic Shenandoah Valley.

Virginia's shores, mountains, mineral springs, natural wonders, and numerous historic sites draw millions of visitors annually. Crowning the hilltops and river bluffs from the Chesapeake region west to the Blue Ridge and adding to the grace and elegance of the Virginia landscape are the classic Greek revival homes and public buildings with their stately porticoes. Major tourist attractions include Shenandoah National Park; Colonial Williamsburg; and Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial. Other historic points of interest include Appomattox Court House National Historical Park; Manassas and Richmond national battlefield parks; Booker T. Washington and George Washington Birthplace national monuments; Colonial National Historical Park and Jamestown National Historic Site, both on Jamestown Island; and several national cemeteries and battlefields (see National Parks and Monuments, table).

Richmond is the capital, and Virginia Beach the largest city; other large cities are Norfolk; Newport News; Chesapeake; Hampton; Portsmouth; and Alexandria and Arlington (officially a county), both suburbs of Washington, D.C.

Economy

Virginia has an economy that is highly diversified. Agriculture, once its mainstay, now follows other sectors in employment and income generation. Tobacco, Virginia's traditional staple, is still the leading crop, and grains, corn, soybeans, peanuts, sweet potatoes, cotton, and apples (especially in the Shenandoah Valley) are all important. Wine production is also important; but the major sources of agricultural income are now poultry, dairy goods, and cattle, raised especially in the Valley of Virginia. The coastal fisheries are large, bringing in especially shellfish—largely oysters and crabs.

Coal is Virginia's chief mineral; stone, cement, sand, and gravel are also important. Roanoke is a center for the rail transport equipment industry, and a high proportion of the nation's shipyards are concentrated at Hampton Roads, especially in Newport News. Norfolk is a major U.S. naval base, and Portsmouth is a U.S. naval shipyard; Hampton is a center for aeronautical research. N Virginia has become the home of one of the largest concentrations of computer communications firms in the U.S. Other leading industries include tourism and the manufacture of chemicals, electrical equipment, and food, textile, and paper products. Tens of thousands of Virginians work in government, especially in the District of Columbia or in nearby "Beltway" suburbs like Reston and Langley.

Government, Politics, and Higher Education

Virginia is officially styled a commonwealth. The Virginia constitution was revised extensively in the late 1960s. The legislature (called the general assembly) consists of a house of delegates of 100 members and a senate with 40 members. The governor serves a four-year term and is ineligible for reelection. Mark R. Warner, a Democrat, was elected in 2001; he succeeded James S. Gilmore 3d, a Republican. Warner's lieutenant governor, Democrat Timothy M. Kaine, was elected governor in 2005; Republicans regained the governorship in 2009 when Robert F. McDonnell was elected. Virginia sends 11 representatives and 2 senators to the U.S. Congress and has 13 electoral votes. Long a Democratic stronghold, the commonwealth now has highly competitive two-party politics.

Among Virginia's many institutions of higher learning are the College of William and Mary in Virginia, mainly at Williamsburg; George Mason Univ., at Fairfax; Hampton Univ. (formerly Hampton Institute), at Hampton; Mary Washington College, at Fredericksburg; Randolph College, at Lynchburg; Randolph-Macon College, at Ashland; Sweet Briar College, at Sweet Briar; the Univ. of Virginia, mainly at Charlottesville; Virginia Commonwealth Univ., at Richmond; Virginia Military Institute and Washington and Lee Univ., at Lexington; Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State Univ., at Blacksburg; and Virginia State College, at Petersburg.

History

Early Settlements of the Virginia Company

Virginia (named for Elizabeth I, the Virgin Queen) at first included in its lands the whole vast area of North America not held by the Spanish or French. The colony on Roanoke Island, organized by Sir Walter Raleigh, failed, but the English soon made another attempt slightly farther north. In 1606 James I granted a charter to the London Company (better known later as the Virginia Company), a group of merchants lured by the thought of easy profits in mining and trade. The company sent three ships and 144 men under captains Christopher Newport, Bartholomew Gosnold, and John Ratcliffe to establish a base, and the tiny force entered Chesapeake Bay in Apr., 1607. On a peninsula in the James River they founded (May 13, 1607) the first permanent English settlement in America, which they called Jamestown. It soon became clear that the company's original plans were unrealistic, and the Jamestown settlers began a long and unexpected struggle to live off the land.

By 1608, despite the firm and resourceful leadership of John Smith, hunger and disease had reduced their numbers to 38. The company responded by sending supplies and men as well as new leadership in the person of Sir Thomas Gates, who was to take charge as deputy governor under the authority of a new charter (1609). Gates arrived in 1610 to find that only a handful of settlers had survived the terrible winter (the "starving time") of 1609-10. He decided to take them back to England, but as they were about to abandon the colony in June, 1610, his superior, Governor Thomas West, Baron De la Warr, ordered them to reoccupy Jamestown. Although sickness and starvation continued to take a heavy toll, the settlement at last began to make headway under the harsh regimes of Sir Thomas Dale, De la Warr's successor in 1611, and later under that of Sir Samuel Argall.

Tobacco, first cultivated by John Rolfe in 1612, gave the company new hope of a profitable return on its investment. To encourage settlement and improve agricultural productivity it granted colonists (still technically employees and shareholders) the right to own private gardens, then, at the urging of Sir Edwin Sandys, promised to give 100 acres (40 hectares) of its land to purchasers of stock and 50 acres (20 hectares) to settlers who brought over other settlers at his own expense (the "head-right" system). The company also set up smaller joint-stock companies to settle vast tracts known as "colonies" or "hundreds." In 1619, at the instruction of the company, Governor George Yeardley provided additional incentives to settlers by forming a house of burgesses—the first representative assembly in the New World—and in 1620 by beginning to send women to the colony.

Although these various expedients did succeed in attracting new settlers and strengthening the colony, the company itself failed to prosper. Rolfe's marriage (1614) to Pocahontas, daughter of chief Powhatan, secured good relations with the Native Americans for a time, but in 1622 Powhatan's son Opechancanough led the Powhatan Confederacy in a surprise attack on the colony, killing 350 settlers (about one third of the total community). English retaliation effectively ended Native American resistance, except for a final uprising of the Confederacy in 1644. However, the 1622 attack had delivered a fatal blow to the company, and in 1624, beset by internal dissension, it surrendered its charter to the crown.

A Royal Colony

After almost two decades as a private enterprise, Virginia became a royal colony, the first in English history. Partly because the English kings were occupied with affairs at home, the Virginia house of burgesses was able to continue its functions and won formal recognition in the late 1630s. Thus representative government under royal domain was assured. By 1641, when Sir William Berkeley became governor, the colony was well established and extended on both sides of the James up to its falls.

Three fourths of the European settlers (about 7,500 in 1641) had come as indentured servants or apprentices, but many of them became freemen and small farmers. In 1641 there were also about 250 Africans (the first had arrived in 1619 on a Dutch ship), most of whom were indentured servants rather than slaves. The freeholders, together with the merchant class (from which were descended most of the "first families of Virginia"), controlled the government. Only white males were enfranchised, and property-owning qualifications for voting continued during and after the colonial period.

Most of the white settlers were Anglicans, and during the civil war in England, many well-to-do Englishmen (mainly Anglicans and supporters of Charles I, if not actually Cavaliers) came to Virginia. The colony was understandably loyal to the crown until 1652, when an expedition sent by Oliver Cromwell forced it to adhere to the Puritan Commonwealth. With the Commonwealth busy at home, Virginia was practically independent until 1660, engaging in free trade with foreigners, especially the Dutch, and enjoying the profits of the expanding tobacco and fur trade. This prosperous era came to an end with the Restoration in 1660.

The Navigation Acts forced the tobacco trade to use only English ships and English ports, which were at first insufficient to handle it; tobacco piled up in Virginia and in England, and prices plummeted. The wealthy planters weathered this depression, but the small farmers faced ruin. Serious discontent spread and was aggravated by Governor Berkeley's high-handed policies, by his favoritism toward the wealthy tidewater planters, and by his refusal to sanction a campaign against the Native Americans who had been attacking frontier settlements. These grievances brought the eruption of Bacon's Rebellion in 1676. The unfortunate death of Nathaniel Bacon left the yeomen leaderless, and they were put down so ruthlessly that Berkeley was recalled to England.

Tidewater Plantations and Westward Migration

Expansion of the plantation system was made possible only with the use of slave labor (first recognized in law in 1662), and tens of thousands of Africans were being imported every year by the end of the century. Small, independent cultivators, unable to compete with the plantation-slave system, formed the nucleus of a poor white class that drifted southward or pioneered to the west. Also contributing to westward settlement were the French Huguenots, who came to Virginia by the end of the 17th cent. and began to settle the Piedmont.

Westward movement was stimulated under Gov. Alexander Spotswood, who himself discovered (1716) the Swift Run Gap in the Blue Ridge Mts., leading into the Shenandoah valley. Spotswood also imported (1714-17) Germans to work his iron furnaces in the Piedmont area, and numerous others followed their countrymen. They helped settle the Shenandoah valley (beginning c.1730) as did many newcomers from Pennsylvania—German Lutherans, English Quakers, Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, and a lesser number of Welsh Baptists.

Soil exhaustion from continuous tobacco cultivation hastened the westward march, as did the settlement activities of land speculators like Spotswood and William Byrd (d. 1744). Many of these speculators were indebted eastern planters attempting to salvage their fortunes. The Ohio Company grant (1749) furthered exploration beyond the Allegheny Mts. but brought conflict with the French.

The activities and interests of the new frontier settlements contrasted sharply with the plantation life of the tidewater region, where the lavish material life of the planter aristocracy was complemented by high cultural accomplishments and by the spread of the ideas of the Enlightenment. The last of the French and Indian Wars, in which Virginians—notably Col. George Washington—were prominent, ended the French obstacle to westward migration. After the war many indebted planters were disturbed by England's own limitations on westward settlement.

The American Revolution

Along with Massachusetts, Virginia was a leader in the movement that culminated in the American Revolution although, despite the burning oratory of Patrick Henry and the enlightened political writings of Thomas Jefferson and other brilliant native spokesmen, Virginia was never as politically discontent or radical as Massachusetts. In 1773 the burgesses at Williamsburg (the capital since 1699), led by Richard Henry Lee, formed an intercolonial committee of correspondence. The Virginia leaders proposed (May, 1774) a congress of all the colonies, delegates were chosen at the First Virginia Convention (Aug.), and in September Virginia's Peyton Randolph was elected president of the First Continental Congress. The next year, in June, George Washington was made commander in chief of the Continental Army.

After the patriots forced the royal governor, John Murray, earl of Dunmore, to flee, the Fifth Virginia Convention (May 6-June 29, 1776) declared the colony's independence, instructed the Virginia delegates to the Continental Congress to propose general colonial independence (resulting in the Declaration of Independence written by Thomas Jefferson), and adopted a declaration of rights and the first constitution of a free American state, both drawn up by George Mason. Patrick Henry was elected the first governor.

Although the British had burned Norfolk in Jan., 1776, they did not invade the state in full force until 1779, when they took Portsmouth and Suffolk. Continentals under Lafayette came to Virginia in 1780, and the British cause was lost as American land forces and a French fleet combined to bring about Cornwallis's surrender (Oct. 19, 1781) in the Yorktown campaign. Meanwhile, George Rogers Clark and his Virginians had wrested (1779) the Northwest Territory from the British, and in 1784 Virginia yielded its claim to this area to the federal government.

Virginia's Role in the New Nation

During the Revolution a degree of religious freedom had been instituted in Virginia under the lead of Jefferson. Other reforms had removed entail and primogeniture from land tenure, liberalized the legal code, and abolished further importation of slaves. A liberal law for formal emancipation of slaves was passed in 1782 and remained in force for more than 20 years. In 1786 a statute for religious freedom, championed by James Madison, completed the disestablishment of the Anglican Church and established complete religious equality for all Virginians.

In replacing the unsatisfactory Articles of Confederation with the Constitution of the United States, Virginians, especially James Madison, again played leading roles. Other leaders such as Patrick Henry, Edmund Pendleton, and Edmund Randolph at various times opposed the document, but the state ratified it (June 26, 1788) with both tidewater and western support. Later, another Virginian, Chief Justice John Marshall, later gave the document much of its strength. The Old Dominion ceded (1789) a portion of its Potomac lands to the United States for the creation of the District of Columbia. In 1792, Kentucky, a Virginia county since 1776, was admitted to the Union as a separate state. After Madison and Jefferson raised an opposition to the financial program of Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, Virginia supported the emerging Democratic-Republican party's struggle against the Federalists and became a hotbed of states' rights sentiment (see Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions).

Of the first 12 Presidents of the United States, seven were Virginians—Washington, Jefferson, Madison, James Monroe (these four comprising the "Virginia Dynasty"), William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, and Zachary Taylor. Later, in the 20th cent., the name of Woodrow Wilson was to further lengthen the generally distinguished list of Virginian presidents.

The native sons who led the country during the 1800s sometimes expanded national power and national development to an extent that many states' rights Virginians deemed unconstitutional. However, Virginia itself, stimulated by western complaints, embarked on a vigorous policy of internal improvements in the second and third decades of the 19th cent. The tidewater majority made few concessions to western demands for male suffrage and other reforms in the constitution of 1830. Economically, however, the whole state benefited from transportation improvements, from the growth of scientific agriculture and the spread of wheat cultivation, and from the growth of such industries as tobacco processing and iron manufacture.

Slavery, Insurrection, and Civil War

As the cotton economy grew in the newer Southern states the tidewater became a breeding ground for the slaves they needed. Elsewhere in the state, especially in the west, antislavery sentiment was strong in the early 19th cent., and following the slave insurrection (1831) led by Nat Turner the house of delegates voted down a bill to abolish slavery by the narrow margin of seven votes. The insurrection did result in harsher laws and more conservative policies regarding African Americans. The constitution of 1851, granted suffrage to "every white male citizen," and thus effected reapportionment of representation.

For the most part Virginians labored to avert conflict between North and South. But "fire-eaters" such as Edmund Ruffin and abolitionists such as John Brown of Harpers Ferry fame, shaped the course that led to the Civil War. Secession came (Apr. 17, 1861) only after all attempts to keep peace had failed. Virginia joined the Confederacy, and Richmond became the Confederate capital. Robert E. Lee entered the military service of the South's new government, but not a few Virginians such as Winfield Scott, George H. Thomas, and David G. Farragut remained loyal to the Union. Most Virginians who lived west of the Appalachians also opposed secession, and on June 20, 1863, this section was admitted to the Union as the new state of West Virginia. As the conflict progressed, Virginia emerged as the chief battleground of the Civil War.

In the beginning the Union armies repeatedly suffered setbacks—at the first battle of Bull Run (July 21, 1861), in the Seven Days battles of the Peninsular campaign (April-July, 1862) after the Monitor and Merrimack had clashed in Hampton Roads, and in lesser but related campaigns such as the triumph of Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson in the Shenandoah valley. The second battle of Bull Run (Aug., 1862) was a smashing victory for Lee, but in the Antietam campaign (Sept., 1862) he fared no better than Union Gen. George B. McClellan in invading enemy country. However, in the battles of Fredericksburg (Dec. 13, 1862) and Chancellorsville (May 2-4, 1863), the Federals under Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside and then under Gen. Joseph Hooker were again repulsed.

Thus encouraged, Lee and his lieutenants—James Longstreet, R. S. Ewell, A. P. Hill, and J. E. B. Stuart—undertook another invasion of the North but failed against George G. Meade in the Gettysburg campaign (June-July, 1863). That campaign marked the beginning of the end for the Confederacy, although it took considerable bloody pounding by Gen. U. S. Grant in the Wilderness campaign (May-June, 1864) and the siege of Petersburg (1864-65) before Lee surrendered what remained of his Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Courthouse (see under Appomattox) on Apr. 9, 1865. President Jefferson Davis had already fled Richmond, and the Confederacy soon collapsed.

Postwar Political Reform and a New Economy

The war left its marks on the land and the people. The Shenandoah Valley was particularly desolate after the campaigns of Confederate Gen. Jubal A. Early and Union Gen. Philip H. Sheridan in 1864. But poverty-stricken as it was after the war, the state, under Gov. Francis H. Pierpont, escaped the worst aspects of Reconstruction. Radical Republicans were but briefly in power. On the recommendation (1869) of President Ulysses S. Grant, Congress allowed Virginia to vote without coercion, and the state passed the essential clauses of a constitution that the Radicals had drafted (1868), providing for free public schools and heavy taxes on land. More importantly, Virginia was allowed to elect to office its own moderate party, the "white Republicans," led by Gen. William Mahone. Radical sway was ended. In 1870, after the Virginia assembly had ratified the 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution, the state was readmitted to the Union.

The abolition of slavery and the hard agricultural times of postwar decades ended the plantation system in Virginia and brought some increase in farm tenancy, but the economy benefited from diversification as fruit farming and the tobacco industry became important. To offset declines in demand for dark Virginia tobacco, the bright-leaf variety was increasingly grown.

Politics and Industry in the Early Twentieth Century

In 1902 a new state constitution demanded rigorous literacy tests for voters, thus completing the long process of reducing the black electorate. During the years preceding World War I, Virginia's prosperity grew as dairy farming in particular gained importance. During the war agriculture boomed, as did industry. Especially prosperous were the important shipbuilding works at Hampton Roads.

In the mid-1920s, Harry Flood Byrd assumed direction of the state's powerful Democratic organization, formerly headed by U.S. Senator Thomas S. Martin and Methodist Episcopal Bishop James Cannon, Jr. Byrd, governor from 1926 to 1930 and U.S. Senator from 1933 until 1965, became the most influential figure in the state. As chief executive he initiated a sound reorganization of the state government, brought about the passage of the first antilynching law adopted by any state, and improved the highway system. However, the organization's chief boast was that the state was entirely free of debt due to a rigid "pay-as-you-go" policy. Liberals criticized this financial policy for scrimping on public education and welfare.

In the Great Depression of the 1930s Virginia fared better than many states. Its industries had not been overexpanded, and, more important, the state's economy was built around consumer goods—foods, textiles, and tobacco—that remained in relatively high demand. Farmers benefited from the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, but conservative Virginians resisted some of the economic policies of the New Deal. In World War II Virginia was the scene of much military training, and the shipyards at Hampton Roads and other industries again aided the war effort. In the prosperous postwar period the conservative Byrd organization maintained its power.

Desegregation and Growth

After the 1954 Supreme Court decision on public school integration, attempts at desegregating Virginia's schools proceeded slowly. After Virginia courts and federal courts ruled illegal the order by Gov. J. Lindsay Almond, Jr., to close public schools in nine counties, a lame compromise of "local option" was adopted. With the exception of Prince Edward County, where schools remained closed from 1959 until 1964, all parts of Virginia had accepted at least token integration by the mid-1960s. In 1989, L. Douglas Wilder, a Democrat, became the first African American elected governor in Virginia.

Virginia has benefited in recent decades from increased federal spending. In the 1980s the Hampton Roads area saw a naval shipbuilding boom. The greatest growth, however, has come in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., where expanded federal offices and hundreds of quasi-official and private organizations engaged in lobbying, communications, and other businesses that owe their existence to proximity to the seat of the government have in turn spawned trade and service hubs like Dale City and Tysons Corner.

Virginia, city (1990 pop. 9,410), St. Louis co., NE Minn., on the Mesabi range; inc. 1892. In addition to its iron mines—both open-pit and underground—the city has foundries, lumbering, and food-processing and manufacturing plants. Dairy cattle and poultry are raised and oats and alfalfa are grown. Tourism is economically important, and many recreational and ski areas are nearby. The Minnesota Museum of Mining is there.

Virginia, Confederate name for the ironclad Merrimack. See Monitor and Merrimack.

Virginia, in Roman legend, daughter of the centurion Virginius. Her father stabbed her to save her from the lust of Appius Claudius Crassus, decemvir. This precipitated the fall of the decemvirs. The story occurs often in literature.

Virginia, University of, mainly at Charlottesville; state supported; coeducational; chartered 1819, opened 1825 with Thomas Jefferson as its rector. Jefferson also planned the organization and curriculum and designed its first buildings. A leading Southern university, it was the first U.S. university to use the elective system. The university is known for its law school and for its library, which contains collections in American literature and international law. It also operates a branch college at Wise. Its colonnaded buildings and rectangular "Lawn" are part of the spacious campus. Mary Washington College was consolidated with the Univ. of Virginia from 1944 to 1972.

Dare, Virginia, b. 1587, first white child of English parents to be born in America. She was the daughter of Ananias and Elenor Dare, members of Sir Walter Raleigh's ill-fated colony that settled Roanoke Island on the North Carolina coast. Since no trace remained of the colony when the relief expedition reached Roanoke in 1591, the child's fate is not known.

State (pop., 2000: 1,808,344), east-central U.S. It covers an area of 24,232 sq mi (62,760 sq km); its capital is Charleston. West Virginia is bordered by Pennsylvania to the north, Maryland and Virginia to the east, Kentucky to the southwest, and Ohio to the northwest. The Ohio River forms a large section of the upper western boundary, while the Potomac River forms a section of the northern boundary. The Great Kanawha, Little Kanawha, Monongahela, and Shenandoah rivers cross the state. West Virginia is crossed by the Appalachian Mountains and is generally rugged land. The highest elevation is Spruce Knob (4,861 ft [1,482 m]). Long occupied by Indian hunters, it was home to the Adena, or Mound Builders, who left archaeological traces. They were succeeded by the Iroquois and the Cherokee. The first permanent white settlement was in the 1730s. The English controlled the region during the 1750s and 1760s. Though eastern Virginia was rapidly settled, the western area's rugged terrain restricted settlement there. After the American Revolution, largely nonslaving settlers moved west; they grew dissatisfied with the Virginia government. With the outbreak of the American Civil War, residents from western Virginia voted against the ordinance of secession in 1861. In 1863 West Virginia was admitted to the Union as the 35th state. Its industrial emergence, encouraged by railroad expansion, began in the 1870s when its natural resources, including coal and gas, contributed to the growth of the U.S. In the 20th century, recreation and tourism became an increasingly important part of the state's economy.

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U.S. public university founded in Charlottesville by Thomas Jefferson. It was chartered in 1819 and opened in 1825. Jefferson designed its beautiful campus and buildings, planned the curriculum, and selected the faculty. By the time of the Civil War, the university was second only to Harvard in size of faculty and student body. It first admitted women in 1970. In addition to its college of arts and sciences, it has schools of architecture, education, engineering and applied sciences, and nursing, as well as a business school, a graduate school, and schools of law and medicine.

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(1788–89) Measures passed by the legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky as a protest against the Alien and Sedition Acts. Drafted by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson (though their role went unknown for 25 years), the resolutions protested limitations on civil liberties and declared the right of states to decide on the constitutionality of federal legislation. Though their authors applied the resolutions to the specific issues of the day, Southern states later used the measures to support the theories of nullification and secession.

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(born Aug. 18, 1587, Roanoke Island, Va.) First child born to English parents in America. Her parents were among the 120 settlers who landed at Roanoke Island, Va., in 1587. Her grandfather, John White, was the colony's governor; he left to collect supplies in England nine days after her birth. A relief expedition that finally reached the colony in 1590 found only the word croatoan carved on a post; the infant Virginia had vanished along with all the other colonists.

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English trading company chartered by James I in 1606 to colonize the eastern coast of North America. Its shareholders were residents of London. Approximately 105 colonists in three ships reached Virginia in 1607 and founded Jamestown. The company expanded its territory with new charters (1609, 1612) and authorized a two-house legislature (1619), including a House of Burgesses. The colony survived many hardships, but the company was divided by internecine disputes and was dissolved in 1624, whereupon Virginia became a royal colony. Seealso Plymouth Company.

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City (pop., 2000: 425,257), southeastern Virginia. It is situated on the Atlantic Ocean and Chesapeake Bay. Founded in 1887, it developed as a resort after a railroad was built linking it with Norfolk. After World War I it became an important base in the national coastal defense system. In 1963 it and the former Princess Anne county merged to become the City of Virginia Beach. Its economy is based on tourism and military installations. Cape Henry Memorial is in the city and the Cape Henry Lighthouse (1791) is nearby.

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State (pop., 2000: 7,078,515), southeastern U.S. It is bordered by Maryland to the northeast, North Carolina and Tennessee to the south, Kentucky to the west, West Virginia to the northwest, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Located on the central Atlantic seaboard, it covers an area of 40,600 sq mi (105,154 sq km); its capital is Richmond. The coastal plain, also known as the Tidewater, lies in the east; the Piedmont province, a region of rolling hills, is in the middle of the state; and the Blue Ridge and Appalachian mountains lie to the west. The Potomac, Shenandoah, James, and Roanoke rivers flow through the state. Virginia was inhabited by American Indians when England's first American colony was founded there in 1607 at Jamestown. Virginia's citizens were among the leaders of the American Revolution, and the state later contributed four of the country's first five presidents. In 1788 it became the 10th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution. Slavery was an important part of Virginia's economy; Nat Turner's slave insurrection occurred there in 1831. In 1861, soon after the start of the American Civil War, Virginia seceded from the Union. Richmond became the capital of the Confederacy (see Confederate States of America), and Virginia was the chief battleground throughout the war. The western part of the state refused to secede; it split off to become West Virginia in 1863. Virginia was readmitted to the Union in 1870. Strife over state debt took over political life for the next decades, but after World War I the state's prosperity increased. World War II brought thousands to Virginia's military camps and caused the Norfolk area to experience rapid growth. The federal government is the state's largest employer, while manufacturing is the second largest. Hampton Roads is one of the nation's leading ports. Tourism is important; Virginia's many historical sites include Colonial Williamsburg, George Washington's Mount Vernon, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello, Civil War battlefields, and Gen. Robert E. Lee's house, located within the grounds of what is now Arlington National Cemetery. The College of William and Mary (founded 1693) is the country's second oldest college; the University of Virginia was largely the creation of Thomas Jefferson.

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U.S. public university founded in Charlottesville by Thomas Jefferson. It was chartered in 1819 and opened in 1825. Jefferson designed its beautiful campus and buildings, planned the curriculum, and selected the faculty. By the time of the Civil War, the university was second only to Harvard in size of faculty and student body. It first admitted women in 1970. In addition to its college of arts and sciences, it has schools of architecture, education, engineering and applied sciences, and nursing, as well as a business school, a graduate school, and schools of law and medicine.

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(born Dec. 27, 1915, Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.—died Feb. 16, 2001, Tucson, Ariz.) (born Feb. 11, 1925, Springfield, Missouri, U.S.) U.S. human-sexuality research team. Together (as physician and psychologist, respectively), they founded and codirected the Masters & Johnson Institute in St. Louis. They observed couples having sex under laboratory conditions, using biochemical equipment to record sexual stimulations and reactions. Their book Human Sexual Response (1966) was considered the first comprehensive study of the physiology and anatomy of human sexual activity (see sexual response). They were married in 1971 and continued to collaborate after their divorce in 1993.

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(born Dec. 1, 1913, Weatherford, Texas, U.S.—died Nov. 3, 1990, Rancho Mirage, Calif.) U.S. singer and actress. She co-owned a dancing school in her native Weatherford, Texas, before moving in 1938 to New York City, where she won a small part in the musical Leave It to Me and became famous for her rendition of “My Heart Belongs to Daddy.” She appeared in movies before returning to Broadway to star in One Touch of Venus (1943). Martin originated the role of Nellie Forbush in South Pacific (1949–53) and later starred in Peter Pan (1954, Tony Award; television version, 1955), The Sound of Music (1959, Tony Award), and I Do, I Do (1966).

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(born Dec. 1, 1913, Weatherford, Texas, U.S.—died Nov. 3, 1990, Rancho Mirage, Calif.) U.S. singer and actress. She co-owned a dancing school in her native Weatherford, Texas, before moving in 1938 to New York City, where she won a small part in the musical Leave It to Me and became famous for her rendition of “My Heart Belongs to Daddy.” She appeared in movies before returning to Broadway to star in One Touch of Venus (1943). Martin originated the role of Nellie Forbush in South Pacific (1949–53) and later starred in Peter Pan (1954, Tony Award; television version, 1955), The Sound of Music (1959, Tony Award), and I Do, I Do (1966).

Learn more about Martin, Mary (Virginia) with a free trial on Britannica.com.

(born Aug. 18, 1587, Roanoke Island, Va.) First child born to English parents in America. Her parents were among the 120 settlers who landed at Roanoke Island, Va., in 1587. Her grandfather, John White, was the colony's governor; he left to collect supplies in England nine days after her birth. A relief expedition that finally reached the colony in 1590 found only the word croatoan carved on a post; the infant Virginia had vanished along with all the other colonists.

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The Commonwealth of Virginia is an American state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. The state is named after Queen Elizabeth I of England, who was known as the 'Virgin Queen' because she never married. The state is also known as the "Old Dominion" and sometimes "Mother of Presidents", because it is the birthplace of eight U.S. presidents. The state is geographically shaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Chesapeake Bay. The capital of the commonwealth is Richmond, Virginia Beach is the most populous city, and Fairfax County is the most populous political subdivision.

The roots of modern Virginia trace back to the founding of the Virginia Colony in 1607 by the Virginia Company of London as the first permanent New World English colony. Slavery played significant roles in Virginia's early economy and politics. Virginia became one of the thirteen colonies in the American Revolution and subsequently joined the Confederacy in the American Civil War. Although traditionally conservative and historically part of the South, modern Virginia is a politically competitive state for both major national parties.

Virginia has an economy with several sectors, including agricultural production, military bases in Hampton Roads, and federal agencies, such as The Pentagon, in Northern Virginia. The Historic Triangle includes the popular heritage tourism destinations of Jamestown, Yorktown and the living museum of Colonial Williamsburg. The growth of the technology sector has made computer chips the state's leading export, with the industry based on the strength of Virginia's public schools and universities. Areas where the state has lagged behind include health care and environmental protection.

Geography

Virginia has an area of making it the thirty-fifth largest state. Virginia is bordered by Maryland and the District of Columbia to the north and east; the Atlantic Ocean to the east; by North Carolina and Tennessee to the south; by Kentucky to the west and by West Virginia to the north and west. Due to a peculiarity of Virginia's original charter, its boundary with Maryland does not extend past the low-water mark of the southern shore of the Potomac River, meaning Maryland and the District of Columbia contain the whole width of the river rather than splitting it between them and Virginia. The southern border is defined as the 36°30' parallel north, though surveyor error has led to historic deviations.

Geology and terrain

The Chesapeake Bay separates most of the contiguous portion of the Commonwealth from the two-county peninsula of Virginia's Eastern Shore. Many of Virginia's rivers flow into the Chesapeake Bay, including the Potomac, Rappahannock, James, and York. Geographically and geologically, Virginia is divided into five regions from east to west: Tidewater, Piedmont, Blue Ridge Mountains, Ridge and Valley, and Appalachian Plateau.

The Tidewater is a coastal plain between the Atlantic coast and the fall line. It includes the Eastern Shore and major estuaries which enter the Chesapeake Bay. The Piedmont are a series of sedimentary and igneous rock-based foothills east of the mountains which were formed in the Mesozoic. The region includes the Southwest Mountains. The Blue Ridge are a physiographic province of the chain of Appalachian Mountains. The mountains are the highest points in the state, including Mount Rogers at . The Ridge and Valley region is west of the mountains, and includes the Great Appalachian Valley. The region is carbonate rock based, and includes Massanutten Mountain. The Appalachian Plateau is a region in the south-west corner of Virginia, below the Allegheny Plateau. In this region rivers flow northwest, with a dendritic drainage system, into the Ohio River basin.

The Virginia seismic zone has not had a history of regular activity. Earthquakes are rarely above 4.5 on the Richter magnitude scale because Virginia is located centrally on the North American Plate. The largest earthquake, at , was in 1897 in Blacksburg. Besides coal, resources such as slate, kyanite, and sand and gravel are mined, with an annual value over $2 billion.

Climate

Most of the state east of the Blue Ridge Mountains, as well as the southern part of the Shenandoah Valley, has a humid subtropical climate. In the mountainous areas west of the Blue Ridge, the climate becomes humid continental. The moderating influence of the ocean from the east, powered by the Gulf Stream, also creates the potential for hurricanes near the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, making the coastal area vulnerable. Although Hurricane Gaston in 2004 inundated Richmond, hurricanes rarely threaten communities far inland.

Thunderstorms are a regular occurrence, and the state averages thirty-five to forty-five days of thunderstorm activity annually. Additionally, the western part of the state experiences more thunderstorms. The state averages eighty-five tornadoes per year, though most are F2 and lower on the Fujita scale. Cold air masses arriving over the mountains, especially in winter, can lead to significant snowfalls in those regions, such as the Blizzard of 1996. The interaction of these elements with the state's topography creates distinct micro-climates in the Shenandoah Valley, the mountainous southwest, and the coastal plains.

In recent years, the expansion of the southern suburbs of Washington into Northern Virginia has created an urban heat island due to the increased energy output of more densely used areas. In the American Lung Association's 2008 report, two counties received failing grades for air quality, with Fairfax County having the worst in the state due to automobile pollution. Coal supplies half of the state's electricity, with another third from two nuclear power plants.

Flora and fauna

Forests cover sixty-five percent of the state. In some mountainous areas of the state, pine predominates and there is also the occasional naturally growing prickly pear cactus. Lower altitudes are more likely to have small but dense stands of moisture-loving hemlocks and mosses in abundance. Other commonly found trees and plants include oak, hickory, chestnut, maple, tulip poplar, mountain laurel, milkweed, daisies, and many species of ferns. Since the early 1990s, Gypsy moth infestations have eroded the dominance of the oak forests.

Mammals include white-tailed deer, black bear, beaver, bobcat, raccoon, skunk, opossum, groundhog, gray fox, and eastern cottontail rabbit. Though unsubstantiated, there have been some reported sightings of mountain lion in areas of the state. Birds include Virginia cardinal, barred owls, Carolina chickadees, Red-tailed Hawks, and wild turkeys. The Peregrine Falcon was reintroduced into Shenandoah National Park in the mid-1990s. Freshwater fish include brook trout, longnose and blacknose dace, and the bluehead chub.. Running brooks with rocky bottoms are often inhabited by a plentiful amount of crayfish. The Chesapeake Bay is home to many species, including blue crabs, clams, oysters, and rockfish, also known as striped bass.

Virginia has many National Park Service units, including one national park, the Shenandoah National Park. Shenandoah was established in 1935 and encompasses the scenic Skyline Drive. Almost forty percent of the park's area (79,579 acres/322 km²) has been designated as Wilderness and is protected as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System. Other parks in Virginia, such as Great Falls Park and Prince William Forest Park, are included in the many areas in the National Park System. Additionally, there are thirty-four Virginia state parks, run by the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation and the Virginia Department of Forestry. The Chesapeake Bay, while not a national park, is protected by both state and federal legislation, and the jointly run Chesapeake Bay Program which conducts restoration on the bay and its watershed. The Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge is protected by both Virginia and North Carolina.

History

Jamestown 2007 marked Virginia's quadricentennial year, celebrating four hundred years since the establishment of the Jamestown Colony. Over the centuries Virginia has been at the front of warfare from the American Revolution and the Civil War to the Cold War and the War on Terrorism. The far-reaching social changes of the mid- to late-20th century were expressed by broad-based celebrations marking contributions of three cultures to the state: Native American, European and African.

Colony

At the time of the English colonization of Virginia, Native American people were living in what now is Virginia. Native American tribes in Virginia included the Cherokee, Chesepian, Chickahominy, Mattaponi, Meherrin, Monacan, Nansemond, Nottoway, Pamunkey, Powhatan, Rappahannock, Saponi and others. The natives are often divided into three groups, based to a large extent upon language differences. The largest group was known as the Algonquian led by Chief Powhatan. In 1607, the native Tidewater population was between 13,000 to 14,000. Powhatan controlled more than thirty tribes and over 150 settlements, speaking Virginia Algonquian. Two other large groups, the Nottoway and Meherrin, spoke dialects of Iroquois, and others in the piedmont used Sioux dialects.

In 1583, Queen Elizabeth I of England granted Sir Walter Raleigh a charter to explore and plant a colony north of Florida. In 1584, Sir Walter Raleigh explored the Atlantic coast of North America. Raleigh, or possibly the Queen herself, named the area "Virginia" after Queen Elizabeth, known as the "Virgin Queen" because she never married. The name eventually applied to the whole coast from South Carolina to Maine, and included Bermuda. The London Virginia Company was incorporated as a joint stock company by the proprietary Charter of 1606, which granted land rights to this area. The Company financed the first permanent English settlement in the New World. Jamestown, named for King James I, was founded on May 13, 1607 by Captains Christopher Newport and John Smith. In 1609 many colonists died during the "starving time" after the loss of the Third Supply's flagship, the Sea Venture.

The House of Burgesses was established in 1619 as the colony's elected governance. During this early period Virginia's population grew with the introduction of settlers and servants into the burgeoning plantation economy. In 1619, African servants were first introduced, with slavery being codified in 1661. After 1618 the headright system led to more indentured servants from Europe. In this system, settlers received land for each servant they transported. Land from the Native Americans was appropriated by force and treaty, including the Treaty of 1677, which made the signatory tribes tributary states. The colonial capital was moved in 1699 to Williamsburg, where the College of William and Mary had been founded in 1693.

The House of Burgesses was temporarily dissolved in 1769 by the Royal governor Lord Botetourt, after Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee led speeches on the distresses of the British taxation without representation. In 1773, Henry and Lee formed a committee of correspondence, and in 1774 Virginia sent delegates to the Continental Congress. On May 15, 1776, the Virginia Convention declared independence from the British Empire. Shortly after, the Virginia Convention adopted the Virginia Declaration of Rights written by George Mason, a document that influenced the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. Then on June 29, 1776, the convention enacted a constitution, drafted by Thomas Jefferson, that formally declared Virginia as an independent commonwealth.

During the American Revolutionary War, the capital was moved to Richmond at the urging of Governor Thomas Jefferson, fearing Williamsburg's location made it vulnerable to British attack. In 1781, the combined action of Continental and French land and naval forces trapped the British on the Yorktown peninsula, where troops under George Washington and French Comte de Rochambeau defeated British General Cornwallis in the Battle of Yorktown. The British surrender on October 19, 1781 so shifted British public opinion that it led to the end of major hostilities and secured the independence of the colonies.

Statehood

Virginians were instrumental in writing the United States Constitution. James Madison drafted the Virginia Plan in 1787 and the Bill of Rights in 1789. Virginia ratified the Constitution on June 25, 1788. The three-fifths compromise ensured that Virginia initially had the largest bloc in the House of Representatives, which with the Virginia dynasty of presidents gave the commonwealth national importance. In 1790, both Virginia and Maryland ceded territory to form the new District of Columbia, though in 1847 the Virginian area was retroceded. Virginia is sometimes called "Mother of States" because of its role in being carved into several mid-western states.

Nat Turner's slave rebellion in 1831 and John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859 showed deep social discontent over the issue of slavery in Virginia and its role in the plantation economy. Besides agriculture, slave labor was also increasingly used in mining, shipbuilding and other industries. By 1860, almost half a million people, roughly thirty-one percent of the total population of Virginia, were enslaved.

Virginia seceded from the Union on April 17, 1861 after the Battle of Fort Sumter. Virginia turned over its military and ratified the Confederate States of America (CSA) constitution in June 1861. The CSA then moved its capitol to Richmond. In 1863 forty-eight counties in the northwest of the state separated from Virginia to form the State of West Virginia. Virginia in the American Civil War saw more battles fought than anywhere else, including the Battles of Bull Run, the Seven Days Battles, the Battle of Chancellorsville, and the concluding Battle of Appomattox Courthouse. After the capture of Richmond, the Confederate capitol was moved to Danville, Virginia. With the work of the Committee of Nine during post-war Reconstruction, Virginia formally rejoined the Union on January 26, 1870, and adopted a constitution which should have provided for Negro suffrage, a system of free public schools, and guarantee civil and political rights.

However during the culmination of the Jim Crow era, legislators rewrote the Constitution of Virginia to include a poll tax and other measures on voter registration that effectively disfranchised African Americans, leading to underfunding for segregated schools and services, and a lack of representation. African Americans still created vibrant communities and made progress. The first black students attended the University of Virginia School of Law in 1950, and Virginia Tech in 1953. Protests in Farmville started by Barbara Rose Johns led to the lawsuit Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County by Richmond natives Spottswood Robinson and Oliver Hill. This case was decided with Brown v. Board of Education. Virginia however declared in 1958 that desegregated schools would not receive state funding, under the policy of "massive resistance" spearheaded by the powerful segregationist Senator Harry F. Byrd. In 1959 Prince Edward County closed their schools rather than integrate them.

The Civil Rights Movement gained many participants in the 1960s and achieved the moral force to gain national legislation for protection of suffrage and civil rights for African Americans. In 1971, state legislators rewrote the constitution, after goals such as legal integration and the repeal of Jim Crow laws had been achieved. In 1989, Douglas Wilder became the first African American elected as governor in the United States.

In 1926, Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin, rector of Williamsburg's Bruton Parish Church, began restoration of colonial era buildings in the historic district with financial backing of John D. Rockefeller Jr. resulting in Colonial Williamsburg. World War II and the Cold War led to massive expansion of government programs in the areas near Washington. The Pentagon in Northern Virginia, was targeted in the September 11, 2001 attacks. In that attack, one hundred and eighty-five people died. Tragedy again struck Virginia in 2007 when thirty-two students were murdered in the Virginia Tech massacre.

Cities and towns

Virginia is divided into independent cities and counties, which function in the same manner. According to the US Census Bureau, independent cities are considered county-equivalent. As of 2006, thirty-nine of the forty-two independent cities in the United States are in Virginia. Incorporated towns are recognized as part of the ninety-five counties in Virginia, but are not independent. There are also hundreds of other unincorporated communities in Virginia. Virginia does not have any further political subdivisions, such as villages or townships.

Virginia has eleven Metropolitan Statistical Areas. Northern Virginia, Hampton Roads, and Richmond-Petersburg are the three most populated metropolitan areas of the state. Richmond is the capital of Virginia, and the its metropolitan area has a population of over people. Virginia Beach is the most populous city in the commonwealth, with Norfolk and Chesapeake second and third, respectively. Norfolk forms the urban core of this metropolitan area, which is home to over people and the world's largest naval base.

Although it is not incorporated as a city, Fairfax County is the most populous locality in Virginia, with over one million residents. Fairfax has a major urban business and shopping center in Tysons Corner, Virginia's largest office market. Neighboring Loudoun County, with the county seat at Leesburg, is the fastest-growing county in the United States. Arlington County, the smallest self-governing county in the United States by land area, is an urban community organized as a county. Roanoke, with a , is the largest Metropolitan Statistical Area in western Virginia. Suffolk, which includes a portion of the Great Dismal Swamp, is the largest city geographically.

Demographics

As of 2006, Virginia had an estimated population which is an increase , or one percent, from the prior year and an increase , or eight percent, since the year 2000. This includes an increase from net migration of into the commonwealth. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of , and migration within the country produced a net increase of . The center of population of Virginia is located in Goochland County.

English was passed as the commonwealth's official language by statutes in 1981 and 1996, and by law in 2006, though the status is not mandated by the Constitution of Virginia. English is the only language spoken by , though it is spoken very well by an additional for a total of 94.3% of the Commonwealth which speaks English. Spanish has the most speakers of other languages, with . Asian and Pacific Islander languages, including Vietnamese and Filipino.

Ethnicity

The five largest reported ancestry groups in Virginia are: African (19.6%), German (11.7%), unspecified American (11.4%), English (11.1%), and Irish or Scotch-Irish (9.8%). Most African-American Virginians are descendants of enslaved Africans who worked its tobacco, cotton, and hemp plantations. These men and women were brought from west central Africa, primarily from Angola and Igbo areas of the Niger Delta region. The twentieth century Great Migration of blacks from the rural South to the North reduced Virginia's black population; however, in the past forty years there has been a reverse migration of blacks returning to Virginia and the rest of the South. The western mountains have many settlements founded by Scotch-Irish immigrants before the Revolution. There are also sizable numbers of people of German descent in the northwestern mountains and Shenandoah Valley. People of English heritage settled throughout the state during the colonial period, and others of British and Irish heritage have migrated there through the decades for work.

Because of more recent immigration in the late 20th century and early 21st century, there are rapidly growing populations of Hispanics, particularly Central Americans, and Asians. As of 2007, 6.6% of Virginians are Hispanic, 5.5% are Asian, and 1.8% are American Indian/Alaska Native/Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander. The Hispanic population of the state tripled from 1990 to 2006, with two-thirds of Hispanics living in Northern Virginia. In contrast to Hispanics nationally, those in Virginia have higher median household incomes and educational attainment than the general United States or Virginia population.

Northern Virginia has the largest Vietnamese population on the East Coast, with slightly more than residents, whose major wave of immigration followed the Vietnam War. Due to their ties to the U.S. Navy, Hampton Roads has a sizable Filipino population, numbering about 45,000. Virginia also continues to be the home to eight federally recognized Native American tribes, with six other tribes recognized by the state.

Religion

Religious affiliation
Christian:		76%		Baptist:	30%
	Protestant:	49%		Methodist:	7%
	Roman Catholic:	14%		Lutheran:	2%
	Other Christian:	13%		Presbyterian:	3%
Judaism:		1%		Episcopal:	3%
Islam:		1%		Pentecostal:	2%
Other religions:		4%		Congregational:	1%
Non-religious:		12%		Other/general:	2%

Virginia is predominantly Protestant; Baptists are the largest single group with thirty percent of the population. Baptist denominational groups in Virginia include the Baptist General Association of Virginia, with about churches, which supports both the Southern Baptist Convention and the moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship; and the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia with over five-hundred affiliated churches, which supports the Southern Baptist Convention. Roman Catholics are the second-largest group, and the group which grew the most between 1990 and 2000.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Arlington includes most of Northern Virginia's Catholic churches, while the Diocese of Richmond covers the rest. The Virginia Synod is responsible for the congregations of the Lutheran Church. The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia, Southern Virginia, and Southwestern Virginia support the various Episcopal churches. In November 2006, fifteen conservative Episcopal churches in the Diocese of Virginia voted to split from the diocese and the larger Anglican Communion church over the issue of sexuality and the ordination of openly gay bishops and clergy. Virginia law allows parishioners to determine their church's affiliation. The resulting property law case is a test for Episcopal churches nationwide, as the diocese claims the church properties of those congregations that want to secede.

Among other religions, adherents of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints constitute 0.75% of the population, while those of Buddhism and Hinduism each comprise one percent. While a small population in terms of the state overall, organized Jewish sites date to 1791. Muslims are a rapidly growing religious group, though have experienced certain prejudices. Megachurches in the state include Thomas Road Baptist Church, McLean Bible Church and Immanuel Bible Church.

Economy

Virginia's economy is well balanced with diverse sources of income, made up of 4.1 million civilian workers. In 2006, Forbes Magazine named Virginia the best state in the nation for business. The Gross Domestic Product of Virginia was $383 billion in 2007. As of 2000, Virginia had the highest number of counties and independent cities, fifteen, in the top one-hundred wealthiest jurisdictions in the United States based upon median income. As of 2007, seven Fortune 500 companies are headquartered in the Richmond area. Virginia has seventeen total Fortune 500 companies, ranking the state tenth nationwide.

Virginia has the highest concentration of technology workers of any state. One-third of Virginia's jobs are in the service sector. Computer chips became the state's highest-grossing export in 2006, surpassing its traditional top exports of coal and tobacco, combined. Northern Virginia, once considered the state's dairy capital, now hosts software, communication technology, and consulting companies. The Dulles Technology Corridor near Dulles International Airport has a high concentration of Internet, communications and software engineering firms. Fairfax and Loudoun counties in Northern Virginia have the highest and second highest median household income, respectively, of all counties in the United States as of 2006.

In Southside Virginia from Hampton Roads to Richmond and to Lee County, the economy is based on military installations, and cattle, tobacco and peanut farming. About twenty percent of Virginian jobs are in agriculture, with , averaging . Tomatoes surpassed soy as the most profitable crop in Virginia in 2006, with peanuts and hay as other agricultural products. Oysters are an important part of the Chesapeake Bay economy, but declining populations due to disease, pollution, and overfishing have diminished catches. Wineries and vineyards in the Northern Neck and along the Blue Ridge Mountains also have begun to generate income and attract tourists.

Many of Northern Virginia's well-educated population work directly for Federal agencies. Many others work for government contractors, including defense and security contractors. Well-known government agencies headquartered in Northern Virginia include the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Defense, as well as the National Science Foundation, the United States Geological Survey and the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The Hampton Roads area has the largest concentration of military bases and facilities of any metropolitan area in the world. The largest of the bases is Naval Station Norfolk. The state is second only to Alaska in per capita defense spending.

Virginia collects personal income tax in five income brackets, ranging from 3.0% to 5.75%. The sales and use tax rate is 5%. The tax rate on food is 2.5%. There is an additional 1% local tax, for a total of a 5% combined sales tax on most Virginia purchases and a combined tax rate of 2.5% on food. Virginia's property tax is set and collected at the local government level and varies throughout the commonwealth. Real estate is taxed at the local level based on one-hundred percent of fair market value. Tangible personal property also is taxed at the local level and is based on a percentage or percentages of original cost.

Culture

Virginia's historic culture was popularized and spread across America and the South by Washington, Jefferson, and Lee, and their homes represent Virginia as the birthplace of America and of the South. Modern Virginia culture has many heritages, and is largely part of the culture of the Southern United States. The Smithsonian Institution divides Virginia into nine cultural regions. The Piedmont region is one of the most famous for its dialect's strong influence on Southern American English. Various accents are also present including the Tidewater accent and the anachronistic Elizabethan of Tangier Island, as well as a more homogenized American English in urban areas with a great deal of transplants.

Besides the general cuisine of the Southern United States, Virginia maintains its own particular traditions. Virginia wine is made in many parts of the state. Smithfield ham, sometimes called Virginia ham, is a type of country ham which is protected by state law, and can only be produced in the town of Smithfield. Virginia furniture and architecture are typical of American colonial architecture. Thomas Jefferson and many of the state's early leaders favored the Neoclassical architecture style, leading to its use for important state buildings. The Pennsylvania Dutch and their style can also be found in parts of the state.

Fine and performing arts

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities works to improve commonwealth's civic, cultural, and intellectual life. The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is a state-funded museum with the largest collection of Fabergé eggs outside of Russia. The Chrysler Museum of Art is home to many pieces, stemming from the Chrysler family collection, including the final sculpture of Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Other museums include the popular Science Museum of Virginia, the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum, the Frontier Culture Museum, and the Mariners' Museum. Besides these sites, many open air museums and battlefields are located in the state, such as Colonial Williamsburg, Richmond National Battlefield, and Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park.

Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts is located in Vienna and is the only national park intended for use as a performing arts center. Wolf Trap hosts the Wolf Trap Opera Company, which produces an opera festival every summer. The Harrison Opera House in Norfolk is home to the official Virginia Opera. The Virginia Symphony Orchestra is based in Hampton Roads. The American Shakespeare Center is located in Staunton, and home to resident and touring theater troupes. Other notable theaters include the Ferguson Center for the Arts, the Barter Theatre, and the Landmark Theater.

Virginia has launched many award-winning traditional music artists as well as internationally successful popular music acts. Ralph Stanley, Patsy Cline, The Statler Brothers and The Carter Family are award winning Bluegrass and Country music musicians from Virginia, and Ella Fitzgerald and Pearl Bailey were both from Newport News. Hip hop and Rhythm and blues acts like Missy Elliott, Timbaland, The Neptunes, Chris Brown, and Clipse hail from the commonwealth. The Neptunes produced 43% of all songs on American radio in 2003. Singer-songwriters from Virginia include Jason Mraz and jam bands like the Pat McGee Band and Dave Matthews Band, who continue their strong charitable connection to Charlottesville, Virginia. Influential stage-rock group GWAR also began at Virginia Commonwealth University. Major performance venues in the state include The Birchmere, Norva Theatre, John Paul Jones Arena, Nissan Pavilion, the Patriot Center, and the Verizon Wireless Virginia Beach Amphitheater.

Festivals

Many counties and localities host county fairs and festivals. The Virginia State Fair is held at the Richmond International Raceway every September. Fairfax County sponsors Celebrate Fairfax! the second weekend after Memorial Day. In Virginia Beach, the end of September brings the Neptune Festival, celebrating the city, the waterfront, and regional artists. The Virginia Lake Festival is held during the third weekend in July in Clarksville.

On the Eastern Shore island of Chincoteague the annual Pony Swim & Auction of feral Chincoteague ponies at the end of July is a unique local tradition expanded into a week-long carnival. The Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival is a six-day festival held annually in Winchester that includes parades and bluegrass concerts. From 2005 to 2007, Richmond was host of the National Folk Festival. The Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival is held on a May weekend in Reston.

Two important film festivals, the Virginia Film Festival and the VCU French Film Festival, are held annually in Charlottesville and Richmond, respectively. Annual fan conventions in the commonwealth include Anime USA, the national anime convention held in Crystal City, Anime Mid-Atlantic held in various cities, Magfest music and gaming festival, and RavenCon science fiction convention in Richmond.

Media

The Hampton Roads area is the forty-second largest media market in the United States as ranked by Nielsen Media Research, and the Richmond-Petersburg area is sixtieth and Roanoke-Lynchburg is sixty-eighth. There are twenty-one television stations in Virginia, representing each major U.S. network, part of forty-two stations which serve Virginia viewers. Over eight-hundred FCC-licensed FM radio stations broadcast in Virginia, with over three-hundred such AM stations. The nationally available Public Broadcasting Service, abbreviated as PBS, is headquartered in Arlington. The locally focused Commonwealth Public Broadcasting Corporation, a non-profit corporation which owns public TV and radio stations, has offices around the state.

Major newspapers in the commonwealth include the Richmond Times-Dispatch, The Virginian-Pilot, based in Norfolk, The Roanoke Times and the Daily Press based in Newport News. The Times-Dispatch has a daily , slightly more than the Pilot , fiftieth and fifty-second in the nation respectively, while the Roanoke Times has about subscribers. Several Washington, D.C. papers are based in Northern Virginia, such as The Washington Examiner and The Politico. The nation's widest circulated paper, USA Today, is headquartered in McLean. The Arlington based Freedom Forum is an organization dedicated to free press and journalistic free speech. Besides traditional forms of media, Virginia is home to telecommunication companies such as Sprint Nextel and XO Communications. The Dulles Technology Corridor contains the pathways which carry over half of all internet traffic.

Education

Public K-12 schools in Virginia are generally operated by the counties and cities, and not by the state. Virginia's educational system consistently ranks in the top ten states on the U.S. Department of Education's National Assessment of Educational Progress, with Virginia students outperforming the average in all subject areas and grade levels tested. The 2008 Quality Counts report ranked Virginia's K-12 education fifth best in the country. All school divisions must adhere to educational standards set forth by the Virginia Department of Education, which maintains an assessment and accreditation regime known as the Standards of Learning to ensure accountability. In 2008, 81.3% of high school students graduated on-time after four years.

A total of 1,232,436 students were enrolled in Virgina public schools in September 2007. There are a total of and regional schools in the commonwealth, including three charter schools, and an additional and special education centers in 134 school divisions. Besides the general public schools in Virginia, there are Governor's Schools and selective magnet schools. Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, a public school which requires an application, is ranked as the best public high school in the nation. The Governor's Schools are a collection of more than forty regional selective magnet high schools and summer programs intended for gifted students. The Virginia Council for Private Education oversees the regulation of private schools.

Individual Virginia public high schools are often well rated, with Langley High School ranked thirty-seventh best public high school in the nation according to U.S. News & World Report, Clarke County High School forty-eighth, and H-B Woodlawn in Arlington sixteenth according to The Washington Post Challenge Index. Northern Virginia schools also pay the test fees for students to take Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate exams, and the city of Alexandria and Arlington County lead the nation in college course tests.

Two of the U.S. top ten public universities are located in Virginia, according to the U.S. News and World Report annual college rankings. The University of Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson, is ranked second, and the College of William and Mary, the second-oldest college in America, is ranked sixth. James Madison University has been the number one public master's level university in The South since 1993. Virginia is also home to the Virginia Military Institute, the oldest state military college in the U.S. and a top ranked public liberal arts college. Virginia Commonwealth University is the largest university in Virginia with over , followed closely by George Mason University. Virginia Tech and Virginia State University are the land-grant universities of the state. Virginia also operates twenty-three community colleges on forty campuses serving over .

Health

Unlike the nation-leading education system, Virginia has a mixed health record, and is ranked as the twenty-second overall healthiest state according to the 2007 United Health Foundation's Health Rankings. Virginia falls twenty-first highest among United States in the rate of premature deaths, 697 per 10,000. There are also racial health disparities, with African Americans experiencing sixty-three percent more premature deaths than whites. Additionally, 13.3% of Virginians lack any health insurance. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's 2007 survey, 25.3% of Virginians are obese and another 36.6% are overweight, and only 78.4% of residents exercise regularly. Additionally, as of 2005, thirty percent of Virginia's ten- to seventeen-year-olds overweight or obese.

There are eighty-five hospitals in Virginia listed with the United States Department of Health and Human Services. Notable examples include Inova Fairfax Hospital, the largest hospital in the Washington Metropolitan Area, and the Medical College of Virginia (MCV), the medical school of Virginia Commonwealth University, which is home to the nation's oldest organ transplant program. The University of Virginia Medical Center, part of the University of Virginia Health System, has the eighth ranked endocrinology specialty in the nation, and the best in the South according to U.S.News & World Report. Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, part of the Hampton Roads based Sentara Health System, is also nationally ranked, and was the site of the first successful in-vitro fertilization birth. Virginia does have a high number of primary care physicians, with 123.7 per 100,000, which is the twelfth highest nationally.

Transportation

As of 2007, the Virginia state government owns and operates 84.6% of roads in the state, instead of the local city or county authority. of the total are run by the Virginia Department of Transportation, making it the third largest state highway system in the United States. Virginia's road system is ranked as the eighteenth best in the nation. While the Washington Metropolitan Area has the second worst traffic in the nation, Virginia as a whole has the twenty-first lowest congestion. With low disbursements for both roads and bridges, and a low road fatality rate, Virginia has a good system with a tight budget. The average commute time is 22.2 minutes.

Virginia has five major airports: Washington Dulles International, Reagan Washington National, Richmond International, Norfolk International and Newport News/Williamsburg International Airport. Sixty-six public airports serve the state's aviation needs. Northern Virginia company Space Adventures is currently the only company in the world offering space tourism. The state's main seaport is that of Hampton Roads, which is the largest port complex in America, and carries over fifty-million tons of cargo annually.

Virginia has Amtrak passenger rail service along several corridors, and Virginia Railway Express maintains two commuter lines into Washington, D.C. from Fredericksburg and Manassas. The Washington Metro rapid transit system currently serves Northern Virginia as far west as Fairfax County, although expansion plans call for Metro to reach Dulles Airport in Loudoun County by 2015. Commuter buses include the Fairfax Connector and the Shenandoah Valley Commuter Bus. The Virginia Department of Transportation operates several free ferries throughout Virginia, the most notable being the Jamestown-Scotland ferry which crosses the James River in Surry County.

Law and government

In colonial Virginia, free men elected the lower house of the legislature, called the House of Burgesses, which together with the Governor's Council, made the "General Assembly." Founded in 1619, the Virginia General Assembly is still in existence as the oldest legislature in the Western Hemisphere. The modern government is ranked with an "A-", the highest grade in the nation, by the Pew Center on the States, an honor it shares with two others.

Virginia functions under the 1971 Constitution of Virginia, the commonwealth's seventh constitution, which provides for fewer elected officials than the previous constitution, with a strong legislature and a unified judicial system. Similar to the federal structure, the government is divided in three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial. The legislative branch is the General Assembly, a bicameral body whose one-hundred member House of Delegates and forty member Senate write the laws for the commonwealth. The Assembly is stronger than the executive, as incumbent governors cannot run for re-election, and the General Assembly selects judges and justices. The current governor is Tim Kaine. Other members of the executive branch include the Lieutenant Governor and the Attorney General. The judicial branch consists of the Supreme Court of Virginia, the Court of Appeals of Virginia, the General District Courts and the Circuit Courts.

The Code of Virginia is the statutory law, and consists of the codified legislation of the General Assembly. The Virginia State Police is the largest law enforcement agency in Virginia. The Virginia Capitol Police are the oldest police department in the United States. The Virginia National Guard consists of in the Virginia Army National Guard and in the Virginia Air National Guard. The "total crime risk" is twenty-nine percent lower than the national average. However in 2006, Virginia saw 341 race related hate crimes, the sixth-highest total nationwide. Since the 1982 resumption of capital punishment in Virginia, 101 people have been executed, second most in the nation.

Politics

In the last century Virginia has shifted from the largely rural, politically Southern and conservative state to a more urbanized, pluralistic political environment. Since the 1970s, Virginia has moved away from a racially divided single-party state. African Americans were effectively disfranchised until after passage of civil rights legislation in the mid-1960s. Enfranchisement and immigration of other groups, especially Hispanics, have placed growing importance on minority voting. Regional differences play a large part in Virginia politics. Politically moderate urban and growing suburban areas, including Northern Virginia, are the Democratic Party base. Rural southern and eastern areas moved to support the Republican Party in response to their "southern strategy. Portions of Southwest Virginia influenced by unionized coal mines, college towns such as Charlottesville and Blacksburg, and southeastern counties in the Black Belt Region have remained more likely to vote Democratic.

While Virginia's Governor is a Democrat, the Lieutenant Governor is a Republican, and Republican Robert McDonnell became Attorney General by following a legally mandated recount of ballots for that race in 2005. In the 2004 U.S. Presidential election, Fairfax County in Northern Virginia voted for the Democrat for the first time in forty years, joining Democratic strongholds Alexandria and Arlington. In the 2007 state elections, the Democrats regained control of the State Senate, and narrowed the Republican majority in the House of Delegates to eight votes.

The upset election of Democrat Jim Webb as one of Virginia's two U.S. Senators in the 2006 Virginia Senate election may have demonstrated disaffection with the incumbent administration's performance. John Warner, a Republican, has long held Virginia's other seat in the U.S. Senate, but he has announced his intention not to seek reelection in 2008. Both of Virginia's Senators are former Secretaries of the Navy. Of the state's eleven seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, Republicans hold eight and Democrats hold three. Though the state has voted for the Republican candidate in each presidential election since 1968, Virginia is now classified as a "swing state" for future presidential elections.

Sports

Virginia is by far the most populous U.S. state without a major professional sports league franchise. The reasons for this include the lack of any dominant city or market within the state and the proximity of teams in Washington, D.C. Virginia is home to many minor league clubs, especially in baseball and soccer, and the Washington Redskins have Redskins Park, their headquarters and training facility, in Ashburn, Virginia. Virginia has many professional caliber golf courses including the Greg Norman course at Lansdowne Resort and Upper Cascades, Kingsmill Resort, home of the Michelob ULTRA Open.

The Washington Nationals and Baltimore Orioles also have followings due to their proximity to the state, and both are broadcast in the state on MASN. When the New York Mets ended their long affiliation with the Norfolk Tides in 2007, the Orioles adopted the minor league club as their top level (AAA) minor league affiliate. Additionally, the Nationals, Orioles, Pittsburgh Pirates, Boston Red Sox, Seattle Mariners, Chicago White Sox, and Atlanta Braves also have Single-A and Rookie-level farm teams in Virginia. From 1966 until 2008, Atlanta's AAA franchise was the Richmond Braves. However, the capital is now one of the largest markets in the country without any form of professional baseball.

Virginia is home to two NASCAR tracks currently on the Sprint Cup schedule, Martinsville Speedway and Richmond International Raceway. Norfolk born Joe Weatherly won the NASCAR Grand National in 1962 and 1963. Current Virginia drivers in the series include brothers Jeff Burton and Ward Burton, Ricky Rudd, Denny Hamlin, and Elliot Sadler. Former Cup tracks include South Boston Speedway, Langley Speedway, Southside Speedway, and Old Dominion Speedway.

Virginia does not allow state appropriated funds to be used for either operational or capital expenses for intercollegiate athletics. Despite this, both the University of Virginia Cavaliers and Virginia Tech Hokies have been able to field competitive teams in the Atlantic Coast Conference and maintain modern facilities. The Virginia-Virginia Tech rivalry is followed statewide. Several other universities compete in NCAA Division I, particularly in the Colonial Athletic Association. Three historically black schools compete in the Division II Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association, and two others compete in Division I MEAC. Several smaller schools compete in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference and the USA South Athletic Conference of NCAA Division III. The NCAA currently holds its Division III championships in football, men's basketball, volleyball and softball in Salem.

State symbols

The state nickname is the oldest symbol, though it has never been made official by law. Virginia was given the title, "Dominion", by King Charles II of England at the time of The Restoration, because it had remained loyal to the crown during the English Civil War, and the present moniker, "Old Dominion" is a reference to that title. The other nickname, "Mother of Presidents," is also historic, as eight Virginians have served as President of the United States, including four of the first five: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Woodrow Wilson. Additionally, Virginian Sam Houston served as president of the Republic of Texas.

The majority of the symbols were made official in the late 20th century, though the state motto and seal have been official since Virginia declared its independence. Virginia currently has no state song. In 1940, Virginia made "Carry Me Back to Old Virginny" the state song, but it was retired in 1997 and reclassified as the state song emeritus.

Bat: Virginia Big-Eared Bat Beverage: milk Boat: Chesapeake Bay deadrise Bird: Cardinal Dance: Virginia reel	Dog: American Foxhound Fish: Brook trout Flower/Tree: Dogwood Fossil: Chesapecten jeffersonius Insect: Tiger swallowtail	Motto: "Sic semper tyrannis" Nickname: The Old Dominion Shell: Eastern oyster Slogan: Virginia is for Lovers Tartan: Virginia Quadricentennial Tartan

See also

• List of Virginia-related topics

References

External links

Government

• State Government website
• Virginia General Assembly
• Virginia's Judicial system
• Constitution of Virginia

Tourism and recreation

• Virginia Tourism Website
• Virginia State Parks
• Virginia Main Street Communities Travel
• WikiTravel guide

Culture and history

• Virginia Historical Society
• Virginia Historical Markers
• Virginia's First People

Maps and Demographics

• USGS geographic resources of Virginia
• Virginia State Climatology Office
• Virginia State Fact Sheet