Portal:Virginia

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Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The state's capital is Richmond and its most populous city is Virginia Beach, though its most populous subdivision is Fairfax County, part of Northern Virginia, where slightly over a third of Virginia's population of 8.72 million live .

The Blue Ridge Mountains cross the western and southwestern parts of the state. The state's central region lies predominantly in the Piedmont. Eastern Virginia is part of the Atlantic Plain, and the Middle Peninsula forms the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. The fertile Shenandoah Valley fosters the state's most productive agricultural counties, while the economy in Northern Virginia is driven by technology companies and U.S. federal government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency. Hampton Roads is also the site of the region's main seaport and Naval Station Norfolk, the world's largest naval base. (Full article...)

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Virginia Beach is an independent city located in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of the Commonwealth of Virginia, on the Atlantic Ocean at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. Although Fairfax County is the most populous jurisdiction in the state, Virginia Beach is the most populous city in the state, as well as the 39th largest city in the United States, with a population of 447,489 in 2012. Virginia Beach is the easternmost city of the Hampton Roads area that makes up the core of the Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News, VA-NC MSA.

Virginia Beach is a resort city with miles of beaches and hundreds of hotels, motels, and restaurants along its oceanfront. Every year the city hosts the East Coast Surfing Championships as well as the North American Sand Soccer Championship, a beach soccer tournament. It is also home to several state parks, several long-protected beach areas, three military bases, a number of large corporations, two universities, Edgar Cayce's Association for Research and Enlightenment, and numerous historic sites. Near the point where the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean meet, Cape Henry was the site of the first landing of the English colonists, who eventually settled in Jamestown.

The city is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as having the longest pleasure beach in the world. It is located at the southern end of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, the longest bridge-tunnel complex in the world.

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First Lieutenant Charles Bare Gatewood (April 5, 1853 – May 20, 1896) was an American soldier born in Woodstock, Virginia. He served in the United States Army in the 6th Cavalry after graduating from West Point. Upon assignment to the American Southwest, Gatewood led platoons of Apache and Navajo scouts against renegades during the Apache Wars. In 1886 he played a key role in ending the Geronimo Campaign by persuading Geronimo to surrender to the army.

Beset with health problems due to exposure in the Southwest and Dakotas, Gatewood was critically injured in the Johnson County War and retired from the Army in 1895, dying a year later from stomach cancer. Before his retirement he was nominated for the Medal of Honor, but was denied the award. He was portrayed by Jason Patric in the 1993 film Geronimo: An American Legend.

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This month in Virginia history

May 2, 1863: During the Battle of Chancellorsville, General Stonewall Jackson is shot behind his own lines, and dies several days later.
May 5–7, 1864: The Battle of the Wilderness is the first engagement between Generals Grant and Lee.
May 14, 1607: Jamestown is founded on an island in the James River, upstream of the Chesapeake Bay. (Historic Jamestowne, pictured)
May 15, 1776: Virginia declares itself independent of the British Empire, prior to the general Declaration of Independence made later that year
May 23, 1610: The Third Supply arrives in Jamestown with desperately-needed provisions and new colonists, enabling continued survival of the colony

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Credit: justin.critzer

The Rappahannock River near Fredericksburg, Virginia

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Did you know - load new batch

... that equipment from a bankrupt North Carolina TV station was dismantled, loaded on three rental trucks, and reassembled to start a station in Virginia?
... that after Lew Dickey Sr. broke into the radio business by buying a station in West Virginia, his son would go on to own Cumulus Media?
... that the Jefferson Scholarship gives scholars more than $293,000 to attend the University of Virginia?
... that Adam W. Oberlin, the 1917 Republican nominee to be the mayor of Canton, Ohio, went missing and was found seven months later working as a carpenter in Norfolk, Virginia?
... that American lawyer and politician Armistead Abraham Lilly was also a principal owner of Ruffner Hotel in Charleston, West Virginia, and resided in its penthouse?
... that in 1897, Francis Pharcellus Church wrote "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus"?