A Few
Hours Away….
By Clive
Donegal, Intrepid Reporter
There
is nothing wrong with a visit to Colonial Williamsburg or the breathtakingly historic sites at Jamestown, and a short way down the
road offers the option of spending some time in beautiful Virginia Beach. Most visitors to the
area miss out on some of the lesser-known—and fascinating— historic and unusual activities and sites. Today, we
will visit Hampton and Newport
News.
Hampton
The Hampton University Museum is more than merely the oldest African American
museum in the country. One of the most comprehensive African American collections, the museum also represents Native American,
Asian and Pacific Island art and artifacts.
The Virginia Air and Space Center (VAASC) is a good complement to the better
known museum in Washington, DC. With more than 100 interactive exhibits, an IMAX theater and the Apollo 12 Command
Module that you can approach almost close enough to touch. The VAASC has a more personal feel than the national museum.
Besides which, for an extra feel you can make your self dizzy and sick performing
rolls and loops in a flight simulator. Do not eat first.
One of my favorite sites is Fort Monroe, continuously garrisoned since 1823. Packed with history, Fort Monroe was Jefferson Davis’s prison after the civil War. Visitors may enter his cell, which is actually a capacious
bedroom within the ramparts of the fort. Lieutenant Robert E Lee helped to construct the fort, SGT Edgar Allen Poe served
here, Abraham Lincoln visited during the Civil War (it was held by the Union) and Harriet Tubman was head nurse at the Contraband
Hospital, so named because Major General Benjamin “Spoons” Butler, the commanding officer at Fort Monroe, refused
to comply with the Fugitive Slave Law on the grounds that it did not pertain to a foreign country, such as the independent
Confederate States. On May
27, 1861, Major General Butler declared the slaves contraband
of war. As contraband the slaves could not be delivered to an enemy, and escaped slaves flocked to Hampton.
Built on the site of several previous forts since 1609, when the Jamestown Colony
built Fort Algernourne on the site, fort
Monroe is the largest stone fort ever built in the United States. The fort is scheduled to close in 2011, so its future as an untainted historic site is in jeopardy.
In March
of 1862, the Battle of Hampton Roads, which for the first time pitted two ironclad ships against each other, took place in
Hampton roads, within sight of the fort.
It would be a shame to leave Hampton without
taking a tour of the Bay and James River.
A 2 ½- 3-hour tour on the Miss Hampton II offers a look at the site where Blackbeard’s
head was impaled on a stake, a good view of Fort Monroe and the oldest operating lighthouse in the country, at Point Comfort. It passes
the battleships at Norfolk Naval Base and over the site where the Merrimac (CSS Virginia) and USS Monitor fought the fierce
battle that changed the face of naval warfare.
Newport News
When it’s time to leave Hampton, fresh from
hearing about the clash of the Ironclads, you could do no better than to visit the extraordinary 60,000 square-foot Mariner’s
Museum in Newport News. In addition to a wonderful collection of miniature ships (No, these are not
the typical ships in a bottle, but hand-carved, carefully detailed replicas of ships by August Crabtree) rare figureheads,
and the turret and guns from the Monitor as they undergo restoration.
The Mariner’s Museum opened in 1932, but its current facilities
are state-of-the art.
The crowning jewels of the museum are the USS Monitor’s artifacts, some of which are integrated
into reproduced cabins, but it also offers interactive exhibits that kept several adults with us engaged for quite some time.
The films that tell the Ironclads’ story are as vibrant as they are brief
and informative. The hi-def depiction of the battle is a 360-degree aural-visual experience. Throw in an exact full-size reproduction
of the turret as it looked when it was extracted from the floor of the Bay (A film allows watchers to choose hoe to proceed
in the delicate undertaking.) and you are there. Outside the building stands a full-scale reproduction of the Monitor. During
the month of July, the conservation tank is drained so that visitors can better see the original turret of the Monitor.
The Mariner’s Museum is the jewel in the tiara of three excellent sites
in Newport News, all within minutes of the others. The second we heartily endorse is the oddly
named Virginia Living Museum, which is not about interior design. Because we did not want to miss the opportunity, we followed
the ¾ mile raised walkway directly to the red wolf pups’ enclosure, instead of following the normal sequence. The six
pups scampered busily around the yard in company with their parents a one-year-older sibling, as photographers snapped shot
after shot, without considering how well the beasties blend with their environment.
We also saw foxes and a bobcat, bald eagles and a raccoon whose goal seemed
to be entertaining us as long as possible. Stretching through the natural setting, the rustic boardwalk through woods and
over water would be an enjoyable experience even if representative wildlife from throughout the Commonwealth were not also
visible in their natural habitat along the way.
Inside,
the museum offers discovery centers and interactive exhibits to sustain interest beyond the SOLs (which they address). The
indoor exhibits provide context for the animals with natural settings and signage that explains and extends knowledge.
Our initial reticence about visiting yet another wildlife preserve was replaced
by the excitement of discovering several paddlefish about which we had first heard while boating in Kentucky a few weeks before. The museum’s marketing director, Virginia Gabriele, did not attempt to conceal her amusement
at the jaded geezer doing Horschak impressions when he spotted the first paddlefish.
She should have been used to it after the red wolves. And bald eagles. And alligators.
And raptor fossils you can touch.
We finished the museum with the Survivor:Jamestown, (through
November 2007) a maze that familiarizes participants with the choices and hardships Jamestown residents
faced. We did exceedingly well, only because we cheated with reckless abandon, but the wheel of misfortune regularly reminded
us that even the best laid schemes of mice and men….
What the third of the museums lacks in flash and style, it shares with its more
polished brethren: substance.
The name of the Virginia War Museum is more wildly misleading than the Virginia
Living Museum. It is more accurately a gallery of unique military uniforms and artifacts, from
a collection of Nazi memorabilia to Gatling guns and Harry Truman’s infantry helmet from World War I. A slab of the
Berlin Wall, a swatch of the fencing from Dachau, a proclamation by John Adams declaring a day of fasting and prayer in March
1798, a British battle standard from the Revolutionary War, a 1918 handwritten welcome message to American troops from King
George, and an impressive display of World War II posters from around the world.
The Virginia War Museum contains a rare and eclectic collection of military history, with something to surprise and delight boys from 8 to
108, and several women.