Colonial Williamsburg

Colonial Williamsburg is an 18th century town that was painstakingly preserved by John D. Rockefeller Jr. and is the largest living history museum in the country, second largest in the world, as the sweet 18th century-looking lady told us. We visited on a gorgeous fall day where we wandered through the streets and visited old shops watching processes from the past come alive. We saw a printing press, book binding, an apothecary shop, jewelry-making, an old farmstead with tobacco drying in the barn, corn cobs in various shucked states, an eighteenth century feast laid out complete with a roasted pig's head, and a fife and drum parade. At the end of the day we followed actors through the village as we watched a re-enactment of events that took place at the beginning of the Revolutiony War in Williamsburg. We watched as tensions rose between opposing opinions which almost resulted in a good old-fashioned tar-and-feathering, we watched the militia form, lovers bidding each other farewell, slaves being offered their freedom to fight if their owners supported the king's cause, and a dramatic ending including the reading of the Declaration of Independence, which all Virginians surrounding us had memorized, and climaxing in cannon and musket fire.

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