Colonial Williamsburg- Wednesday, July 1, 2026

     As our plans were developing for an "America 250 Trip," we looked at the map for what to do between the Battle of Sullivan's Island on one weekend and Philadelphia the following weekend.  Sitting almost right in the middle of them is Colonial Williamsburg, and Scott thought stopping here for a day or two was a logical choice.  We've been to Williamsburg many times, especially when we were living a short drive away in Petersburg.  We'd often come here to go shopping or walk the streets with visiting friends and relatives, but oddly enough, though, we've never paid to see the insides of the buildings.  We decided it would be an appropriate thing to do this week.

     We had breakfast outside at the hotel, and walked to the Visitors Center which is basically on the other side of the parking lot from where we're staying.  We browsed the stores there.  Abby fell in love with a fuzzy stuffed horse, but we told her we weren't going to get her until we were on the way back to the hotel later-- Our Disney World rules would work here too.

     We watched the lines for the ticketing grow longer and longer without moving very much.   We skipped buying our tickets here, and instead we rode the free shuttle bus to what would be our first stop, the Capitol building.  We ended up buying our tickets online, though Julie had to wrestle with the phone a little bit to get it to work.  We then went up to the Capitol building for our first tour of the day.

     We waited in the arched piazza which forms the breezeway in the middle of the Capitol, and a nice breeze was blowing through it just then.  Our tour began in the General Court side of the building.  This court was where you would be tried for capital crimes.  The governor's chair was in the center and the members of the Governor's Council flanked him on each side.  He represented the crown's presence here, and together with his council, he wielded executive power, headed the judicial courts and made up half of the legislative body.  We went upstairs to the council's chambers and into the Conference Room above the piazza where the Governor's Council would negotiate and compromise with the House of Burgesses from the other side of the building.  In the Conference Room, we heard about the origin and influence of the English Bill of Rights and the Magna Carta.  From there, we passed down into the room where the House of Burgesses met.  The House of Burgesses was the first representative body in the English colonies, elected by free, white men, over 21, who owned land.  It was in this room where Patrick Henry gave his speech In 1765, when famously declared, "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third—...may profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it!"  Or rather, it was in a room like this one.  The original Capitol building burned down and the one we see today is a recreation from the 1930s.  The giant speakers' chair of black walnut in the middle, though, was original.  The interpreter who took us through was very knowledgeable, but his voice and delivery had sort of a drone to it.  It was a soothing sound and Abby was ready to go to sleep by the end of the tour.

     Scott feels a little sorry for the interpreters that have to say the same thing many times a day, every day.  Been there, done that.  Pro-tip: Don't ask them if they are hot in their clothes.  We're ALL hot today. 

     There were a lot of modern intrusions in the historic area this time, as tents, speakers and equipmen are being set up for the crowds that are expected on the Fourth.  One interpreter told us she had heard estimates from between 40,000 and a quarter of a million people expected for that day, which is a tremendously broad range for the guesses.  She figured that everyone was only guessing because they didn't have much to base it on.  They're also expecting temperatures over 100.  It was at least in the mid-90s today, and we were moving very slowly because of it.

     After the Capitol tour, we made our way up the Duke of Gloucester Street to the Raleigh Tavern.  Scott wanted to see this building, but we also knew that behind it was the Raleigh Tavern Bakery, where we could get a quick lunch.  We got some sandwiches and sat at the picnic tables in back.   After Scott was done eating, he went into the tavern itself.  During his time in the Petersburg City Museums, Scott attended a conference here in Williamsburg, where they talked about training museum staff and he acquired a copy of the large training binder that is used to prepare people to interpret the taverns here.  Like the Capitol, this building is a reconstruction, but Scott was interested in what it represented.  He enjoyed seeing the barroom and the billiards room, but it was the Apollo room that attracted him.  When the governor of Virginia dissolved the House of Burgesses for supporting the Boston Tea Party, they removed themselves from the Capitol and continued their meeting in this room.  True, it wasn't the same room exactly, but it was rebuilt from a picture by Benson Lossing. 

    Once Scott joined up with Julie and Abby, they decided to take the shuttle bus to the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.  We had never been in here before either.  Scott was amazed at several pictures that he recognized as we entered including one of Charles Wilson Peale's portraits of George Washington.  The ladies at the front thought Abby should see the large doll house, which was at the back of one gallery, so we headed there.  She was very fascinated by it, and since it's over 15 feet long, there's a lot to see in its detailed rooms.  Scott walked around the corner from the doll house and immediately recognized a portrait of Buffalo's own Peter B. Porter, a business entrepreneur of early Buffalo and a militia general in the War of 1812.

     We were waiting for a program called,  "Hands On: Toy Making."  We knew Abby would want to do anything that was arts and craftsy.  In fact, back at the Visitor's Center this morning, when a woman told us about the art museum, Abby immediately asked if there was an activity that kids could do to make something.  The toy today was a "thaumatrope," which was an 1820s invention that basically creates an optical illusion.  It consists of a disc with two strings attached that allow you to spin the disc rapidly.  If you draw of two different pictures, one on each side of the disc, the spinning creates the illusion of the merging of the two pictures.  The example given had a bird on one side and a cage on the other, so when it was spun, the bird appeared to be in the cage.  Abby drew a two girls that got stars over their heads when it was spun.  Julie drew a dog that was...driving a car?

     After that, it was going on 2:00 and we went separate ways.  Julie took Abby back to the hotel.  They stopped at the gift shop to get Abby's horse, and then went back to the pool.  Abby got some swimming googles yesterday and she was anxious to try them.   After a long time in the pool, they returned to the room and ended up taking naps because the heat had taken so much out of them.  Abby slept until way past 7:00 that evening. 

     Scott continued at the museum.  He wanted to see a presentation called, "Designing Virginia's Seal."  In this play, George Mason and George Wythe were working to design a new seal for Virginia.  The audience acted as if they were the 5th Virginia Convention, meeting shortly after Virginia became a commonwealth in 1776.  Mr. Mason was chairing the convention and Mr. Wythe was acting as secretary.  They went through some symbols and mottoes that were "rejected" by the committee, and then went through suggestions for the obverse (front) of the new seal.  They needed a motto, a symbol for virtue and a symbol for Virginia.  Each man came up with a suggestion and the audience voted three times.  Each time the decision of the audience was displayed on a screen behind the actors.  Our votes created a seal that ended up looking like the one on today's flag- an Amazonian warrior standing over a fallen tyrant, with the motto "Sic Semper Tyrannus."  In the question an answer period that followed, the two actors shared that they were prepared in case the votes went the other way, and shared the image of a turkey sitting on a chair with the "skin of Sisamnes" from Herodotus.  It was a delightful presentation with just enough humor to carry it along.  (Sadly, photography and videography were forbidden because it was a theatrical production in a darkened auditorium.)

     After the play, Scott continued to look around the museum because there was a lot to see.  As part of a program called "Music in the Galleries," he found a woman singing period songs and playing a guitar.  He stopped to listen to her for a while, and enjoyed her rendition of "Over the Hills and Far Away," but was afraid that if he stayed sitting in the air conditioning there, her voice would lull him to sleep.  He continued to explore around the galleries.  He was fascinated by an exhibit about musical instruments from the time.  He saw a recreation of a gourd banjo based on a painting that he has often used in class.  He also saw a "kit" violin that had a neck as long as usual, but a tiny little body making it more portable.  In other exhibits, he saw a silver tankard created by Paul Revere and one of 50 surviving copies of the Declaration of Independence from its first printing on parchment.  There was a large exhibit called "Centennial!" since this year is the 100th anniversary of the start of Colonial Williamsburg.  There were a lot of exhibits throughout the museum showing how the restoration or reconstruction of the buildings were done.  There was a very cool film that was taken in the 1930s that was taken by someone riding through the streets of Williamsburg.  It was running alongside of a modern video of the same places to show how much they have changed.  Scott also got to see the copper plate engraving that was discovered in Oxford which showed the Capitol, the Governor's Palace, and the Wren building at William and Mary.  It was crucial for the reconstruction of the buildings in the 1930s.

     When he had finished in the museum, Scott had a few other things to check off his to-do list while he still had a valid ticket.  The big thing that he wanted to see was the inside of the Governor's Palace.  He walked in that direction, and passed by the George Wythe house.  Since he had just "met" Mr. Wythe in the play, he decided to stop in and pay his respects.  George Wythe was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and was at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 as well.  He was a law professor at William and Mary and taught Thomas Jefferson among others.  He apparently was a man of many varied interests, like Jefferson, because his dining room table was prepared with scientific instruments and models for a meeting of the Virginia Society for the Promotion of Useful Knowledge.  Scott asked about a case that looked like a metronome, but was shown that it was actually a case for a microscope. 

     Scott continued on to the Governor's Palace nearby.  At four o'clock, the palace uses self-guided tours instead of one led by a guide, and he had to wait a few minutes before being allowed to go in.  He saw a demonstration in the kitchen while he waited.  Once in, he was able to see the building that was originally the home to Virginia's royal governors.  The royal governors were appointed by the crown and, as we saw in the Capitol, were basically in control of all three branches of the colonial government.  By this point, in July of 1776, Virginia had chosen its first governor of the commonwealth, Patrick Henry, and he would have been living in this residence.  The second governor, Thomas Jefferson, lived here too, though it was in his term that the capital was moved to Richmond.  Like the Wythe house, there was less interpretation in each room, but at this point in the day, Scott was happy to be moving a little faster through it.  Of course, a person notices all of the guns, swords and weapons on display.  When he asked, Scott was told that there were over 230 "brown bess" muskets on display among other weapons.  Scott had been looking for the big circle of muskets on the ceiling, shaped like a giant pinwheel, but he did not see it.  When he asked about it in the ballroom, an interpreter explained that even though they had been displayed like that for years, further research has failed to find a reference of guns on the ceiling.  The guns on the walls were mentioned as a way to emphasize the strength of the governor, but no one mentioned them on the ceiling, so they were taken down.    

     From the Governor's Palace, Scott went toward the Powder Magazine in the middle of town.  Here he watched the fife and drums who were playing retreat in the military camp to end their day.  An interpreter explained how it was the ceremony that ended their day and included a roll call, an equipment inspection and a health check.  Scott listened for a while and then tfied to catch a bus.  As he approached the bus stop, the bus was pulling away.  He backtracked on the bus route and missed a second one.  He eventually got the bus and rode it to the Visitors Center.  He used the time there to shop again.  He bought the newest version of the Colonial Williamsburg guidebook.  Since ours dates back to the 1980s or 1990s, he figured it was time to update it.  He got a couple of pins and a bottle of beer brewed with a 250th anniversary label.  He's not sure when he'll drink it though, and it's currently in our cooler.

    When Scott got back to the hotel room, Abby was still asleep.  We were hoping to go out for dinner somewhere, but we didn't want to wake her up.  Julie decided to go out for Papa John's (and Starbucks).  When she returned it was after 7:00.  When Abby finally woke up, her first response was, "Aww!  Whenever I take a nap I miss dinner."  We had saved her some pizza, though.   We went back out for some more time in the pool.