Back in 1955, the travelogue series, “Guided Tour,” came to Richmond to film an episode about the city.
The short film, shot in black and white, explains that Richmond is home to 365,000 people, with major highways like U.S. Route 1 and Route 60 running through town.
The narration highlights the “world famous shrines” to Civil War heroes like Robert E. Lee on Monument Avenue and boasts that the art collection at theVirginia Museum is “valued at more than $5 million.
“Showing a picture of a freight train moving through town, it proudly states that the city is a hub of industry and commerce—”first among them tobacco, where more than 110 billion cigarettes are produced each year.
“There is one black person shown in the entire film, a caretaker. Playing in the background are well-known Southern melodies including “Dixie” and “Swanee River.”
My, how things have changed.
You don’t have to go back 50 years—try 30, or 10. Or last spring.
A bustling, new-world metropolis Richmond now has 200,000 people, but roughly a million residents live in the greater metro area. Interstate roadways form a high-speed asphalt ring around it, connecting every square mile of former farmland-turned-suburb to the city.
A statue of African-American tennis great Arthur Ashe, a native son, now sits at the entrance to Monument Avenue’s stone parade of Confederate heroes.
By law, all Virginia restaurants, including those in Richmond, the former tobacco capital of the world, are now smoke-free.
And the soundtrack to the story of the city is not a twangy, old-timey melody, but a modern symphony: The buzz of 32,000 college students from all walks of life, amid the bang of construction crews erecting another building downtown on the ever-expanding campus of Virginia Commonwealth University.
The neighborhood chatter of the Saturday morning farmers market at Forest Hill Park, and a cul-de-sac cocktail hour in a Chesterfield subdivision.
The cheers echoing off the rafters of renovated downtown performance spaces after concerts—not just by the Richmond Symphony—but Noah-O. The bustle of eager art lovers crowded into a Picasso exhibit at the VirginiaMuseum of Fine Arts and along Broad Street storefront galleries during First Friday Art Walks. And the Saturday morning hustle of soccer moms and dads at Short Pump Town Center, looking for shin guards before their daughter’s afternoon match at Striker Park.
And always, the timeless roll of the James River, flowing through the heart of the city—carrying whitewater kayakers today the way it carried Captain Christopher Newport, John Smith and the first English explorers to Richmond’s leafy banks more than 400 years ago.
Revisiting history Centuries after its settlement, Richmond is dense with history. But during the last 30 years, it has undergone a dynamic transition and growth that again makes it a place waiting to be discovered.
“We have a unique blend of cultural and natural resources that live side by side,” said William Martin, president of the Valentine Richmond History Center. “It’s not just the importance of history, but it’s history plus.”In today’s Richmond, “That’s the way we’ve always done it” is no longer the way it’s always done.
“It’s like my canvas,” said Richmond-raised Lucy Meade of the civic group, Venture Richmond. “This incredible, ever-changing canvas. Every time you look at it, it’s different. It’s not rococo—it’s a modern work of art.”
That work has many foundations. The city’s history is one of them. In Church Hill, there is St. John’s Church, where Patrick Henry uttered his famous “Give Me Liberty” speech rallying Virginia to revolution in 1775.
Downtown, sandwiched by the VCU Medical Center, is the White House of the Confederacy, which housed Jefferson Davis during the Civil War.
A couple of blocks away, on a hill, is the beaming white state capitol building, designed by Thomas Jefferson, home to the nation’s longest sitting legislature.
Richmond’s story has broadened in recent years to become more inclusive and embrace parts of its past that were previously ignored.The city’s role as a slave trading capital of the colonies has been recognized with the establishment of the Richmond Slave Trail. There are plans to excavate a slave burial ground in Shockoe Bottom.
Civil War 150th anniversary exhibits at the Library of Virginia and the Virginia Historical Society delved into both sides of the story. A statue on the capitol grounds, the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial depicts Prince Edward High School student Barbara Johns and her 1951 protest against the state’s massive resistance policies that led to school segregation.
“The whole race issue has held us back for so long because nobody wanted to talk about it,” said Richmond resident Leighton Powell, executive director of Scenic Virginia.
“Now everybody’s getting on board, realizing you can’t hide history, you can’t pretend it didn’t happen. But if you do it the right way, it can become a teaching tool, and if you do tourism right, it can pay for everything you need in this city.”Investment in the arts in recent years also has paid dividends for Richmond. More museums, more galleries, more young artists, thanks to VCU’s celebrated arts program, have taken up residence in Richmond.
Creativity driving growthA $150 million expansion of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts was capped with the landing of an extensive exhibit of the works of Picasso, which drew more than 230,000 visitors and generated $29 million in economic impact for the region.”It is an indication, yet again, that Richmond is poised, ready and willing to move into the future,” said Alex Nyerges, director of the VMFA.”Richmond has become a vibrant center of creativity and activity and it’s all blending together at the right time. It’s not just a renaissance, it’s a coming of age.”
In the 1970s and early 1980s, Americans left cities in droves to discover suburban life and the promise of more space, less crime and strong schools. Retail businesses followed, deserting downtowns for upscale indoor and outdoor malls designed to replicate the “town-like” lifestyle of their former homes.In suburban Richmond, retail remains dominant, offering residents of the region the chance to buy just about anything within a 30-minute drive.But unlike other cities, when people wanted to return to urban living—lured by affordable housing, safer streets and an engaged, diverse community—Richmond’s neighborhoods had plenty of authenticity to offer.
“Our urban character contributes to our economic growth,” said Richmond Mayor Dwight Jones. “We have livable, walkable, neighborhoods that help attract and retain an eclectic, educated and diverse workforce.”
Artist Eliza B. Askin has been to them all—Church Hill, the Fan, Northside, Bon Air, Rocketts Landing, and the list goes on. The former VCU art student’s ink-on-paper drawings of Richmond places has kept the Northside resident inspired for 30 years.”I never run out of things to draw,” she said. “It’s been a great city to me. It’s like a small town, but it is a city,” she continued. “The neighborhoods all have their own bars and restaurants and personalities and feelings about their schools and councilman. That combination is what is so old-world about Richmond, even though it is extremely modern. How all that connects defines the city to me.”
The best of the old, the best of the new
The modern Richmond is growing and increasingly diverse. For the first time in a decade, the city gained population. And in recent years, communities of Asians and Hispanics and Indians have come here, adding their own cultural brushstrokes to the canvas of the region with restaurants and festivals that celebrate their heritage. It’s not just souvlaki at the Greek Festival and Hanover tomatoes anymore.”There’s an energy fueled by people coming to the city,” added Martin. “Richmond has always had, as a community, the elements of an important and interesting place to live.”
Maybe the 1955 movie had it right after all:”Richmond,” it concludes, “where the best of the old is combined with the best of the new, making it one of the most interesting and charming cities in America today.”