With Good Reason

Michael Jones McKean (Virginia Commonwealth University) is an artist whose work is a simple, but phenomenal visual event: he creates rainbows that can arc up to 400 feet in height. For over two weeks last summer, his rainbows in downtown Omaha, Nebraska could be seen from a thousand feet away. Also featured: If you’ve ever [...]

When faced with a court order to integrate, Prince Edward County in Virginia closed its entire school system in 1959 rather than integrate. The closure lasted five years and was part of a larger policy enacted by the state called Massive Resistance. Larissa Smith Fergeson (Longwood University) speaks to people who were students in Prince [...]

When faced with a court order to integrate, Prince Edward County in Virginia closed its entire school system in 1959 rather than integrate. The closure lasted five years and was part of a larger policy enacted by the state called Massive Resistance.   Larissa Smith Fergeson (Longwood University) speaks to people who were students in [...]

Inter-country adoptions gone awry have a way of capturing headlines.  A missionary group lands in jail after trying to remove children from Haiti.  An American woman puts her seven year-old adopted son on a one-way flight back to Moscow.  Karen Rotabi (Virginia Commonwealth University) has studied this issue in Guatemala and beyond for decades and [...]

Colonial Williamsburg, Monticello, and Mt. Vernon are popular destinations for American history tourism.  However, smaller sites are being developed with the help of the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities that focus on the contributions of African Americans to early U.S. history.  Larissa Smith Fergeson (Longwood University) discusses the Thyne Institute in Mecklenburg County, Carver-Price High [...]

In 1951, young Barbara Johns led a student walkout to protest conditions at her segregated Moton High School in Farmville, Virginia.  Her actions led to a lawsuit that eventually helped strike down the doctrine of “separate but equal.”  Lacy Ward (Longwood University) is Director of the Robert Russa Moton Museum.  He wants the museum to [...]

US Highway 58 begins at the beaches of Hampton Roads and winds along the southern border of Virginia.  Author Joe Tennis (Virginia Highlands Community College) shares stories from this road, which takes you from a statue of Poseidon, through the Great Dismal Swamp, past the original Lovers’ Leap, to the New River, and to the [...]

While the media may cover mega-celebrity Angelina Jolie’s pregnancy with loving attention to every detail, mere mortal women still face prejudice and even outright hostility in our society during pregnancy. Eden King (George Mason University) says this is not only counter-productive; it’s illegal. Also, Nicole Karjane (Virginia Commonwealth University) offers insights into pregnancy and labor [...]

Despite what many people believe, fall leaf color in Virginia is remarkably consistent every year. Dendrologist John Seiler (Virginia Tech) has been studying fall leaf color for decades. Also: biologist Dan Cristol (William & Mary) says mercury pollution in waterways is not only bad for fish-eating birds, but for songbirds as well, who are absorbing [...]

Batten Institute Director Mike Lenox (University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business) and internationally-renowned ethicist Ed Freeman (Batten Institute) engage in a lively discussion about the corporate world’s recent and increasing interest in sustainability. How, they ask, can businesses move beyond the “low-hanging fruit” of the green movement, taking major strides toward making service and [...]