The Augusta County Historical Society

  • Voices from the Blue Ridge Tunnel

    After a break during the holiday season, the Society’s exciting educational interactive exhibit “Voices from the Blue Ridge Tunnel: When Men were Machines” is back in full force and will remain open until early November. The free exhibit can be seen in the History Gallery of the R.R. Smith Center for History and Art on Tues-Thurs 1-4, Fri-Sat 10-4, Sun 10-2. 

    ACHS’s inspiring educational interactive exhibit shines a light on the compelling human story behind the Blue Ridge Tunnel construction – the historic railroad tunnel 700 feet under Afton Mountain. The tunnel that opened in 1858 for trains and reopened in 2021 (after two decades of cooperative restoration work) to walkers and bicyclists, was designed by French engineer Claudius Crozet, but it and the railroad were built by several thousand Irish immigrants and enslaved African Americans whose blood, sweat, and lives (at least 14 Irishmen and 3 slaves died during construction) turned Crozet’s idea into one of the greatest engineering feats in the world at that time. This exhibit is their story.

    Using hand drills, picks, shovels, hammers, gunpowder and fuses, they opened up the mountain inch by inch, laid tracks, and otherwise worked to bring America’s newest transportation sensation—the railroad—into the southern Shenandoah Valley.

Come Visit our Galleries and Research Library.

History Gallery hours on the first floor are: W-F 1-4 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m.-4 p.m., and Sun. 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Our office and research library hours are Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday 9-12, however, those hours may vary. It is strongly suggested that visitors and researchers make an appointment by either emailing augustachs@ntelos.net or calling 540-248-4151.

For Society updates and information about upcoming events, please sign up to receive our e-blasts.

Research requests can be emailed to the archivist team at archivist@augustacountyhs.org

Augusta County’s history is America’s history.

restored

Here in the county that once stretched west to the Mississippi River and north to the Great Lakes…Native Americans clashed with pioneers opening the frontier…Revolutionary War patriots helped secure their nation’s liberty…America’s agricultural revolution began…a future U.S. President was born…Civil War armies vied for control of a state…and great artists shaped their vision.

Indeed, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Cyrus McCormick, Woodrow Wilson, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson all played important roles in our history, but so did Grandma Moses, George Caleb Bingham, Kate Smith, John Coalter ,and William Sheppard. Daniel Boone visited kinfolk here, Santa Anna stopped here, Charles Lindbergh landed here, Erwin Rommel studied here, and Billy Sunday preached here. Even history’s great names like Eisenhower and Lincoln traced their ancestral homes to this county. And, we cannot tell a lie – George Washington slept here.