Mission

         Castlewood                 Magnolia Grange          Old Jail               Museum

Vision
To be the premier resource for local history and provide quality programs, exhibits and information to residents of and visitors to Chesterfield County, and to support the educational goals of the public school system as well as home schooled students.  

Chesterfield County Facts

Chesterfield County was founded on May 25, 1749, by the House of Burgesses. It was carved from Henrico County to eliminate lengthy travel by residents from the southern area to the Courthouse for business and court proceedings.

The historic James River borders the county on the northeast and the Appomattox River forms the county's southern boundary.

Chesterfield County received its name from the Fourth Earl of Chesterfield, England's famed Lord Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope.

Chesterfield was first settled in 1611 at the Citie of Henricus, when residents of Jamestown moved upstream to a "convenient, strong, healthie and sweete seate" for a new town after conditions at Jamestown were too harsh.

Full size copies of  the 1888 LaPrade map are available to purchase in at Magnolia Grange gift shop.

National Register of Historic Places in the county's rich history includes many historic "firsts," such as:

     ♣ 1611 -- Citie of Henricus was established as the second permanent English
settlement in the new work

   ♣ 1612 -- Tobacco was first cultivated in America at Bermuda Hundred

   ♣ 1614 - -Bermuda Hundred was the first incorporated town in America

   ♣ 1619 -- Falling Creek was the first iron furnace in the New World

   ♣ 1622 -- Mount Malady, near Dutch gap, was the site of the first American hospital

   ♣ 1709 -- Midlothian produced the first commercially mined coal in America

   ♣ 1807 -- Midlothian Turnpike was the first paved road in Virginia

   ♣ 1831 -- The Midlothian to Manchester Railroad was the first in Virginia

More Chesterfield Facts

               

Thomas Dale Exhibit at the Chesterfield Museum