CREATING COLONIAL WILLIAMSBURG PB

Thousands of people each year experience life in eighteenth-century Virginia by visiting Colonial Williamsburg, one of America’s premier historical restorations. That is not what the founders had in mind when they opened this museum in 1932. Their aim was to build a shrine to promote American values — individualism, democracy, and representative government — at a time when they felt these beliefs were being eroded. As Anders Greenspan demonstrates in this lucid analysis, Colonial Williamsburg’s evolving presentation of history offers an excellent means of understanding many social and political changes in twentieth-century America.

Greenspan begins with a detailed profile of pre-1926 Williamsburg and closely follows the continuing development of the restoration. As the century progressed, Colonial Williamsburg gently adjusted its staging of colonial history to address the varying concerns of the Great Depression, World War II, and the Cold War. But the combined forces of the Civil Rights movement, the women’s movement, and the rising popularity of social history forced Colonial Williamsburg to incorporate African Americans, women, and the working class into its presentations at the risk of offending some of its strongest supporters.

Greenspan brings his study up to the present by reviewing how financial constraints have caused Colonial Williamsburg to make controversial alliances with nearby entertainment theme parks. As its presentation of American history continues to evolve, Colonial Williamsburg remains a valuable source for understanding and interpreting American life.