History of Richmond's Museum District
1885
Robert E. Lee Camp No. 1 opens as a benevolent society to aid needy former Confederate soldiers.
1888
Electric streetcar lines begin regular operation in Richmond powered by overhead trolley wires. The arrival of the electric streetcar raises land values and encourages development.
1889
West End Land Development Company forms to develop a large suburban neighborhood in Richmond.
1895
Richmond Traction Company receives its franchise to operate a streetcar line in Richmond and develops a four-block tract of land at Robinson and Cary streets into car barns and trolley shops. The bus garage eventually serves as the headquarters for Greater Richmond Transit Company, which vacates the property in 2010, and in 2018, it converts to the current Cary Street Station, a multi-use home and business complex.
1890-1895
The oldest homes in the Museum District appear along Grove and Ellwood avenues, including twin ornate brick houses on Ellwood on each side of Colonial Avenue. They are commonly referred to as the “Two Sisters.” Three granite homes in the 2900 block of Grove Avenue anchor The Grove Avenue Historic District and earn it recognition on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
1890s
Oliver Schoolcraft purchases a tract of land in the 3200 block of Grove known as Auburn and builds a brick stable behind the house at 3211 Grove Avenue. He also installs a racetrack from Grove to Cary, which later becomes Crenshaw Avenue.
1901
The Westhampton Streetcar line becomes operational. It runs west from Floyd and Robinson, jogs over to Grove, and terminates at what is now the University of Richmond.
1906
Annexation brings much of the neighborhood into the city limits from Henrico County.
1911
Benedictine Church and High School opens on Sheppard Street. The interior of the high school is completely destroyed by fire in 1986. A renovated school served the community until 2013, when it moves to Goochland County.
Richmond City adopts a residential segregation ordinance banning black people from living in a house in a majority white neighborhood and does the same for white people in black neighborhoods.
1919
Robert E. Lee Elementary School, at 3101 Kensington Avenue, is the first public school in the neighborhood.
St. Benedict’s parochial school opens. The first floor of the convent house is used for 90 students and four teaching nuns until the new school building is complete in 1923 at the corner of Grove and Belmont.
1922
St. Gertrude High School for girls opens on Stuart Avenue. In 2020, the school moves to Goochland County to the site of Benedictine High School. The property undergoes an extensive renovation to become The Abby, a luxury apartment complex, scheduled to open in 2024.
First Congregational Christian Church opens at the corner of Grove and Sheppard streets. It sells in 1985 to the All Saints Reformed Presbyterian Church.
The largest building in the district opens as Johnston-Willis Hospital, located at 2900 Kensington Avenue. The six-story, flat-roofed, beige brick building with a rooftop garden expands to add the Nurses Home for Johnston Willis Hospital in 1928. In 1980, the hospital moves to a new location in Chesterfield County, and the building becomes the Kensington Garden Retirement Home. A 2000 renovation transforms it into an up-scale apartment building now called Kensington Court Apartments.
1925
Christadelphian Chapel, a simple, rectangular brick church at the comer of Ellwood and South Sheppard is the last church built in the district.
1926
Richmond Normal School opens on Patterson Avenue as a combination teacher training school and elementary school. Unusual at the time, it becomes famous, and visitors came from as far away as China and India to learn about the operation. In the early 1930s, state colleges begin educating teachers, and in 1933, the school becomes Albert H. Hill Elementary School, eliminating student teaching. In 1934, it becomes a combined elementary-junior high, and since 1956 operates as a public middle school for the City of Richmond.
1927
English Village opens on Grove Avenue as one of the earliest ventures in cooperative planned communities, the precursor to a condominium structure. The National Register of Historic Places recognizes the complex of Tudor Revival town houses in 1983.
1928
The Byrd Theatre opens as an architecturally sophisticated talking film venue in the city’s West End neighborhood.
1929
Richmond adopts an ordinance based on Virginia’s newly adopted “racial integrity law” that prohibits a person from living in a neighborhood where he or she is not permitted to marry any member of the majority population. Interracial marriages were illegal at the time.
1932
The Confederate Home for Woman opens at R. E. Lee Camp to serve as a residence for destitute female relatives of Confederate veterans. It operates for 57 years, until the final eight living Confederate widows move to a suburban retirement home in 1989.
1936
Despite the Great Depression, Virginia is able to open the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The building undergoes numerous expansions and, in 2010, completes the grandest of all improvements, drawing international awards.
1937
The Home Owners’ Loan Corporation creates a redlining map of Richmond that portrays the Museum District as an all-white neighborhood.
1938
Cary Street Park and Shopping Center opens. The Art Deco style shopping center expands to the west and east in 1949 and 1951.
1939
Temple Beth-El dedicates its building at 3330 Grove Avenue. The 1923 building was originally Grove Avenue Presbyterian Church. In 1949, Temple Beth-El moves to a newly constructed building on the adjacent lot. In 2023-2024 the temple undergoes an enormous renovation and expansion project.
1946
The Virginia Museum of History & Culture, known at the time as the Virginia Historical Society (VHS), acquires Battle Abbey at the corner of the Boulevard and Kensington Avenue from the struggling Confederate Memorial Association. Significant expansions take place in 1998, 2006 and 2022, when it becomes the VMHC.
1949
Richmond discontinues streetcar service. The city sponsors a parade and burns dozens of streetcars in celebration. The Belmont Line streetcar, which ran north-south from Broad and Sheppard streets to the Byrd Park area, becomes part of a permanent exhibit at VMHC.
1952
Chiocca’s Downstairs Deli opens on the corner of Kensington and Belmont.
1954
In Brown vs Board of Education, the Supreme Court rules that separating children in public schools on the basis of race is unconstitutional. The case signals the end of legalized racial segregation in schools, overruling the “separate but equal” principle set forth in the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case. Massive Resistance, Virginia’s 1956 policy to defy desegregation, results in many schools remaining segregated until the early 1970s.
1956
Belmont Library opens at the corner of Belmont and Ellwood avenues.
1960s
Zoning laws allow high-rise buildings in the West of the Boulevard area. Neighbors fight plans for high-rise, subsidized apartments, including a 1974 project by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for older adults in the 2900 block of Grove Ave. The neighborhood eventually defeats the proposal by convincing City Council to reverse the zoning law.
1961
Daisy Jane Cooper becomes the first Black student to integrate Westhampton Junior High School in compliance with a US Desegregation Court Order. The following year she becomes the first Black student at Thomas Jefferson High School.
1964
Fourteen residents become charter members of the West of the Boulevard Civic Association (WOBCA). The association is formed to combat development, protect property values and encourage community cohesion.
1968
The Fair Housing Act passes at the federal level, prohibiting discrimination during the sale, rental, and financing of housing based on race, as well as color, national origin, religion, gender, disability, and family status. Locally, efforts to stymie the policy continue.
1969
Richmond Oktoberfest holds its first celebration at Hanover Avenue and Sheppard Street.
1970
The area where Sheppard Street, Park Avenue and Patterson Avenue converge earns the nickname Devil’s Triangle for its boisterous bars and rollicking patrons. For decades the rowdy night life continues, but over time, the triangle becomes a cherished business area. In 2020, the Bandazian family sells much of the property to a shopping corporation that retains the flavor and architecture while strengthening the Devil’s Triangle brand.
1974-76
Increased real estate prices in the Fan District drive up prices in the Museum District.
1986
Reverend Kenryu T. Tsuji purchases the home located at 3411 Grove at the request of local Buddhists for a temple.
1994
After several years of hard work by the residents, the neighborhood wins official designation as a Federal and State Historic District.
1995
The first Mother’s Day House and Garden Tour showcases the neighborhood’s beautiful homes.
1996
The Arthur Ashe Monument, sculpted by Paul DiPasquale, takes its place at the intersection of Monument Avenue and Roseneath Road. The statue depicts tennis player Arthur Ashe, who was born, raised and buried in Richmond.
2000
Robert E Lee School closes, leaving Albert Hill Middle School the only public school in the immediate neighborhood. Two years later, the building reopens as luxury apartments, and in 2022, rebrands as River School Lofts.
2001
West of the Boulevard Civic Association votes to change its name to Museum District Association to better reflect the flavor of the neighborhood.
2002
The MDA partners with The Boulevard Association to absorb both sides of the Boulevard into the Museum District Association membership.
2003
Richmond residents vote in a new political system headed by a managerial mayor and retire the previous system in which council members hire a city manager to oversee daily governmental operations and choose a ceremonial mayor from within their own ranks.
2006
Belmont Butchery opens.
2010
Ukrops Grocery Stores close with a sale to Giant-Carlisle’s Martin’s, and the Carytown store becomes a Martin’s Grocery. In 2017, Martin’s closes, and rumors spread that Publix will occupy the Carytown location.
Katie Blue hair salon opens on Belmont Avenue.
2012
The Belmont Food Shop restaurant opens, paying homage to the original use of the space, Seay’s Food Market in 1923 and Belmont Food Store in the 1960s.
After a year of construction, Carytown Place on Nansemond Avenue transforms an old call-center building. Fresh Market, Panera Bread and Chipotle are the first tenants.
2013
Benedictine High School relocates to a 50-acre campus, part of the pristine Mary Mother of the Church Abbey (home of the Benedictine monks) along the James River in Goochland County.
2014
The Museum District Association celebrates its 50th anniversary with a birthday party at the Virginia Historical Society.
2015
After decades in the Fan, Buddy’s moves to Sheppard Street.
Black Rabbit Tattoo opens on Belmont Avenue.
2016
Street art gains popularity in the neighborhood as murals begin showing up on homes.
2017
The Museum District Association undergoes rebranding with a new logo, weekly email newsletter, neighborhood flags, and updated website and social media accounts.
2018
The Columns rebrands from a black and white newsletter to a 24-page full-color magazine and maintains home delivery.
2019
The Boulevard becomes Arthur Ashe Jr. Boulevard to honor the late Arthur Ashe, activist, tennis giant and Richmond native.
Cristo Rey Richmond High School occupies the old Benedictine High School space and opens its doors to the Founding Class of 2023, which includes 95 students from 34 middle schools and 33 zip codes.
Construction begins on Carytown Exchange. The six acres of the old Richmond Shopping Center are the new home of a Publix, numerous shops, restaurants and a large concealed parking garage. Construction, expected to take two years, is delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
2020
The COVID-19 pandemic creates chaos here, across the nation and around the world.
Civil unrest erupts in the area, triggered by the murder of George Floyd during his arrest in Minneapolis.
Citizens topple Confederate statues across Richmond, including the Fan District and the Museum District, and city officials remove the remaining monuments.
Publix in Carytown Exchange opens in December.
2021
State officials remove the statue of Robert E. Lee, the last Confederate memorial in the city, leaving Arthur Ashe in the Museum District as the only statue on Monument Avenue. Ownership of the traffic circle property conveys to the City of Richmond.
2023
Carytown Exchange expansion between Ellwood and Cary is complete.