Cheers! The Spirited History of Alcohol in Colonial Virginia

Cheers! The Spirited History of Alcohol in Colonial Virginia

April 24 • 6 p.m. • American Revolution Museum at Yorktown

Join Nick Powers, curator of Collections at the Museum of the Shenandoah Valley, for a look at the spirited history of Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley which has been infused by alcohol since the early 18th century.

In 1716, colonial governor Alexander Spotswood led an expedition across the Blue Ridge Mountains to claim the Valley for the British Empire. Spotswood and his companions toasted King George I with musket volleys, wine, brandy, claret, cider and champagne. From these boisterous beginnings, alcohol impacted Virginians of all social classes. It swayed faith, politics — including George Washington’s first publicly elected office in 1758 — and the objects used to display, consume and store it.

Nick Powers

Nick Powers is curator of Collections at the Museum of the Shenandoah Valley (MSV) in Winchester, Va. A native of the Shenandoah Valley, Powers graduated from James Madison University in 2011 with a degree in history. In 2014, he graduated from the Winterthur Program in American Material Culture at the University of Delaware. At the MSV, Powers researches, exhibits and lectures on the museum’s collection of fine, decorative, and folk and self-taught art, as well as the collection of American, European and Asian art assembled by museum benefactor Julian Wood Glass Jr. He is the author of multiple articles on the Shenandoah Valley and Southern decorative arts, material culture and history.

Admission to the event is $15 per person and advance registration is required to reserve your seat. Link for tickets