Montgomery County was established in 1776 and named after General Richard Montgomery, a Revolutionary War hero. The area originally served as a massive, 12,000 square-mile western frontier, stretching into West Virginia and Ohio. It was later shaped by the arrival of the railroad, coal mining and the founding of Virginia Tech.
The Montgomery Museum of Art and History in downtown Christiansburg officially opened a new exhibit this past week, which delves into that vast history ranging from before the revolutionary war and through two decades.
Visitors can experience Montgomery County’s history through two floors of exhibits in every room at the museum including some photographs, which are hanging in the building’s restrooms.
Sherry Wyatt is the museum’s director and said the “Montgomery County: 250 Years of History” exhibit is the largest exhibit the Montgomery Museum has ever undertaken.
“The exhibit spans two levels of the building with history that covers not only the modern boundaries of Montgomery County, but the New River Valley as well as southwestern West Virginia. By exploring the major themes in this shared history, visitors will learn about how the geology and geography of our beautiful area impacted early settlement and later economic development such as mining and mills and brought about early tourism in the form of mineral springs resorts,” she said.
The exhibit includes interactive resources and over 150 historic images and artifacts, many of which have never been exhibited in Montgomery County before.
Several of the displays demonstrate the area’s coal mining heritage that drove the local economy in the 19th and 20th centuries, shaping the working-class identity of the county’s rural communities.
Other parts of the exhibit take a deeper look at early education, which also shaped its heritage with displays on the Christiansburg Institute and the original Christiansburg Women’s College.
Quilting was also a big part of Montgomery County’s history, and an entire room is dedicated to “barn quilts” and their overall meaning in people’s lives.
The museum is located at 4 East Main in a former bank building, which still includes the full-sized vault for visitors to walk through. Open hours are 1-4 p.m. on Saturdays, closed on Sundays and Monday, and open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday.
The museum became more accessible this past week with the dedication of a new elevator lift.
The new ADA lift and the exhibit were funded by a Department of Historic Resources VA250 grant with matching funds from the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors. The exhibit was a collaborative effort between museum staff, volunteers, and students and faculty at Virginia Tech with important historical images and items being provided by private collectors and public history institutions across the region. The exhibit will run until January 2027.
