News Articles

March 31, 2009

Virginia Museum of Natural History staff members recognized John Redd Smith Elementary School's strong participation in museum education programs, presenting the school's Parent-Teachers Organization with the museum's first "Partners in Academic Excellence Award" during a PTO meeting on Monday, March 30. By the end of the current school year, six VMNH educators will have delivered 107 programs to third, fourth, and fifth-grade students at the Henry County, Virginia school. Dr. Dennis Casey, director of education and public programs at VMNH, presented the award to the PTO officers during the event, which also included insect-themed refreshments provided by VMNH educators. "This award represents the power of partnerships," ...

March 27, 2009

The Virginia Museum of Natural History is partnering with the American Museum of Natural History to present Science Bulletins, now playing at the entrance to the Uncovering Virginia exhibit gallery. Presented by the American Museum of Natural History, Science Bulletins is a video program that brings visitors the latest developments in the fields of astrophysics, Earth science, biodiversity and human biology and evolution through documentary feature stories about scientists in the field and regular brief research updates using scientific visualizations and imagery. In the exhibition halls of the American Museum of Natural History and other museums and science centers throughout the world, Science Bulletins presents Astro, ...

March 27, 2009

Most cultures throughout time, including our own, have had effigies—figural representations of gods, rulers, important mythical figures, animals, or just individuals. Many effigies were made for religious or spiritual reasons. Some were made to be sacrificed in religious rituals; others were made to provide protection from malevolent gods or spirits. Some may have had no religious purpose but were made for aesthetic reasons, as art pieces to provide pleasure to the artist who made them and the owner who kept them. Many of the effigies on display date from circa A.D. 600. Some of the finer pieces are probably later as they are stylistically similar to pieces found from the time of Cortes' defeat of Montezuma II in ...

March 24, 2009

Jefferson's Ground Sloth (Megalonyx jeffersonii) Residents of Virginia during the Ice Age, these ground sloths became extinct around 9,000 years ago. They survive nowhere on earth today. They may have looked somewhat like bears, but their closest living relatives are tree sloths, armadillos, and anteaters. Giant sloths were huge, bulky, slow-moving herbivores (plant eaters), eating leaves and twigs of woody plants. They were about 20 feet (6 m) long and weighed roughly 3-4 tons. Although other species of sloths still exist in South America, they are much smaller than the giant sloth, which went extinct about 11,000 years ago. 'Clawd', named by a local elementary school student, is a giant ground sloth model located on ...

March 20, 2009

The Virginia Museum of Natural History is "Celebrating 25 Years of Discovery" in 2009 with its year-long 25th anniversary celebration. The museum was founded on August 28, 1984 as The Boaz Foundation, a private institution. Guided by a group of scholars and citizens from throughout the Commonwealth, The Boaz Foundation soon became the Virginia Museum of Natural History. Recognizing the need for public support, A. L. Philpott, then Speaker of the Virginia General Assembly, worked on behalf of the institution in an effort to secure state agency status in 1988. Since its founding, VMNH has experienced phenomenal growth, and has earned recognition as one of the nation's leading museums in its field. It is accredited by the ...

March 13, 2009

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