Historic Sandusky, in partnership with the University of Lynchburg, is dedicated to providing educational opportunities and career development for students and the public by preserving and interpreting the history of the Civil War, slavery, and 19th-century American life.
Sandusky in the News
The Santa Who Started it All Makes His Rounds
December 10, 2018
Clad in a patriotic blue star field cloak and red and white striped pants, the Santa Claus of the Civil War era made an appearance at Historic Sandusky’s annual Christmas open house Saturday.
The historic and jolly Old St. Nick is meant to bring to life famed political cartoonist Thomas Nast’s original 1863 depiction of the Christmas icon. Nast’s drawing of a plump and cheery Father Christmas was published at the height of the Civil War in Harper’s Weekly and quickly became the defining American image of Santa Claus.
C-SPAN Crew Visits Lynchburg to Spotlight Area's Rich History
January 22, 2018
For most people, C-SPAN is a TV channel purely for die-hard political junkies and journalists who want to watch live, unedited feeds of democracy in action.
This week a crew from the network is spending five days touring the Hill City, visiting historical sites and interviewing local experts on Lynchburg history for its 2018 Cities Tour. Running since 2011, the series takes C-SPAN2’s Book TV and C-SPAN3’s American History TV on the road and crews spend a week in one city in order to prepare an entire weekend’s worth of content about the area for the two channels.
LC students digitize historic Civil War documents and design webpage
May 16, 2017
Lynchburg College students are learning the history of the Civil War from those who lived it.
As part of a digital history project, 13 students have pored through and archived local documents from the Civil War to understand the life and times of those living in and around Lynchburg during this period.
“A lot of the documents they are dealing with come from people who lived in Lynchburg during the war and wrote about their experiences,” LC history professor Adam Dean said.
April 01, 2017
Visitors to Civil War site Historic Sandusky used to be greeted with broken shutters and rotting wood, Tom Eastman, a self-identified history buff and local re-enactor, said Saturday.
“It was run down,” Eastman recalled of years past. “… The place was horrible. Nobody came through here.”
Now the pristine home and well-manicured lands are maintained by a wellspring of volunteers, Greg Starbuck, the director of Historic Sandusky, said during the site’s annual Park Day event.
March 14, 2017
Every Friday, a group of Lynchburg College students peer closely at small pieces of people’s lives from the Civil War era.
Word by word, they transcribe script writing from 150-year-old letters and diaries, and they study the details of photographs. A letter from a Confederate prisoner of war reveals his distress at hearing of Robert E. Lee’s surrender. A portrait of a soldier shows a stern impression.
Later this year, the entire collection of documents will be available online for history buffs and researchers alike.
“History class is usually about reading a book and discussion of history, not handling material from the time period,” said Lynchburg College History professor Dr. Dean. “But these students have the opportunity to do the work of historians.”
November 15, 2016
Kelley Fanto Deetz, a Lynchburg College professor, archaeologist and historian specializing in issues related to African-American culture and slavery, is working with Sandusky to deepen that story to tell what she calls “shared history.”
“It’s all of our history. At some point, whether it’s a poor white history, whether it’s a woman’s history, whether it’s an African-American’s history, a Chinese-American’s history, it’s all part of this America that we live in,” Deetz said.
Virginia Living Magazine Recognises LC and Sandusky
September 16, 2016
Virginia Living Magazine named Lynchburg College among the top schools in the state for “Research & Mentorships” in its State of Education 2016.
The education-themed supplement to Virginia Living’s October 2016 issue celebrates excellence and innovation in Virginia’s schools.The feature highlights Lynchburg College’s ongoing partnership with Historic Sandusky. Over the past five years, LC and the Historic Sandusky Foundation have collaborated on a variety of projects, including lectures, research, and archaeological work.
July 31, 2016
Armed with neon dust pans, ten children crowded around two large black tub of dirt searching for buttons, coins and broken plates Saturday morning on the grounds of Historic Sandusky. Patiently, the children went through each layer of dirt to find and document artifacts just like real life archeologists.
June 26, 2016
We are proud to announce that Historic Sandusky is now officially a part of Lynchburg College...
April 17, 2016
Several items from an archeological dig at Oak Hill Plantation in Danville now sit in a laboratory at Historic Sandusky. Lynchburg engineering and land surveying firm Hurt & Proffitt was awarded a contract last year by the Virginia Department of Historic Resources to perform archeological work at the plantation, deemed a “threatened site” following a treasure hunt conducted as part of the Discovery Channel’s Rebel Gold series.
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