VMI Museum at the Virginia Military Institute

The VMI Museum at the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Va., is small museum honoring the history of the institute, and showcasing an impressive firearms collection that was donated to them.

The museum dates to 1856 and was the first public museum in Virginia. It has more than 15,000 items in its collection.

VMI was the first state-sponsored military college in the U.S., founded in 1839. Its first class graduated 16 cadets.

African Americans were first admitted in 1968, but it didn’t go co-ed until 1997!

An exhibit featuring a VMI cadet dorm room, with the “Room Arrangement Manual” pictured up front!

Colonel’s Epaulets worn by Francis Smith, 1858.

There is a display case dedicated to Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, who was a professor at the institute for several years. We wrote about that in our post about several Jackson sites we visited in Virginia. The VMI Museum also runs the Stonewall Jackson House nearby.

The museum highlights shows some aspects of VMI life, and honors some of its graduates with significant achievements, such as George C. Marshall, a top general in World War II, the Army’s first five-star general, and the only career military officer to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

A display of items used by LTC James R. Berger (VMI class of 1961) while he was a prisoner of war in Vietnam from 1966 to 1973.

In just 2020 The Washington Post ran an expose about ongoing structural racism (including a threat of lynching, for crying out loud!), which led to a state-led investigation, the resignation of the Superintendent, the removal of a Stonewall Jackson statue, and the implementation of diversity programs.

The report issued by the investigation found that VMI “maintained and allowed a racist and sexist culture that, until recently, it had no appetite to address.” Interestingly, none of this was covered in the VMI museum.

Honoring VMI alumni who have died in the line of duty since September 11, 2001 in the Global War on Terrorism.

A display on poetess Margaret Junkin Preston, whose affiliation with VMI is that she was the sister-in-law of Stonewall Jackson and the wife of one of the founders of VMI. This seems like a stretch to be included in the museum, in my opinion.

Henry M. Stewart of the 1935 VMI Class donated his collection of antique firearms that he had built over fifty years. The collection includes many one-of-a-kind or “only known surviving example” of firearms from throughout history.

The total collection includes more than 800 pieces, though only a portion of that is on display (see cover photo), including an air rifle carried by Lewis and Clark during their 1803 Northwest Expedition. Though I’m not especially a fan of guns, many of these are works of art.

If you come to VMI at the right time of the year, you can sign up for a walking tour led by a Cadet. Unfortunately, the summer season had just ended, but the fall tours had not yet started while we were in town.