J. Thomas Newsome

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Joseph Thomas Newsome (1869–1942) was the first African-American lawyer in post-Civil War Newport News, Virginia, to practice before the Virginia Supreme Court. Newsome was a respected lawyer, newspaper editor and civic leader who hosted many up and coming African-Americans in his historic Queen Anne home including, Booker T. Washington.

Lawyer legal professional who helps clients and represents them in a court of law

A lawyer or attorney is a person who practices law, as an advocate, attorney, attorney at law, barrister, barrister-at-law, bar-at-law, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, counsellor, counselor at law, solicitor, chartered legal executive, or public servant preparing, interpreting and applying law, but not as a paralegal or charter executive secretary. Working as a lawyer involves the practical application of abstract legal theories and knowledge to solve specific individualized problems, or to advance the interests of those who hire lawyers to perform legal services.

American Civil War Civil war in the United States from 1861 to 1865

The American Civil War was a war fought in the United States from 1861 to 1865, between the North and the South. The Civil War is the most studied and written about episode in U.S. history. Primarily as a result of the long-standing controversy over the enslavement of black people, war broke out in April 1861 when secessionist forces attacked Fort Sumter in South Carolina shortly after Abraham Lincoln had been inaugurated as the President of the United States. The loyalists of the Union in the North proclaimed support for the Constitution. They faced secessionists of the Confederate States in the South, who advocated for states' rights to uphold slavery.

Newport News, Virginia Independent city in Virginia, United States

Newport News is an independent city in the U.S. state of Virginia. As of the 2010 census, the population was 180,719. In 2013, the population was estimated to be 183,412, making it the fifth-most populous city in Virginia.

Newsome was the editor of the Newport News Star, a weekly African-American publication.

The J. Thomas Newsome House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1990, and is open to the public. [1]

J. Thomas Newsome House

J. Thomas Newsome House is a historic home located at Newport News, Virginia. It was built in 1898, and is a 2 1/2-story, seven bay, asymmetrical, frame Queen Anne style dwelling. It features a steeply pitched irregularly composed roof, three sided bay, front Palladian window, and corner tower. From 1906 until 1942, it was the residence of J. Thomas Newsome (1869–1942), an African-American attorney and journalist.

National Register of Historic Places federal list of historic sites in the United States

The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance. A property listed in the National Register, or located within a National Register Historic District, may qualify for tax incentives derived from the total value of expenses incurred preserving the property.

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The Newport News Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism is the government agency responsible for maintaining city parks and other sites of interest to tourists and the general population within the city of Newport News, Virginia. It is under the authority of Assistant City Manager Alan Archer. The Director of Newport News Parks is Michael Poplawski.

United States National Register of Historic Places listings

The National Register of Historic Places in the United States is a register including buildings, sites, structures, districts, and objects. The Register automatically includes all National Historic Landmarks as well as all historic areas administered by the U.S. National Park Service. Since its introduction in 1966, more than 90,000 separate listings have been added to the register.

First Landing State Park

First Landing State Park offers recreational opportunities at Cape Henry in the independent city of Virginia Beach, Virginia. As the first planned state park of Virginia, First Landing is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as Seashore State Park Historic District. A portion of the park is listed as a National Natural Landmark as part of the Seashore Natural Area.

Lee Hall Mansion human settlement in Virginia, United States of America

Lee Hall or Lee Hall Mansion is a historic brick plantation house that was built during the period from 1848 to 1859. The community of Lee Hall, Virginia is named for it. The house and village are located near the junction of U.S. 60 and VA 238, in Newport News, Virginia.

Endview Plantation human settlement in United States of America

Endview Plantation is an 18th-century plantation which is located on Virginia State Route 238 in the Lee Hall community in the northwestern area of the independent city of Newport News, Virginia.

Aberdeen Gardens (Hampton, Virginia)

Aberdeen Gardens is a national historic district located at Hampton, Virginia, United States. The district was part of a planned community initiated by Hampton University under New Deal legislation. The neighborhood is listed on the Virginia Landmarks Register and the National Register of Historic Places. The district encompasses 157 contributing buildings.

Banneker-Douglass Museum historic church building and museum in Annapolis, Maryland

The Banneker-Douglass Museum, formerly known as Mt. Moriah African Methodist Episcopal Church, is a historic church at Annapolis, Anne Arundel County, Maryland. It was constructed in 1875 and remodeled in 1896. It is a ​2 12-story, gable-front brick church executed in the Gothic Revival style. It served as the meeting hall for the First African Methodist Episcopal Church, originally formed in the 1790s, for nearly 100 years. It was leased to the Maryland Commission on African-American History and Culture, becoming the state's official museum for African-American history and culture. In 1984, a ​2 12-story addition was added when the building opened as the Banneker-Douglass Museum.

Greenlawn Memorial Park (Newport News, Virginia)

Greenlawn Memorial Park, also known as Greenlawn Cemetery, is located at 2700 Parish Avenue, Newport News, Virginia. Greenlawn Memorial Park is a 50-acre (200,000 m2) cemetery located where two natural streams, Mill Dam Creek and Salters Creek, come together. The cemetery has been in continuous operation, serving the Newport News and Hampton, Virginia, since 1888. There are approximately 20,000 burials in the cemetery. Greenlawn Memorial Park is on the National Register of Historical Places.

National Register of Historic Places listings in Newport News, Virginia Wikimedia list article

This is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Newport News, Virginia.

National Register of Historic Places listings in York County, Virginia Wikimedia list article

This is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in York County, Virginia.

Newport News Public Library

The first Newport News Public Library, renamed West Avenue Library, now NNPLS Technical Services, in the Newport News Public Library System, was opened on October 14, 1929 at the corner of West Avenue and 30th Street in the City of Newport News, Virginia. This building was the first to be built in Newport News for the express purpose of being a library. In 2005, the West Avenue Library was placed onto the Virginia Landmarks Register and the National Register of Historic Places under its original name of Newport News Public Library. The building now known as West Avenue Library; however it is no longer a functioning library.

Simon Reid Curtis House

Simon Reid Curtis House, now known as the Boxwood Inn, is a historic home located in the Lee Hall neighborhood of Newport News, Virginia. It was built in 1897, and is a large, 2 1/2-story, Colonial Revival style frame combined store, post office, and dwelling. The building consists of two separate structures attached to form a "T" shaped building with common architectural features. It was built by Simon Reid Curtis (1862–1949), a prominent businessman and land owner, who was an influential political leader in Warwick County, Virginia from the 1890s until his death in 1949. The Curtis family owned the house until 1996 when it was sold, renovated, and converted into a bed and breakfast.

James A. Fields House historic home built by James A. Fields

James A. Fields House is a historic home located in the Brookville Heights neighborhood in the East End of Newport News, Virginia. It was built in 1897, and is a two-story, Italianate style red brick dwelling on a raised basement. It features an entrance tower with a low pitched hipped roof and two ten-foot tall two-over-two windows on the first floor. It was built by the prominent African-American lawyer and politician James A. Fields (1844–1903) and served as the location of the first black hospital in the city, which later became the Whittaker Memorial Hospital.

Smiths Pharmacy

Smith's Pharmacy is a historic commercial building located at Newport News, Virginia. It is a two-story brick building. The first floor was built in 1946 to house the pharmacy with the second floor being added in 1952 to serve as office space. The interior of the first floor remains virtually unaltered with the original pharmaceutical retail space, counters, soda fountain and wooden booths. It was the pharmacy of Dr. Charles Calvin Smith, an African-American pharmacist who established the store to serve that community in Newport News. He opened the first black owned pharmacy in Newport News in 1921. The Smith's Pharmacy was sold to the Eckerd Corporation in 1999.

Whittaker Memorial Hospital

Whittaker Memorial Hospital is a historic hospital building located in the Brookville Heights neighborhood in the East End of Newport News, Virginia. The original section was built in 1943 with additions in 1957 and 1966. The earliest portion of the building has a symmetrical "T"-plan with both Moderne and Art Deco influences. It has a concrete frame, with concrete roof and floor slabs, and curtain walls constructed of alternating bands of yellow and brown bricks. The central mass is three stories tall and has two-story wings. The Whittaker Memorial Hospital was founded in 1908 to serve the African-American population of Newport News. The hospital was built by African-American physicians and designed by African-American architects. It was originally housed in the James A. Fields House, then in a frame hospital built in 1915 before this building was constructed in 1943. The hospital closed in 1985.

Denbigh Plantation Site historic archaeological site located at Newport News, Virginia

Denbigh Plantation Site, also known as Mathews Manor, is a historic archaeological site located at Newport News, Virginia. Mathews Manor was built about 1626 for Captain Samuel Mathews. The post-medieval Mathews Manor included a projecting porch and center chimney, both characteristic of Virginia's earliest substantial dwellings. Mathews's house burned about 1650 and was replaced with a smaller house nearby, probably by his son, Samuel Mathews, Jr. (1630-1660), governor of Colonial Virginia (1656-1660). The property was referred to as Denbigh Plantation since the 18th century.

Southern Terminal Redoubt

Southern Terminal Redoubt is a historic archaeological site located at Newport News, Virginia. It is a uniquely intact component that represents the southern end of General John B. Magruder's defensive Warwick Line. It is a relatively small defensive earthwork that constitutes one of the few surviving and undisturbed remnants of the 1862 Peninsula Campaign in Virginia. It is representative of a major military feat significant to the outcome of the American Civil War and exemplifies diverse types of defensive adaptation. An archaeological investigation of this site could yield new insights into Civil War military architecture.

North End Historic District (Newport News, Virginia)

North End Historic District is a national historic district located at Newport News, Virginia. It encompasses 451 contributing buildings in a primarily residential section of Newport News. It is a compact, middle-class and upper middle-class residential neighborhood that arose during the period 1900-1935 in association with the nearby Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company. The neighborhood includes notable examples of the Victorian, Colonial Revival, and Bungalow styles. Notable buildings include the Walter A. Pos House (1902), John Livesay House (1906), J. E. Warren House (1905), W. L. Shumate House (1915), and Willet House.

The Queen Hith Plantation Complex Site is a historic archaeological site in the Oakland Farm area of Newport News, Virginia. It is the site of the central complex of Thomas Harwood's extensive plantation, established some time after his arrival at Jamestown in 1622. The plantation was about 1,500 acres (610 ha) in size, and extended along the banks of Skiffe's Creek. The site includes the foundational remnants of his 1643 house.

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