Arts & Culture

Governor McAuliffe returns from Cuba having spent the last 3 days with his cabinet pursuing stronger economic and educational ties with the increasingly unrestricted nation.

One group you might not expect was along for the ride: representatives from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond.

This holiday season turned many consumers into bargain sleuths, trying to figure out the best deals, the best time to buy.... more decisions to make than ever before. But researchers say, it’s becoming clear that there’s also more to a great deal than price alone. 

Rajesh Bagchi is assistant professor of marketing at Virginia Tech, who studies judgment and decision making by consumers.

Christmas may have come and gone, but that doesn't mean the festivities have ended everywhere. In Richmond, more than half a million people visit Maymont each year -- a gilded age estate that's still decorated for the holidays.

Step through the doors of Maymont's stone mansion and you'll travel through time -- to the era of Vanderbilt and Rockefeller.

"When millionaires were building these fabulous, ornamental estates. They were not farms, but they were ideal worlds,” says Dale Wheary, curator at Maymont.

It’s the time of year for helping others --  donating to toy drives or food pantries. But, as Mallory Noe-Payne reports, this holiday season might be a good time to re-think what we mean, when we say charity.

Walk around Virginia’s capital city, and you will see people begging on street corners, or sleeping on park benches. And this time of year, says Kelly King Horne, people hone in on it. Horne is in charge of Homeward, Richmond’s planning office for homeless services.

In recent months, Richmonders have been deciding how best to memorialize the city's difficult history with race and slavery. Between state and city funds there are almost 20 million dollars to spend on a slavery museum and improvements to the city's Slave Trail.

Lumpkin's Jail, or "the devil's half acre" was the city's most notorious slave jail from the 1830's to the Civil War -- when Richmond was one of the largest hubs of slave trading in America.