247 Local Roofers in Virginia

Virginia (/vərˈdʒɪniə/ (About this soundlisten)), officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States,[5][6] between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are shaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Chesapeake Bay, which provide habitat for much of its flora and fauna. The capital of the Commonwealth is Richmond; Virginia Beach is the most-populous city, and Fairfax County is the most-populous political subdivision. The Commonwealth's population in 2020 was over 8.65 million, with 36% of them living in the Baltimore–Washington metropolitan area.

The area's history begins with several indigenous groups, including the Powhatan. In 1607, the London Company established the Colony of Virginia as the first permanent English colony in the New World. Virginia's state nickname, the Old Dominion, is a reference to this status. Slave labor and land acquired from displaced native tribes fueled the growing plantation economy, but also fueled conflicts both inside and outside the colony. Virginia was one of the Thirteen Colonies during the American Revolution, becoming part of the United States in 1776. The state would be split by the American Civil War in 1861, when Virginia's state government in Richmond joined the Confederacy, but many in the state's western counties remained loyal to the Union, helping form the state of West Virginia in 1863. Although the Commonwealth was under one-party rule for nearly a century following Reconstruction, both major political parties are competitive in modern Virginia.

Virginia's state legislature is the Virginia General Assembly, which was established in July 1619, making it the oldest current law-making body in North America.[7] It is made up of a 40-member Senate and a 100-member House of Delegates. The state government is unique in how it treats cities and counties equally, manages local roads, and prohibits governors from serving consecutive terms. Virginia's economy has many sectors: agriculture in the Shenandoah Valley; high tech and federal agencies, including the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency, in Northern Virginia; and military facilities in Hampton Roads, the site of the region's main seaport.

Geography

Main article: Environment of Virginia

A topographic map of Virginia, with text identifying cities and natural features.

Virginia is shaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Chesapeake Bay and its watershed, and the parallel 36°30′ north.

Virginia has a total area of 42,774.2 square miles (110,784.7 km2), including 3,180.13 square miles (8,236.5 km2) of water, making it the 35th-largest state by area.[8] Virginia is bordered by Maryland and Washington, D.C. to the north and east; by the Atlantic Ocean to the east; by North Carolina to the south; by Tennessee to the southwest; by Kentucky to the west; and by West Virginia to the north and west. Virginia's boundary with Maryland and Washington, D.C. extends to the low-water mark of the south shore of the Potomac River.[9]

The Commonwealth's southern border is defined as 36°30' north latitude, though surveyor error in the 1700s led to deviations of as much as three arcminutes as the North Carolina border moved west.[10] Surveyors appointed by Virginia and Tennessee worked in 1802 and 1803 to reset the border as a line from the summit of White Top Mountain to the top of Tri-State Peak in the Cumberland Mountains. However, errors in this line were discovered in 1856, and Virginia proposed a new surveying commission in 1871, but Tennessee disagreed, and in 1893 the U.S. Supreme Court decided in favor of the 1803 line in the case Virginia v. Tennessee.[11][12] One result of this is the division of the city of Bristol between the two states.[13]

Geology and terrain

Main article: Geology of Virginia

The Chesapeake Bay separates the contiguous portion of the Commonwealth from the two-county peninsula of Virginia's Eastern Shore. The bay was formed from the drowned river valley of the ancient Susquehanna River.[14] Many of Virginia's rivers flow into the Chesapeake Bay, including the Potomac, Rappahannock, York, and James, which create three peninsulas in the bay, traditionally referred to as "necks" named Northern Neck, Middle Peninsula, and the Virginia Peninsula from north to south.[15] Sea level rise has eroded the land on Virginia's islands, which include Tangier Island in the bay and Chincoteague, one of 23 barrier islands on the Atlantic coast.[16][17]

Rapids in a wide, rocky river under blue sky with clouds colored purple by the sunset.

Great Falls is on the fall line of the Potomac River, and its rocks date to the late Precambrian.[18]

The Tidewater is a coastal plain between the Atlantic coast and the fall line. It includes the Eastern Shore and major estuaries of Chesapeake Bay. The Piedmont is a series of sedimentary and igneous rock-based foothills east of the mountains which were formed in the Mesozoic era.[19] The region, known for its heavy clay soil, includes the Southwest Mountains around Charlottesville.[20] The Blue Ridge Mountains are a physiographic province of the Appalachian Mountains with the highest points in the Commonwealth, the tallest being Mount Rogers at 5,729 feet (1,746 m).[2] The Ridge-and-Valley region is west of the mountains, carbonate rock based, and includes the Massanutten Mountain ridge and the Great Appalachian Valley, which is called the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia.[21] The Cumberland Plateau and Cumberland Mountains are in the southwest corner of Virginia, south of the Allegheny Plateau. In this region, rivers flow northwest, with a dendritic drainage system, into the Ohio River basin.[22]

The Virginia Seismic Zone has not had a history of regular earthquake activity. Earthquakes are rarely above 4.5 in magnitude, because Virginia is located away from the edges of the North American Plate. A 5.8 magnitude earthquake struck central Virginia on August 23, 2011, near Mineral, and was the Commonwealth's largest in at least a century.[23] Due to the area's geologic properties, the earthquake was felt from Northern Florida to Southern Ontario.[24] 35 million years ago, a bolide impacted what is now eastern Virginia. The resulting Chesapeake Bay impact crater may explain what earthquakes and subsidence the region does experience.[25] A meteor impact is also theorized as the source of Lake Drummond, one of just two natural lakes in the state.[26]

The Commonwealth's carbonate rock is filled with more than 4,000 limestone caves, ten of which are open for tourism, including the popular Luray Caverns and Skyline Caverns.[27] Virginia's iconic Natural Bridge is also the remaining roof of a collapsed limestone cave.[28] Coal mining takes place in the three mountainous regions at 45 distinct coal beds near Mesozoic basins.[29] More than 72 million tons of other non-fuel resources, such as slate, kyanite, sand, or gravel, were also mined in Virginia in 2020.[30] The largest-known deposits of uranium in the U.S. are under Coles Hill, Virginia. Despite a challenge that went to the U.S. Supreme Court, the state has banned its mining since 1982 due to the dangers of radiation.[31]

Climate

Main article: Climate of Virginia

See also: Climate change in Virginia

Virginia state-wide averages 1895–2021

Climate chart (explanation)

J

F

M

A

M

J

J

A

S

O

N

D

3.3 4525

3.1 4726

3.8 5634

3.4 6742

4 7651

4.1 8260

4.6 8664

4.3 8463

3.7 7956

3.3 6844

2.9 5735

3.3 4727

Average max. and min. temperatures in °F

Precipitation totals in inches

Source: U.S. Climate Divisional Dataset

Metric conversion

Virginia has a humid subtropical climate that transitions to humid continental west of the Blue Ridge Mountains.[32] Seasonal extremes vary from average lows of 25 °F (−4 °C) in January to average highs of 86 °F (30 °C) in July.[33] The Atlantic Ocean and Gulf Stream have a strong effect on eastern and southeastern coastal areas of the Commonwealth, making the climate there warmer and more constant. Most of Virginia's recorded extremes in temperature and precipitation have occurred in the Blue Ridge Mountains and areas west.[34] Virginia receives an average of 43.49 inches (110 cm) of precipitation annually,[33] with the Shenandoah Valley being the state's driest region due to the mountains on either side.[34]

Virginia has around 35–45 days with thunderstorms annually, and storms are common in the late afternoon and evenings between April and September.[35] These months are also the most common for tornadoes,[36] fifteen of which touched down in the Commonwealth in 2020.[37] Hurricanes and tropical storms can occur from August to October, and though they typically impact coastal regions, the deadliest natural disaster in Virginia was Hurricane Camille, which killed over 150 people mainly in inland Nelson County in 1969.[34][38] Between December and March, cold-air damming caused by the Appalachian Mountains can lead to significant snowfalls across the state, such as the January 2016 blizzard, which created the state's highest recorded snowfall of 36.6 inches (93 cm) near Bluemont.[39][40] Virginia only received 13.1 inches (33 cm) of snow during winter 2018–19, just above the state's average of 10 inches (25 cm).[41]

Climate change in Virginia is leading to higher temperatures year-round as well as more heavy rain and flooding events.[42] Urban heat islands can be found in many Virginia cities and suburbs, particularly in neighborhoods linked to historic redlining.[43][44] Arlington had the most code orange days in 2020 for high ozone pollution in the air, with seven, followed by Fairfax County with four.[45] Exposure of particulate matter in Virginia's air has decreased 49% from 13.5 micrograms per cubic meter in 2003 to 6.9 in 2020.[46] The closure and conversion of coal power plants in Virginia and the Ohio Valley region has reduced haze in the mountains, which peaked in 1998.[47] Coal has declined as a source of Virginia's electricity from 44% in 2008 to just 4% in 2019,[48] and current plans call for 30% of the Commonwealth's electricity to be renewable by 2030 and for all to be carbon-free by 2050.[49]

Ecosystem

See also: List of Virginia state parks

Forests cover 62% of Virginia as of 2019, of which 78% is considered hardwood forest, meaning that trees in Virginia are primarily deciduous and broad-leaved. The other 22% is pine, with Loblolly and shortleaf pine dominating much of central and eastern Virginia.[50] In the western and mountainous parts of the Commonwealth, oak and hickory are most common, while lower altitudes are more likely to have small but dense stands of moisture-loving hemlocks and mosses in abundance.[34] Gypsy moth infestations in oak trees and the blight in chestnut trees have decreased both of their numbers, leaving more room for hickory and invasive ailanthus trees.[51][34] In the lowland tidewater and Piedmont, yellow pines tend to dominate, with bald cypress wetland forests in the Great Dismal and Nottoway swamps.[50] Other common trees and plants include red bay, wax myrtle, dwarf palmetto, tulip poplar, mountain laurel, milkweed, daisies, ferns, and Virginia creeper, which is featured on the state flag. The largest areas of wilderness are along the Atlantic coast and in the western mountains, where the largest populations of trillium wildflowers in North America are found.[34][52]

Five mountain ridges in shades of dark blue below an orange and yellow sunset.

Oak trees in particular produce a haze of isoprene, which helps gives the Blue Ridge Mountains their signature color.[53]

As of June 2019, roughly 16.2% of land in the Commonwealth is protected by federal, state, and local governments and non-profits.[54] Federal lands account for the majority, with thirty National Park Service units in the state, such as Great Falls Park and the Appalachian Trail, and one national park, Shenandoah.[55] Shenandoah was established in 1935 and encompasses the scenic Skyline Drive. Almost forty percent of the park's total 199,173 acres (806 km2) area has been designated as wilderness under the National Wilderness Preservation System.[56] The U.S. Forest Service administers the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests, which cover more than 1.6 million acres (6,500 km2) within Virginia's mountains, and continue into West Virginia and Kentucky.[57] The Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge also extends into North Carolina, as does the Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge, which marks the beginning of the Outer Banks.[58]

State agencies control about one-third of protected land in the state,[54] and the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation manages over 75,900 acres (307.2 km2) in forty Virginia state parks and 59,222 acres (239.7 km2) in 65 Natural Area Preserves, plus three undeveloped parks.[59][60] Breaks Interstate Park crosses the Kentucky border and is one of only two inter-state parks in the United States.[61] Virginia allows sustainable logging in 26 state forests managed by the Virginia Department of Forestry totaling 71,972 acres (291.3 km2),[62] and hunting in 44 Wildlife Management Areas run by the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources covering over 205,000 acres (829.6 km2).[63] The Chesapeake Bay is not a national park, but is protected by both state and federal legislation and the inter-state Chesapeake Bay Program, which conducts restoration on the bay and its watershed.[64]

Wildlife

See also: List of endangered species in Virginia

Two red-brown colored deer, one adult female and one young fawn, stand along a grassy area with pink mountains in the background.

An estimated five to seven thousand white-tailed deer, also known as Virginia deer, live in Shenandoah National Park.[65]

White-tailed deer, one of 75 mammal species recorded in Virginia, rebounded from an estimated population of as few as 25 thousand in the 1930s to over one million by the 2010s.[66][67] Native carnivorans include black bears, who have a population of around five to six thousand in the state,[68] as well as bobcats, coyotes, both gray and red foxes, raccoons, and skunks. Rodents include groundhogs, weasels, nutria, beavers, both gray squirrels and fox squirrels, chipmunks, and Allegheny woodrats, while the 17 bat species include brown bats and the Virginia big-eared bat, the state mammal.[69][67] The Virginia opossum is also the only marsupial native to the United States and Canada,[70] and the native Appalachian cottontail was recognized in 1992 as a distinct species of rabbit, one of three found in the state.[71] Whales, dolphins, and porpoises have also been recorded in Virginia's coastal waters, with bottlenose dolphins being the most frequent aquatic mammals.[67]

Virginia's bird fauna consists of 422 counted species, of which 359 are regularly occurring, 41 are accidental (vagrant), 20 are hypothetical, and two are extinct; of the regularly occurring species, 214 have bred in Virginia, while the rest are winter residents or transients in Virginia.[72] Water birds include sandpipers, wood ducks, and Virginia rail, while common inland examples include warblers, woodpeckers, and cardinals, the state bird, and birds of prey include osprey, broad-winged hawks, and barred owls.[73] There are no species of bird endemic to the Commonwealth.[72] Audubon recognizes 21 Important Bird Areas in the state.[74] Peregrine falcons, whose numbers dramatically declined due to DDT pesticide poisoning in the middle of the 20th century, are the focus of conservation efforts in the state and a reintroduction program in Shenandoah National Park.[75]

Virginia has 226 species of freshwater fish from 25 families; the state's diverse array of fish species is attributable to its varied and humid climate, topography, interconnected river system, and lack of Pleistocene glaciers. The state's lakes and rivers are home to Eastern blacknose dace and sculpin on the Appalachian Plateau; smallmouth bass and redhorse sucker in the Ridge-and-Valley region; brook trout, the state fish, and Kanawha darter in the Blue Ridge; stripeback darter and Roanoke bass in the Piedmont; and swampfish, bluespotted sunfish, and pirate perch in the Tidewater.[76] The Chesapeake Bay is host to clams, oysters, and 350 species of saltwater and estuarine fish, including the bay's most abundant finfish, the Bay anchovy, as well as the invasive blue catfish.[77][78] An estimated 405 million Chesapeake blue crabs live in the bay as of 2020.[79] There are 34 native species of crayfish, like the Big Sandy, which often inhabit rocky bottomed streambeds.[80][34] Amphibians found in Virginia include the Cumberland Plateau salamander and Eastern hellbender.[81]

History

Main article: History of Virginia

A painting of a young dark-haired Native American woman shielding an Elizabethan era man from execution by a Native American chief. She is bare-chested, and her face is bathed in light from an unknown source. Several Native Americans look on at the scene.

The story of Pocahontas was romanticized by later artists, in part because of her association with the First Families of Virginia.[82]

Virginia celebrated its quadricentennial year in 2007, marking 400 years since the establishment of the Jamestown Colony. The observances highlighted contributions from Native Americans, Africans, and Europeans, each of which had a significant part in shaping Virginia's history.[83][84] Warfare, including among these groups, has also had an important role. Virginia was a focal point in conflicts from the French and Indian War, the American Revolution and the Civil War, to the Cold War and the War on Terrorism.[85] Fictionalized stories about the early colony, in particular the story of Pocahontas and John Smith, first became popular in the period after the Revolutionary War, and together with other myths surrounding George Washington's childhood and the plantation elite in the antebellum period, became touchstones of Virginian and American culture and helped shape the state's historic politics and beliefs.[86][82]

Original inhabitants

The first people are estimated to have arrived in Virginia over 12,000 years ago.[87] By 5,000 years ago, more permanent settlements emerged, and farming began by 900 AD. By 1500, the Algonquian peoples had founded towns such as Werowocomoco in the Tidewater region, which they referred to as Tsenacommacah. The other major language groups in the area were the Siouan to the west and the Iroquoians, who included the Nottoway and Meherrin, to the north and south. After 1570, the Algonquians consolidated under Wahunsenacawh, known in English as Chief Powhatan, in response to threats from these other groups on their trade network.[88] Powhatan controlled more than thirty smaller tribes and more than 150 settlements, who shared a common Virginia Algonquian language. In 1607, the native Tidewater population was between 13,000 and 14,000,[89] but over that century, three-fourths of the native population in Virginia would die from smallpox and other Old World diseases.[90]

Colony

Main article: Colony of Virginia

Several European expeditions, including a group of Spanish Jesuits, explored the Chesapeake Bay during the 16th century.[91] To help counter Spain's colonies in the Caribbean, Queen Elizabeth I of England supported Walter Raleigh's April 1584 expedition to the Atlantic coast of North America.[92][93] The name "Virginia" was used by Captain Arthur Barlowe in the expedition's report, and may have been suggested that year by Raleigh or Elizabeth, perhaps noting her status as the "Virgin Queen" or that they viewed the land as being untouched, and may also be related to an Algonquin phrase, Wingandacoa or Windgancon, or leader's name, Wingina, as heard by the expedition.[94][95] Initially the name applied to the entire coastal region from South Carolina to Maine, plus the island of Bermuda.[96] Raleigh's colony failed, but in 1606, the new king James I of England issued the First Virginia Charter to the London Company, a joint stock company that financed a new expedition, which was led by Christopher Newport and sailed that December. They landed in Virginia in May 1607, and established a settlement named for the king, Jamestown.[97]

A three-story red brick colonial style hall and its left and right wings during summer.

Williamsburg was Virginia's capital from 1699 to 1780.

Life in the colony was perilous, and many died during the Starving Time in 1609 and in a series of conflicts with the Powhatan Confederacy that started in 1610, and flared up again in 1622, when led by Powhatan's brother, Opechancanough.[98] Only 3,400 of the 6,000 early settlers had survived by 1624.[99] However, European demand for tobacco fueled the arrival of more settlers and servants.[100] The headright system tried to solve the labor shortage by providing colonists with land for each indentured servant they transported to Virginia.[101] African workers were first imported to Jamestown in 1619 initially under the rules of indentured servitude. The shift to a system of African slavery in Virginia was propelled by the legal cases of John Punch, who was sentenced to lifetime slavery for attempting to escape servitude in 1640, and of John Casor, who w