Hours
Tuesday - Friday
10-12:00 and 1-5:00 (open late on game days)
Atkinson Museum Program Board Members
Student Museum Board Application
The Esther Thomas Atkinson Museum, named for its founder and first director, strives to promote an awareness and understanding of the history of Hampden-Sydney College as it relates to its role in the history of Virginia and the United States, while serving to support and enhance the College's mission to form good men and good citizens in an atmosphere of sound learning.
Current and Recent Exhibits
Louis Briel: Homecoming: Art from the Hampden-Sydney Years to Hollywood and Back Again
Exhibit runs through October 26, 2024
Briel’s art leaps from the canvas with colors sometimes whimsical and always lively. Student, employee, and active alumnus, Briel lived a life many only dream about while creating art from Hollywood to Washington D.C. before returning to his roots in Virginia.
Brian Grogan, Documenting the Cultural Landscape: 50 years Behind a Camera
Exhibit runs June 9 through October 10, 2023
For more than thirty years, Brian Grogan '73 has engaged in photographic documentation of historic sites and landscapes independently and for the National Parks Service and has over 10,000 images deposited in the U.S. Library of Congress.
Past Exhibits
Aero Obsoleta
Exhibit runs through March 8, 2022
February 23 | 4:30-5:30 pm, Gallery presentation by artist, Allen Jones
This photographic exhibit features the images of Allen Jones which incorporate his interest in WWII and aviation. This series of discarded, obsolete, and warehoused aircraft were captured in various locations across the US exploring the consistent theme of the artist – an exploration of how our culture’s changing technology and values impact the landscape around us.
An Officer and a Gentleman: The Life and Times of Lieutenant General Samuel Vaughan Wilson
April - November, 2021
10-12 & 1-5pm weekdays and special event Saturdays
Highlights from the Wilson Archives Collection
“During the weeks after (beginning his presidency at Hampden-Sydney College), I began to realize that almost everything I had ever done in my life was coming together in this job – serving as an instructor in a number of military schools, especially developing and teaching courses in leadership, language, and area studies; acting as a consultant to various foreign governments: diplomatic postings; running clandestine intelligence operations, as well as an intelligence analyst; briefing Presidents and their cabinets on intelligence issues; assignments in economic development in Third World nations; studies at the War College level; senior military command assignments and heading up major government agencies as well and, in the process, becoming well-versed in planning, programming, and budgeting. All of these things and more seemed to point the trail to Hampden-Sydney. Not any of the experience has been wasted in the job.”
The Look of Mortality-Leonard Baskin's Prints from Moby Dick
August 27-October 12, 2019
On loan to the Atkinson Museum from Lynchburg College, the prints of Leonard Baskin are filled with images of the harshness and vulnerability of the whalers as they follow Captain Ahab to his doom. FREE and open to the public
A Culinary History of Hampden-Sydney College
April 1-June 8, 2019
From Chocolate Punch to Pig-Nuts providing food for students has always been a challenge. Explore the providers and recipes that were mandated to be "any light diet agreeable to the students." FREE and open to the public
Virginia and the 1918 Influenza
October 22- November 30, 2018
Opening Reception, Saturday, October 20, 10 AM - 2 PM
presented in conjunction with the Honors Program at H-SC
FREE and open to the public
Echoes from the Past: Letters, Manuscripts, and Images From the H-SC Archives
January 24 - March 14, 2018
Unique historical documents gathered from the first 150 years of the College's history from the archives of the Bortz Library
How European Refugees Lifted 19th Century American Pop Art
February 5, 2018
The marvelous world of American lithography reached its apex through the wave of Europeans who immigrated after the Revolution of 1848 and brought advances in technique and art to the United States.
Take a Seat: A Brief History of Chairs
March 23 - May 14, 2017
Curated by students in the American Domestic Architecture class
Finding Old College
September 26, 2017
Lecture: Charles Pearson and Brian Haley: Finding Old College: A Geophysical Search for the Original Hampden Sydney College Buildings
Make a Museum Gift
Help support our programs. Check out the Sponsorship and donor levels.
Making a GiftHistorical Research
Submit your questions to the Atkinson Museum. Angie Way, Curator will respond.
Historical Research RequestEsther Atkinson Museum
Hampden-Sydney College
P.O. Box 745
Hampden-Sydney, VA 23943
Angela Way, Director-Curator
away@hsc.edu
Phone (434) 223-6134 | Fax (434) 223-6344
