Each region has its colorful characters who stand out because of their strength of their convictions and large personalities. They are what make us unique in the world.
John Marshall (Photo via Library of Congress)
John Marshall (1755-1835)
A Revolutionary War line lieutenant and Valley Forge veteran, this former city councilman served 34 years as chief justice of the Supreme Court — the longest tenure to date. He gathered friends at what was dubbed the Quoit Club, enjoying parties, games and wine. He loved his wife, Polly, and their six surviving children. In an era of flamboyant male fashion, he dressed casually, even sloppily. A Shockoe market shopper mistook Marshall for an indigent and offered him payment to carry some goods uphill. Marshall complied, but whether he accepted the remuneration isn’t recorded.
Peter Francisco (Photo via Library of Congress)
Peter Francisco (circa 1760-1831)
The “American Hercules,” standing at least 6-foot-6, started life here as a foundling in 1765 on the docks of City Point (Hopewell), perhaps sent from the Portuguese Azores. Francisco heard Patrick Henry’s “liberty or death” speech at St. John’s Church and later joined the Continental Army. He became a living tall tale, credited with great feats of strength and derring-do. He also sang high tenor. After the war, he outlived two wives, moving with a third from Buckingham to Richmond.
Edgar Allan Poe (Photo via Library of Congress)
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49)
Born to actors in Boston, Poe lived about half his life here — at the age of 15, he swam more than 6 miles down the James River against the current — and he became a professional writer while boosting the circulation of the Southern Literary Messenger. Considered “every inch a gentleman,” his few good clothes included for the Richmond summer a white linen suit and a broad-brimmed Panama. He married his first cousin Virginia, whose prolonged dying sent Poe into a tailspin.
Elizabeth Van Lew (Photo courtesy The Valentine)
Elizabeth Van Lew (1818-1900)
Dubbed “Crazy Bet” by gossiping Richmonders, Van Lew was code-named “Babcock” during the Civil War, when the widowed cat lady ran a Union spy ring out of her Church Hill mansion. Afterward, President U.S. Grant made her Richmond’s postmaster. Her donations to civil rights causes left the elderly Van Lew destitute, and her grave went unmarked until the Revere family stepped in, to honor the assistance she gave to Paul Joseph Revere when he was a prisoner of war near Richmond.
John Dabney (Photo courtesy The Valentine)
John Dabney (1824-1900)
Born into slavery in Hanover County, Dabney bought his freedom while purchasing the same for his wife, Elizabeth. He rose in social rank through the dint of his drink-making and cooking skills, and especially noted were his juleps and terrapin stew. Dabney owned his Broad Street home, founded a catering company, and ran a couple of dining establishments. He carried a gun to work, though, because being a black man running a business in a white neighborhood during Reconstruction meant he never felt safe.
John Mitchell Jr. (Photo via Library of Congress)
John Mitchell Jr. (1863-1929)
Publisher, banker and entrepreneur John Mitchell Jr. was a vigorous advocate for African-American civil liberties within the growing shadow of Jim Crow. Born into slavery, afterward he made the fledgling Richmond Planet newspaper into a national voice and later served as a city alderman from Jackson Ward. A fastidious dresser, he enjoyed his chauffeured Stanley Steamer motorcar and wrote extensive travelogues. At a time when lynching occurred from the mere perception by a white person of a social slight by a black person, Mitchell carried revolvers while investigating cases of justice denied.
Mary Wingfield Scott (Photo courtesy Rosegill/Winkie)
Mary Wingfield Scott (1895-1983)
An architectural historian, Scott researched, photographed (in tennis shoes, sometimes from the roof of her car) and wrote invaluable guides to the city’s old neighborhoods and houses. She used her University of Chicago-honed knowledge to combat “the bulldozing brotherhood” sacrificing swaths of Richmond. With her cousin Elisabeth, she saved Shockoe’s 18th-century Craig House and started the organization that became Preservation Virginia. She also preserved most of 19th-century Linden Row, where bohemians and other characters lived under her indulgent regime.
Elizabeth Scott Bocock (Photo courtesy Special Collections and Archives, VCU Libraries)
Elisabeth Scott Bocock (1901-85)
Her monuments are the institutions Bocock helped start, including the Visual Arts Center of Richmond and the Historic Richmond Foundation. After her husband died and her children grew up, she housed coeds and lived in the back at the Bocock House, now part of VCU. Months after her death, the family found a Montaldo’s box holding a blue and white cotton dress. A note, in Bocock’s signature green ink and strong hand, requested her burial in the garment: “This is the coolest dress I own, and I know it’s hot where I’m going.”
Thomas Cannon (1925-2005)
“The Poor Man’s Philanthropist” grew up in Chase City, in a shack without running water or electricity. While serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, his escapes from sinkings and explosions persuaded Cannon that a greater purpose awaited him. Supporting his wife and two sons through 33 years as a postal carrier, in 1972, he started giving away what totaled around $158,000 to causes and individuals he often learned of through the media. Cannon gave a succinct description of how to honor his memory: “Help somebody.”
Dirt Woman (File photo/Alice McCabe)
Dirt Woman (1951-2017)
Donnie Corker, for most of his adult life, lived gay, out and in drag, becoming an icon for Richmond’s counterculture by being totally himself in a city that didn’t always encourage such behavior. Whether Jell-O wrestling GWAR frontman Dave Brockie (1963-2014) or crashing the 1990 inauguration of Gov. L. Douglas Wilder, Dirt was a Richmond original. A recent documentary on Corker by filmmaker Jerry Williams, “Spider Mites of Jesus,” will be seen here for the Richmond International Film Festival in April.
