History of Virginia Beach, Virginia
Archaeologists and other persons have found numerous Native American artifacts, such as arrowheads, stone axes, pottery, beads, and skeletons in Great Neck Point.
Powhatan, whose real name was Wahunsunacock, was the most powerful chieftain in the Chesapeake Bay area, dominating more than 30 Algonquin-speaking tribes.
By 1607, around the time the first permanent English settlement was founded, the Chesaspeakes had united to fight the Powhatan Confederacy, suffering heavy losses.
Having no prior knowledge of the Europeans that would eventually land at Cape Henry, the Powhatans assumed the vision implicated the Chesepians.
In 1607, a group of three ships (The Susan Constant, The Godspeed and The Discovery), led by Captain Christopher Newport, landed at Cape Henry.
The expedition that founded the first permanent settlement set sail on December 19, 1606 from Blackwall, England on three ships commanded by Captain Christopher Newport.
On April 26, 1607, they made their first landfall at Cape Henry, in the northeastern part of today's independent city of Virginia Beach, a point where the Chesapeake Bay meets the Atlantic Ocean.
However the settlers left the area under orders from England to seek a site further inland which would be more sheltered from ships of competing European countries.
"[1] Other extant documents mention several forts at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay as early as 1610, possibly including Henry Town.
Adam Thoroughgood (1604–1640) of King's Lynn, Norfolk, England, the younger son of an influential family headed by the Reverend William Thorowgood, is one of the earliest Englishmen to become enamored with the area which became Virginia Beach.
This area had been passed by when the earlier settlements such as Jamestown were established beginning in 1607 in favor of locations further inland which would be less susceptible to attacks by other European forces, such as the Spanish.
Much of the land between Lynnhaven River and Seawell's Point was owned by three men: Captain Thomas Willoughby, Francis Mason and Adam Thorowgood.
Thoroughgood appears to have had the foresight to realizing earlier than many other leaders that Lower Norfolk County was too large for a single site for convenient worship and court affairs.
Lower Norfolk County was quite large, and stretched all the way from the Atlantic Ocean west past the Elizabeth River and, as Thoroughgood had earlier envisioned, soon required two courthouses to service the citizenry.
Princess Anne, the easternmost county in South Hampton Roads, extended northward from the North Carolina border to Cape Henry at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, and included all of the area fronting the Atlantic Ocean.
Beginning in the late 19th century, the small resort area of Virginia Beach grew in Princess Anne County, particularly after 1888 with the arrival of rail service and electricity.
Developers built the original Princess Anne Hotel which opened in 1890 at the oceanfront near the tiny community of Seatack, named for a British "attack by sea" during the War of 1812.
In 1891, guests at the new hotel watched the wreck and rescue efforts of the United States Life-Saving Service for the Norwegian bark Dictator.
The "Gay Nineties" and the turn of the century saw a boom in construction of hotels and guest cottages to accommodate increasing numbers of summer vacationers flocking to the seashore.
A railroad passenger station at Cape Henry built in 1902 and served by the original Norfolk Southern Railway was restored late in the 20th century and is used as an educational facility by Joint Expeditionary Base East.
During the next 45 years, Virginia Beach continue to grow in popularity as a seasonal vacation spot, and casinos gave way to amusement parks and family-oriented attractions.
The war also left the town with four permanent military installations, that continue to mark its landscape today: Joint Expeditionary Base East, Naval Air Station Oceana, Dam Neck Fleet Combat Training Center and the State Military Reservation (Camp Pendleton).
The change was seen as part of a larger reorganization of the boundaries and structures of almost all of the counties, cities and towns in southeastern Virginia which took place between 1952 and 1976.
An increasing number of African American college students converged on the Virginia Beach resort area for the Labor Day Weekend each year in the late 1980s.
Apparently fearing for their safety, Virginia Beach police abandoned the oceanfront, returning hours later in full riot gear.
[citation needed] Virginia Beach native Pharrell Williams organized an oceanfront festival called Something in the Water.
The event was, in part, a response to negativity surrounding the annual arrival of college students for spring break previously known as "Greekfest".
