Once home to a multitude of shops, stores, and restaurants, the Landmark Mall now sits empty and closed. The mall has undergone several changes in the past, first opening as an outdoor mall in 1965. When Sears finally closed in 2020, Alexandria was quick to start making plans on what to do with the 52-acre site.
Though there has been a load of coverage about the story behind T.C. Williams and the segregationist superintendent it is named after, there has been little coverage of Minnie Howard, the woman who the freshman campus of T.C. Williams is named after. So who was Minnie Howard, and why is she so important to Alexandria’s history?
There’s nothing quite like going to see a live theater production. Entering the grand venue, the cushioned seats slowly filling with eager viewers. The darkening of the lights, the pull of the curtain. The opening note reverberating through the auditorium as the live tableau begins on stage.
As I scroll through Instagram these days, I never would have guessed that our world is in a pandemic. And no, it is not because my feed is overtaken with aesthetically edited posts of books and food. It is because so many of my peers appear in pictures with their friends, no masks in sight, the distance between them closer to six millimeters than six feet.
Eight columns ring the stage, lit up by blue lights. The overhead lights flicker on and off as the conversations die down. The auditorium is dark and quiet, except for the faint creaks on stage as the actors take their places. The production is starting.
