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The Lyceum Company, founded by Quaker schoolmaster Benjamin Hallowell and other Alexandria civic leaders, built The Lyceum in 1839 as a hall for lectures and debates on literary, scientific and historical subjects. The Alexandria Library Company, which helped fund construction, took up the bottom floor of the two-story Greek Revival building.

Union forces occupying Alexandria during the Civil War turned the stately building into barracks and, later, a hospital. The building became a private residence in 1868, then an office building in 1940. The Alexandria City Council saved The Lyceum from the wrecking ball in 1969, transforming it into the bicentennial visitor's center in 1974.

When The Lyceum officially became the city's history museum in 1985, it also returned to its original function as a center for lectures, concerts, meetings and receptions. The permanent collection chronicles three centuries of Alexandria history through prints, documents, photographs, ceramics, silver, furniture and Civil War Memorabilia. Highlights include items made in the city by the Green and Brothers Furniture Company, the May and Howard Joynt collection of Alexandria-made silver and locally produced 19th-century stoneware.

Text © 1997 Terry White, Drawing © 1997 Bill Harrah