Jolly's Mill Pond in Williamsburg, Virginia

On a quiet stretch of water just outside Williamsburg, recipes, archives, and heirloom crops are revealing stories that conventional history has overlooked. Dating back to the late 18th century, Jolly’s Mill Pond has become an outdoor classroom where Black, Indigenous, agricultural, and culinary histories are explored together around a shared table. In the late 1700s, the pond and its dam were created to power a gristmill that served the surrounding community. Although the mill disappeared long ago, the landscape continued evolving through centuries of farming, recreation, and changing ownership. Rather than restoring the property to a single moment in time, current owners Bill and Angi Kane have embraced these layers, transforming Jolly’s Mill Pond into a place where visitors discover history through courses, tours, and, most importantly, the foods and drinks people enjoyed, from tea to bacon to barbecue. That approach grew from the Kanes’ research into the property’s past. Historical records and archaeological investigations uncovered not only remnants of the original mill and dam, but also stories of people whose connections to the land had largely faded from public memory. Amo…