Missing chalice discovered

This chalice, donated to the University by the widow of James Thomas Jr., recently was found among items slated for auction. A photo of Thomas appears beside the cup.

About 120 years ago, the widow of James Thomas Jr. donated a silver chalice to the University that had belonged to her husband, the wealthy benefactor who saved Richmond College after the Civil War.

The chalice probably was displayed in the James Thomas Jr. Memorial Museum and Art Hall, an elaborate tribute to Thomas on the old downtown campus. When the University moved to the current campus in 1914, many treasures from the old museum were lost, but the chalice landed safely in the Rare Book Room of Boatwright Library.

The only record of the cup comes from Ann Fowle Rumble, W'75, who compiled an inventory of historical artifacts on campus in 1974. Soon after Rumble completed the list, however, the chalice disappeared.

Two years ago, Karl Rhodes, editor of Richmond Alumni Magazine, found Rumble's description of the chalice in the University archives and started looking for the cup. Rumble remembered doing the inventory, but she had no idea what happened to the chalice. Neither did anyone else.

"It was weird," Rhodes says. "We were looking for something from 1853 that had completely vanished from the University's institutional memory—except for Ann's inventory."

The search continued until Rhodes received an e-mail in October from Jeff Evans, president of Green Valley Auctions. Evans had read about James Thomas in the magazine and wondered if the University would be interested in a chalice that had belonged to the 19th century tobacco magnate.

The cup was mixed in among the personal possessions of Stuart Wheeler, associate professor of classical studies, who died in 2006 after teaching at the University for nearly 40 years. Green Valley Auctions has returned it to the University archives, and it is on display at the Virginia Baptist Historical Society adjacent to Boatwright Library.

Richmond Alumni Magazine continues to look for artifacts from the old museum. Join the treasure hunt by visiting magazine.richmond.edu, or contact Rhodes at (804) 289-8059 or krhodes@richmond.edu.