Today, when we think of a tavern, we often imagine a place to order a meal or enjoy a drink with friends. In colonial Virginia, however, a tavern was something far more important. It was the community’s dining room, hotel, courthouse waiting room, post office, stagecoach stop, news center, business office, and social gathering place—all under one roof. Long before railroads, telephones, and newspapers connected communities, taverns connected people. More Than a Place to Drink Travel in eighteenth-century Virginia was slow and often difficult. Roads were little more than dirt paths winding through forests and across streams. A traveler might spend an entire day covering twenty or thirty miles before…