Today, each visitor to Williamsburg, Virginia, steps back in time to the small town that was capital of Virginia, one of England's thirteen American colonies, & the focus of a significant plantation society. Eighteenth-century buildings, furnishings & gardens take their original form in this historic community. Colonial-period carriages clatter along Duke of Gloucester, described by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as "the most historic avenue in all America." Since 1927, when preliminary drawings for the restoration were completed, & John D. Rockefeller Jr. acquired key properties, the American past has been brought to life in an area nearly a mile long. In this hollow of America's past were enacted dramatic scenes of history with famous patriots & Founding Fathers. Restoration & discovery continue by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to the premise that the future should learn from the past.