1. In 1863, the Battle of Bristoe Station was fought in Prince William County during the American Civil War. Confederate General A.P. Hill successfully ambushed Union troops, leading to a Confederate victory.

2. On October 12, 1492, Christopher Columbus made his first landing in the New World on an island in the present-day Bahamas. Despite not actually landing in Virginia, his voyage had a significant impact on the colonization of the Americas.

3. Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States and author of the Declaration of Independence, was born on October 12, 1743 in Albemarle County, Virginia.

4. The Virginia State Capitol building in Richmond was designed by Thomas Jefferson and completed on October 12, 1788. The building has served as the seat of government for the Commonwealth of Virginia ever since.

5. In 1933, the Virginia Military Institute, a state-supported military college in Lexington, Virginia, became the first all-male military college to admit a female student. Mary Baldwin Williams, the daughter of a VMI professor, was allowed to attend classes, but the school remained all-male until 1997.