In Richmond, Virginia, a museum simply known as The Valentine tells the story of the city’s 400-year past. Set in a beautiful neoclassical building that dates to 1812, it was founded on the fortune one man made from his meat juice—which is exactly what it sounds like. Before it became a museum, The Valentine was the home of dry goods merchant Mann S. Valentine II. In the fall of 1870, Valentine’s wife Anne Maria fell ill, apparently suffering from a “severe and protracted derangement of the organs of digestion,” as…
