Last week, once Congress had finalized a roughly $2 trillion relief package responding to the coronavirus crisis, the lobbying firm Monument Advocacy held a virtual happy hour to take a break from the flurry of emails and working the phones.

Reunited on Zoom, the staff played a game, matching their teleworking colleagues to baby photos they had all provided in advance. In a round of trivia, they were asked which of their colleagues grew up in a house that had been occupied by Confederate and Union soldiers during the Civil War. The answer: Stewart Verdery, the boutique firm’s CEO, who was raised in the Richmond area.