Hurley, VA

The church on the hill is the Regular Baptist Church at the mouth of Pounding Mill Branch. The top story was taken off around the mid or late 1940's. The lumber dock was one of three in the Hurley bottom. The Big Sandy & Cumberland Railroad ran on this side of the creek. The school building on the left is the first high school in Buchanan County. The building to the right of the school was used for classroom space and also as a building to teach young ladies the art of homemaking, sewing and quilting. Mr. Arthur Ownby was the first principal. Mrs. Maude Smith of Hurley, was one of the teachers in the school. The buildings were torn down around 1929. The Norfolk & Western Railroad began buying right-of-way up Lester's Fork in 1925, and when the track and present day railroad bridge over the highway was constructed around 1929-30, the landsape was changed completely.