031-5005 Slate Mountain Presbyterian Church and Cemetery

For additional information, read the Nomination Form PDF

VLR Listing Date 12/06/2006

NRHP Listing Date 03/30/2007

NRHP Reference Number 07000227

The Slate Mountain Presbyterian Church and Cemetery are prominently sited within Rock Castle Gap, on the Floyd County side of its border with Patrick County, near the Blue Ridge Parkway.  The church is one of the six Childress rock-faced churches located in the Virginia counties of Floyd, Carroll, and Patrick, built between 1919 and the early 1950s by Presbyterian minister Robert W. Childress. The six churches are significant in their embodiment of Appalachian patterns of Presbyterian religious worship and Presbyterian social activism in western Virginia. Slate Mountain Church began as a mission of Buffalo Mountain Church in 1930, operating in a one-room school in Floyd County. In 1932, the fieldstone church was built, after the Rev. Childress’s success with the local population. It was organized as an independent Presbyterian church in 1939.

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Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark

Updated: August 3, 2021