Although converted to an elementary school in 1968-69, the North River High School was a landmark in Virginia public education as Augusta County’s, and indeed the state’s, first consolidated high school. Opened in 1936, the school grew out of a concern for the crowding and inadequate facilities in the many small high schools in the various districts. Better road conditions made such a centralized high school possible and North River represented a consolidation of the high school classes of four districts, leaving elementary classes in the existing buildings. Employing the central auditorium plan, the new school was a straightforward design, one provided by the state Division of School Buildings. It included a library, offices, laboratory, and a home economics department. Agricultural classes were taught in a detached building. The North River High School was enlarged in 1942, but the original, three-part façade remained essentially unchanged at the time of its listing in the registers. The North River High School was replaced with a new elementary school building ca. 2000.

North River High School was listed under the Public Schools of Augusta County MPD.