The Stonega Historic District recognizes one of the earliest and most long-lived of the coal company towns in the mountains of Southwest Virginia. The Wise County town, founded in 1896, was constructed along the narrow bottomland along Callahan’s Creek four miles north of the corporate headquarters and supply centers at Appalachia and Big Stone Gap. It spreads along both sides of the road that follows the creek and the railroad track to the head of the valley. The surviving buildings are grouped in three clusters: Red Row, a historically African American neighborhood of double houses at the upper end of the town; a central section of groups of mostly double houses known as the Park, Quality Row, and Hunktown; and Midway, a slightly later row of single-family homes near the entrance to the valley. Residential and institutional structures date from 1895 to 1952, built using unusual and innovative building forms and materials.