The Riverside Division buildings of Dan River Inc. represented several stages in the century-long development of one of America’s major textile companies, including the firm’s first cotton mill at the corner of Main and Bridge streets in downtown Danville. The complex consisted of six cotton mills and a flour mill. Also in the extensive assemblage were two masonry dams, warehouses, a dye house, a machine shop, a research building, the remains of a power canal, and a number of support buildings such as boiler houses and coal bunkers. The major architectural styles ranged from the relatively small, brick vernacular mills and outbuildings of the “cotton factory fever” of the 1880s and 1890s to the massive concrete modernist structure of the 1920s. The Dan River Inc. Riverside Division complex formed an important component of the industrial image of this Southern manufacturing city.

The original 1982 nomination for the Dan River Inc. Riverside Division was listed in the Virginia Landmarks Register only. An updated 1999 nomination was approved by the Virginia Landmarks Register (3/15/2000) and listed in the National Register of Historic Places (5/11/2000).

Alterations within the Dan River Mills, Inc. Riverside Division began in 2003 when the Main Street Bridge, a contributing structure, was replaced with the east half of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Bridge, a four-lane, divided structure across the Dan River. Near the district’s west end, the Union Street Bridge is still extant but is a noncontributing structure. In 2006, the Dan Valley Mill and Wheel House, both contributing buildings, were demolished. In 2008-2009, the extensive complex of industrial buildings and structures on the north side of the Dan River were systematically demolished after the failure of an attempted real estate redevelopment project. Due to these extensive demolitions, the Dan River Inc. Riverside Division has been removed from both the Virginia and National registers. In 2010, one portion of the remaining complex, the Dan River Mill No. 8, which is on the south side of the Dan River, has been individually listed in the National Register.