The architecturally delightful Cambria Freight Station is a small-town celebration of early rail travel. The Virginia and Tennessee Railroad reached the Montgomery County town of Christiansburg in 1854 and a depot, built in the present-day suburb of Cambria, was opened in 1857. Union troops burned the depot in 1864; its replacement, the present depot, was part of the railroad restoration program instigated by the rail company’s new president, William Mahone. The Italianate style chosen for the depot was popular for railroad structures of the time. In Country Seats (1865), author Henry Holley states that the easily constructed Italian style was “appropriate for stations in rural settings.” The depot was converted to a freight station in 1906 when a new station was built nearby. The depot was sold into private ownership and restored for adaptive reuse in the 1980s. The former Cambria Freight Station remains one of the oldest depots in the state.