The Strasburg Stone and Earthenware Manufacturing Company built this two-story structure in 1891 as a factory intended to put the Shenandoah Valley’s long tradition of pottery making on a high-volume industrial basis. The project was part of the brief economic boom experienced in the northern Shenandoah County town of Strasburg in the 1890s with the construction of a new railway line in the eastern part of the Valley. The company quickly failed because of competition from other regions and other wares. In 1913 the building was converted into a railroad depot. The building is now the Strasburg Museum, which maintains it as an example of industrial architecture, a relic of the Valley’s short-lived venture into specialized industrial development. The Strasburg Stone and Earthenware Manufacturing Company building further represents a failed attempt to convert a handicraft industry into one of mass production.
Many properties listed in the registers are private dwellings and are not open to the public, however many are visible from the public right-of-way. Please be respectful of owner privacy.
Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark
Programs
DHR has secured permanent legal protection for over 700 historic places - including 15,000 acres of battlefield lands
DHR has erected 2,532 highway markers in every county and city across Virginia
DHR has registered more than 3,317 individual resources and 613 historic districts
DHR has engaged over 450 students in 3 highway marker contests
DHR has stimulated more than $4.2 billion dollars in private investments related to historic tax credit incentives, revitalizing communities of all sizes throughout Virginia