Appalachian Community Histories – North Tazewell, Tazewell County: Kelly’s Mills, the Streetcar, and Depot Memory on the Clinch
North Tazewell did not begin as a courthouse town, a county seat, or a settlement built around a public square. Its story began closer to the Clinch River, where mills, bottomland, roads, and railroad ambition came together in the late nineteenth century.
Before it was known as North Tazewell, the area was remembered as Kelly’s Mills. The name came from Judge J. P. Kelly, who owned a commercial flour mill there. In the years before the railroad arrived, the county seat of Jeffersonville sat about a mile and a half away, up from the river, serving as the political and legal center of Tazewell County. But once the Norfolk and Western Railway pushed into the Clinch Valley, the low ground near Kelly’s Mills became something new.
It became the place where passengers stepped off the train. It became the place where livestock, lumber, coal, poultry, butter, eggs, and other goods moved in and out of the county. It became a depot town.
North Tazewell was shaped by the railroad more than by almost anything else. The trains did not just pass through. They gave the community its reason for growth.
Kelly’s Mills Before North Tazewell
Long before North Tazewell became a separate town, Tazewell County itself had already taken shape in the mountains of Southwest Virginia. The county was formed in 1799, and Jeffersonville was established soon afterward as the county seat. The old county seat stood along routes that had carried travelers, drovers, lawyers, merchants, farmers, and families through the region.
The coming of the railroad changed that older pattern.
By the 1880s, the Norfolk and Western Railway was becoming one of the most important forces in Southwest Virginia. Coal from the Pocahontas field had already begun moving eastward, and the Clinch Valley Line promised to connect more of the region’s farms, forests, mines, mills, and towns to wider markets. For a mountain county where roads could be slow, rough, and seasonal, the railroad was more than transportation. It was a new economy.
In 1887, plans were underway for a depot town north of Jeffersonville, near Kelly’s Mills on the Clinch River. Judge Kelly and Captain C. A. Fudge both owned land in the area and helped prepare for the coming railroad by building houses and commercial buildings. Kelly already had his mill there, and he added a three story planing mill. The area was laid out as a small community called North Tazewell, complete with a park associated with the depot grounds.
That detail matters. North Tazewell was not an accident. It was planned around the railroad.
The First Depot and the Railroad Boom
The first depot at North Tazewell was built in 1888. It was a frame station that handled both passengers and freight. At the time, the station was often tied to the older county seat name of Jeffersonville, but the trains were stopping at the river settlement that was becoming North Tazewell.
The new depot quickly became a center of activity. Newspaper accounts from the period described construction work, grading, contractors, sawmills, mercantile houses, and excitement around the depot grounds. The railroad brought a kind of movement that could be felt in daily life. Goods came in. Farm products went out. Travelers arrived. Workers found jobs. Businesses gathered near the tracks.
Within a few years, the community had grown enough to stand on its own. North Tazewell was incorporated as a town in 1894.
That legal recognition tells us something important. North Tazewell was not merely a neighborhood of Tazewell in its early railroad years. It was a distinct municipality, born from the commercial pull of the depot and the industrial promise of the Clinch Valley Line.
The Streetcar Between Main Street and the Depot
One of the most interesting pieces of North Tazewell history is the streetcar that connected the depot with Main Street in Tazewell.
The old county seat and the new depot town were close to one another, but they were not the same place. The courthouse, stores, lawyers, churches, and older residential sections remained in Tazewell. The railroad station, warehouses, sidings, and depot business were in North Tazewell. The streetcar helped tie the two together.
The first streetcars began running in 1892. Early service was pulled by a horse or mule. In 1904, the line became electric after the town’s power plant was expanded. For a small Appalachian town, that was a notable achievement. Tazewell became remembered as one of the smallest towns in America to operate an electric streetcar.
The route ran between Main Street and the depot, carrying residents, travelers, and commerce between the old courthouse town and the railroad community by the Clinch. The fare was ten cents, and the line remained part of local life until 1933, when automobiles and buses made the streetcar less practical.
For forty years, the streetcar was more than a convenience. It was the physical link between two versions of Tazewell’s identity. One was the older county seat in the valley beneath Rich Mountain. The other was the railroad town at North Tazewell, where the sound of trains shaped the day.
Maps of a Growing Railroad Community
The Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps help show how North Tazewell developed.
The 1897 Sanborn map showed the depot, the main track, sidings, dwellings, stores, small warehouses, and a brick Lutheran church north of the tracks. By 1913, the maps were labeling the area as North Tazewell and giving it a population of about 500. The depot area had grown with more general stores, warehouses, a lumber yard, and a Standard Oil Company presence.
The maps also show how closely the town was tied to freight. There were sidings for railcars, buildings facing the depot, coal yard connections, and warehouses near the tracks. North Tazewell was not just a place where people boarded trains. It was a working landscape.
By the 1920s, the depot district had grown enough that the old frame station was no longer sufficient. Freight and passenger traffic had expanded, and the Norfolk and Western was pressed to build a better passenger station. Coal operators, lumbermen, livestock shippers, and local residents all had a stake in the depot’s future.
The result was the brick Tazewell Depot, also known as the North Tazewell Depot, built in 1928.
The 1928 Brick Depot
The 1928 depot is the building most closely associated with North Tazewell today. It stands on Railroad Avenue, a long brick railroad station that reflected Norfolk and Western design of the period.
The new depot separated passenger service from the growing freight business. The older 1888 frame depot continued beside it for freight, while the 1928 brick station served passengers and mail. Together, the two depots showed how much traffic North Tazewell handled.
Freight was the lifeblood of the station. The depot served a region that shipped livestock, lumber, coal, and agricultural products. Nearby Burke’s Garden, one of the most productive farming areas in the county, added to the station’s importance. Cattle, sheep, wool, forest products, and farm goods helped make North Tazewell a busy commercial point.
The 1928 depot also reflected the segregated South. Like many railroad stations of its era, it was built with separated waiting spaces. Later, as passenger service declined, the formerly segregated section was converted for freight use. That history is part of the building too. The depot tells a story of transportation, commerce, architecture, and the social order of its time.
Hotels, Stores, Warehouses, and Daily Life
Around the depot, a small commercial world developed.
The Clinchview Hotel stood across from the station. By the mid twentieth century, the Sanborn maps showed the hotel building in use again, with a post office on one side, along with a restaurant and a movie theater nearby. Stores, warehouses, produce buildings, and rail related businesses gave the area a different character than the courthouse square in Tazewell.
North Tazewell was a place of movement and noise. Trains arrived and departed. Freight shifted from wagons and trucks to railcars. Travelers waited with luggage. Mail came through. Farmers and merchants watched the schedules because the railroad determined when goods could move.
It is easy to think of small Appalachian towns as quiet places, but North Tazewell’s railroad years were not quiet. The depot district would have carried the sounds of whistles, engines, loading platforms, livestock, streetcars, wagons, automobiles, and people doing business.
The railroad made North Tazewell a gateway for the county.
Passenger Service Fades
By the middle of the twentieth century, the railroad world that had built North Tazewell was changing. Automobiles, buses, trucks, improved roads, and changing travel habits reduced the need for passenger rail service.
The Norfolk and Western discontinued passenger service on the Clinch Valley Line in 1959. The depot continued to handle freight after that, but the old age of passenger rail had passed. Freight service lasted until 1974, when the depot closed.
That closing marked the end of a long chapter. For nearly ninety years, the railroad had defined the identity of North Tazewell. Even after the last passenger trains were gone, the depot remained as a reminder of what the community had once been.
Separate Towns Become One
North Tazewell’s municipal history is important because it shows that the community had its own legal life.
The town was incorporated in 1894. Later charter acts followed in 1916 and 1942. For decades, North Tazewell and Tazewell stood beside one another as separate towns with connected histories. Tazewell remained the county seat, while North Tazewell remained the railroad and depot community.
That changed in the 1960s. Tazewell and North Tazewell were consolidated by court order, effective January 2, 1963. With that consolidation, the separate town government of North Tazewell disappeared into the larger Town of Tazewell.
Still, the name did not vanish. North Tazewell remained a place in memory, in postal use, in local directions, and in the landscape itself. Railroad Avenue, the depot, the river bottom, and the surviving buildings continued to mark the old railroad town.
The Depot Restored
The Tazewell Depot survived long after its railroad use ended. Many stations along the Clinch Valley Line disappeared, but the North Tazewell depot remained.
In the twenty first century, the building was restored and repurposed as the Tazewell Train Station and Visitors Center. The restoration began in 2014 and was completed in 2019. Today, the station at 135 Railroad Avenue is open to the public and helps interpret the railroad history of Tazewell and North Tazewell.
Its survival is significant. The Virginia Department of Historic Resources notes that the depot is one of only two remaining depots from the twenty nine that once served the 103 mile Clinch Valley Line between Bluefield, West Virginia, and Norton, Virginia. That makes it more than a local landmark. It is a rare piece of Southwest Virginia railroad history.
The building stands because the community chose not to let the railroad story disappear.
What North Tazewell Means
North Tazewell’s history is the story of a place made by transportation.
Kelly’s Mills gave the area an early identity. The Norfolk and Western Railway gave it growth. The depot gave it a center. The streetcar tied it to Main Street and the courthouse town. Freight gave it work. Passenger trains gave it movement. Incorporation gave it a separate civic life. Consolidation folded it back into Tazewell, but did not erase it.
Many Appalachian communities grew this way. They were shaped by a station, a mill, a mine, a creek, a store, a road, or a bend in the river. Their names sometimes survive longer than their governments. Their old buildings carry stories that official maps do not always explain.
North Tazewell is one of those places.
To stand near the restored depot today is to see the outline of the old railroad town. The tracks still mark the ground. Railroad Avenue still carries the name. The Clinch River bottom still explains why the railroad came there. The depot still faces the place where travelers once waited, freight once moved, and a small town grew up from Kelly’s Mills into North Tazewell.
The trains made it. The depot anchored it. The name remembers it.
Sources & Further Reading
Virginia General Assembly. “Charter: Tazewell.” Virginia Legislative Information System. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://law.lis.virginia.gov/charters/tazewell/
Virginia Department of Historic Resources. “Tazewell Depot.” Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Last updated June 2, 2023. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/historic-registers/158-5052/
Beckett, Anne Stuart. “National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: Tazewell Depot.” National Register of Historic Places, Virginia Department of Historic Resources, November 3, 2014. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/VLR_to_transfer/PDFNoms/158-5052_TazewellDepot_2014_NR_FINAL.pdf
Worsham, Gibson. “National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: Tazewell Historic District.” National Register of Historic Places, Virginia Department of Historic Resources, February 2001. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/VLR_to_transfer/PDFNoms/158-0005_Tazewell%20HD_2001_Final_Nomination.pdf
Virginia Department of Historic Resources. “Tazewell Historic District.” Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/historic-registers/158-0005/
Worsham, Gibson. “A Survey of Historic Architecture in the Proposed Tazewell Historic District.” Virginia Department of Historic Resources, 1999. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/pdf_files/SpecialCollections/TZ-044_Survey_Historic_AH_Tazewell_HD_1999_WORSHAM_report.pdf
Worsham, Gibson. “Historic Architectural Survey of Tazewell County, Virginia.” Virginia Department of Historic Resources, 2001. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/pdf_files/SpecialCollections/TZ-045_Tazewell_AH_Survey_2001_GWorsham_report_cost_share.pdf
Virginia Department of Historic Resources. “Special Collections.” Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/dhr-archives/special-collections/
Town of Tazewell. “History.” Town of Tazewell, Virginia. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.townoftazewell.org/history/
Town of Tazewell. “Tazewell Train Station.” Town of Tazewell, Virginia. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.townoftazewell.org/tazewell-train-station/
Town of Tazewell. “Comprehensive Plan.” Town of Tazewell, 2016. https://cppdc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Town-of-Tazewell-Comprehensive-Plan-2016.pdf
Tazewell County Public Library. “Genealogy.” Tazewell County Public Library. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://tcplweb.org/genealogy/
Library of Virginia. “Clinch Valley News.” Virginia Chronicle. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.virginiachronicle.com/?a=cl&cl=CL1&sp=CVN
Library of Virginia. “Tazewell Republican.” Virginia Chronicle. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.virginiachronicle.com/?a=cl&cl=CL1&sp=TR
Library of Congress. “Clinch Valley News.” Chronicling America. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn85034357/
Tazewell County Historical Society. “Tazewell Trolley.” Tazewell County Historical Society. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.tazewellhistory.org/tchscoloringbook/tazewelltrolley.pdf
Pendleton, William C. History of Tazewell County and Southwest Virginia, 1748–1920. Richmond, VA: W. C. Hill Printing Company, 1920. https://archive.org/details/historyoftazewel00pendrich
Harman, John Newton. Annals of Tazewell County, Virginia from 1800 to 1922. Richmond, VA: W. C. Hill Printing Company, 1922. https://archive.org/details/annalsoftazewell01harm
Bickley, George W. L. History of the Settlement and Indian Wars of Tazewell County, Virginia. Cincinnati: Morgan & Co., 1852. https://digital.library.pitt.edu/islandora/object/pitt%3A31735054780675
Leslie, Louise B., and Terry W. Mullins. Tazewell. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2006. https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/tazewell-9780738543864
Leslie, Louise B., and Terry W. Mullins. Tazewell County. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2006. https://books.google.com/books/about/Tazewell_County.html?id=OzMqly1hYhUC
FamilySearch. “Tazewell County, Virginia Genealogy.” FamilySearch Research Wiki. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Tazewell_County%2C_Virginia_Genealogy
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Appalachian Counties Served by ARC.” Appalachian Regional Commission. Accessed June 29, 2026. https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-counties-served-by-arc/
Author Note: North Tazewell is one of those Appalachian places whose history is best found through rail records, town charters, maps, newspapers, and local memory. I wrote this piece to show how Kelly’s Mills became a depot town that helped shape Tazewell County’s railroad-era identity.