Grundy, VA

Grundy is Buchanan County's courthouse town at the meeting of the Levisa Fork River and Slate Creek. The county was created in 1858 with this confluence chosen for the courthouse, and the town's working map still follows the river, US 460, and Virginia 83 through the Appalachian coalfields. Coal shaped the county's economy, but water has been just as important: Grundy has endured repeated floods, with the 1977 flood pushing the town toward a rebuilt, elevated center rather than simply returning to the old river edge.

That change is easy to understand when you look at Grundy's newer institutions. The Appalachian School of Law opened in 1997 and remains on Edgewater Drive, with programs in environmental law, hands-on learning, and medical-legal partnerships. It sits alongside the county courthouse and local government as part of a town trying to keep its civic center useful after the coal years. The local scale is small, but the geography is not: steep ridges, a narrow river valley, and two state routes funnel people through Buchanan County's seat. Grundy reads as an Appalachian courthouse town that has had to rebuild its relationship with the water.