East Zone

(Floyd, Franklin, Giles, Montgomery, Patrick, and Pulaski Counties and the City of Radford)

The East Zone features, as its eastern half, a prominent section of the Blue Ridge mountain spine, while its western half is within Appalachia’s long Ridge and Valley Province; bisecting this zone is one natural landmark (the New River, one of the oldest rivers on Earth) and two manmade passageways: the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Appalachian Trail. The East Zone is home to three Crooked Road Major Venues. In Floyd are the Floyd Country Store, which features year-round old time music and dancing, and County Sales, one of the earliest and largest mail-order retailers of American roots music. Another Major Venue is the Blue Ridge Institute & Museum at Ferrum College which serves as the State Center for Blue Ridge Folklore. Located at Ferrum College, this organization implements special events, workshops, and museum exhibits and annually sponsors the Blue Ridge Folklife Festival. Numerous affiliated venues and festivals dot the landscape in the East Zone as well. The East Zone is home to several sites of historical and cultural significance: the birthplace of Booker T. Washington (near the town of Hardy); the Smithfield Plantation (near Blacksburg); the memorial monument commemorating the life of frontierswoman Mary Draper Ingles (in Radford’s West End Cemetery); Calfee Park, the ninth oldest baseball stadium in the US (in Pulaski); Lover’s Leap Scenic Overlook (in Patrick County); Mabry Mill, one of the most photographed buildings in the US (along the Blue Ridge Parkway); distinctively shaped Buffalo Mountain, which inspired the popular inspirational book The Man Who Moved A Mountain (Floyd County), Virginia Tech (in Blacksburg); and Radford University (in Radford).