{"nrhp_refnum":"95001559","name":"Brooklyn Tobacco Factory","other_names":["Hightower &amp","Barksdale Tobacco Factory","VDHR Site No. 14-2"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"VA 650 N side, 0.25 mi. E of jct. with VA 820","address_restricted":false,"city":"Brooklyn","county":"Halifax County","state":"VA","lat":36.67945974400004,"lon":-79.14488984499997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1996-01-22","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Industry"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-story brick tobacco factory built about 1855 in the village of Brooklyn, Halifax County, Virginia, with two log pack houses and the ruins of a log dwelling nearby. It was built for Hightower & Barksdale and is attributed to builder Dabney M. Cosby, Jr.","why_significant":"The nomination calls it apparently the best-preserved antebellum tobacco factory yet identified in Virginia, and one of very few surviving rural examples. Its intact interior features allow the plug tobacco manufacturing process to be reconstructed. It is significant under Criterion A for industry and Criterion D for information it holds on early tobacco manufacturing.","narrative":"Brooklyn Tobacco Factory is a two-story brick building erected around 1855 in southwest Halifax County, Virginia, for the planters Joshua Hightower and Beverly Barksdale II. It produced flavored plug chewing tobacco, relying on hand labor, including enslaved workers before the Civil War. Production stopped about 1860, and the factory briefly reopened in 1880 under Beverly Barksdale III. Surviving features include a lift shaft, stencilled summer beam dates from 1855 to 1860, marks of screw presses, a work table, an office, and stained partitions that show where leaf was prepared, flavored and pressed. Two log pack houses and the ruins of a two-pen log dwelling stand on the property. Because the building was never modernized and later served as an agricultural warehouse, it kept excellent integrity. The nomination describes it as probably the best-preserved antebellum tobacco factory in Virginia and a rare record of early tobacco manufacturing.","period_of_significance":"Ca. 1855-1881","architect_builder":"Cosby, Dabney M., Jr. (attributed)","architectural_style":"No style","criteria":["A","D"],"status_note":"Used as an agricultural warehouse until fairly recently; as of June 1995 the factory was in the early stages of stabilization, with its future use uncertain.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:52:00.526325-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/82/6810/41681082/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_VA/95001559.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/95001559/1602a203ad-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/95001559/1602a203ad-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"Nyttend","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brooklyn_Tobacco_Factory.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Nyttend</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brooklyn_Tobacco_Factory.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/41681082","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooklyn_Tobacco_Factory","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q14712089"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/virginia/halifax-county/brooklyn-tobacco-factory-95001559/"}