Roanoke Veterans Administration Hospital Historic District

Begun in 1934, this hospital campus on Roanoke Boulevard in Salem, Virginia, was built by the Veterans Administration as a neuropsychiatric hospital and still serves veterans today. The district covers about 206 acres and holds 83 resources, of which 54 date from the 1934-1950 period of significance. Buildings fall into three loose clusters: a central core with a monumental Main Building and H-shaped patient ward buildings linked by enclosed corridors, residential quarters along a curving drive, and maintenance and utility buildings. Colonial Revival and Classical Revival detailing is concentrated on the most visible buildings, and a planned landscape of lawns, mature trees and drives survives. The campus also documents racial segregation: one ward building and attendants' housing were set aside for African American patients and staff, a practice that lasted into the 1950s. It represents the neuropsychiatric type of Second Generation Veterans Hospitals, with farm and recreation areas.