Wharf Area Historic District (Boundary Increase)

Located against the base of Sears Hill in Staunton, the Wharf Area is a small district of warehouses and commercial buildings gathered around Middlebrook Avenue and South Augusta Street. Brick warehouses from the late nineteenth century line one side of a trapezoidal open space facing the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad passenger station, built in 1902, and its freight depot. Nearby are the Greek Revival former American Hotel, built around 1854, the Italianate Burns Building of 1874, cast-iron storefronts, a cast-iron footbridge, a railroad water tower and the four-story White Star Mills. The area grew after the Virginia Central Railroad reached Staunton in 1852, serving commission merchants, wholesalers, hotels and rail passengers. During the Civil War it held arsenals and supply warehouses. The district was listed as a well-preserved example of a turn-of-the-century warehouse and commercial area, with a boundary increase adding the mills, grain bins, footbridge and railroad tower.