In the first part of a two-phased project, Hanbury Preservation Consulting, in collaboration with the William and Mary Center for Archaeological Research, conducted a reconnaissance survey of the proposed South Rockfish Valley Rural Historic District. Eighty-six primary resources set within 1,620 acres of rolling Nelson County, Virginia countryside were mapped and photographed. Written descriptions were created, baseline data collected, and all added to the state's property database. Resources dated from as early as the late early eighteenth century. High style residences, bridges, a mill, churches, stores, schools and agricultural buildings, including an apple packing shed, were documented.
The survey work served as the basis for a National Register nomination, completed under Phase 2 of the project.