Tracing Our Roots: A Tour of Laurel Branch Road

Tracing Our Roots: A Tour of
Laurel Branch Road
1:00 PM – 4:00 PM • $20

The tour begins in the Topeco community
and explores the scenic 7.38 miles of Laurel
Branch Road and about five miles of Floyd
Highway S as the bus tour returns to its

starting point. Additional points of interest
on side roads add to the written narrative
provided by the tour’s creator and guide,
Janet Slusher Keith, who grew up on a
Virginia Century Farm on Laurel Branch
Road. The Topeco and Laurel Branch
communities grew as early families built
their homes, farms, churches, and schools.
The anguish of the Civil War era remains in
the cemeteries and the stories: from raids
and epidemics, to sheltering deserters,
to Union Gen. George Stoneman’s army
camping on Shelor and Bishop Meadows
after emptying smokehouses, granaries,
and barns along the Pike from the Hylton
Plantation to Jacksonville.

TOPECO CHURCH OF THE BRETHREN
(use of church bus for tour) 3460
Floyd Highway S, Floyd, VA 24091
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