Buffalo Valley School

Buffalo Valley sits where Big Indian Creek meets the Caney Fork, and at its height it was a transport hub with three grist mills, four general stores, a bank, a timber yard and two blacksmith shops. Floods ended that. One swept away a railroad bridge, and another, in the early twentieth century, devastated the town. The school, opened in 1929, taught through the decline and now works as a community center and library among a few houses and a post office. A railroad bridge over the Caney Fork here appears in a scene of The Green Mile.

What the plaque says

Buffalo Valley School Built as the Great Depression began, Buffalo Valley School opened in 1929 and served continuously until 1966. It withstood flood and neglect as the once-thriving agricultural community gave way to urban consolidation. An important example of rural American school architecture, it is listed in the National Register of Historic Places and still serves as an anchor of community life.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Burgess Falls State Park — 12 mi
  A day-use park on the Falling Water River, where a short trail passes three smaller falls on its way to a drop of more than 130 feet into a limestone gorge.
• Cummins Falls State Park — 14 mi
  A 75-foot waterfall and swimming hole on the Blackburn Fork, saved from a housing development in 2011 and opened as Tennessee's 54th state park.
• Cookeville Depot Museum — 15 mi
  The 1909 Tennessee Central Railroad depot in Cookeville's west side, now a museum with a model of the town in 1955 and a steam engine in the yard.
• Rock Island State Park — 24 mi
  A park where the Collins, Rocky and Caney Fork rivers meet at the head of Center Hill Lake, with a gorge of waterfalls below a 1917 dam and the remains of a cotton-mill town.

More markers nearby

• Last Stagecoach Hold-Up — 2.7 mi
• Center Hill Dam / Center Hill Powerhouse — 3.8 mi
• Granville — 9.0 mi
• Richard Fielding Cooke — 9.4 mi