Unison Town History
From the National Park Service description:
The Unison Historic District is located in the village of Unison, in a rural area of southwest Loudoun County, Virginia.
The village is centered on a dogleg crossroads and contains approximately twenty properties that front along Unison and Bloomfield Roads. The linear district contains a collection of building types and architectural styles that tell the story of the village’s development from the early nineteenth century to modern times.
The town was officially named Union when it was established in 1813, although it had been referred to as Greenville and Butterland in 1802 deeds. It underwent yet another name change in 1829, when it became known as Unison. This change occurred because another town in Virginia named Union had been established earlier and therefore had precedence when the postal system did away with duplicate town names.
Although Unison has no official limits and was established by the General Assembly in 1813 containing 20 acres, it now generally encompasses a much larger area that takes in properties in the surrounding rural landscape. The approximately 70 acres that are included in the district are ones that are historically and visually associated with Unison.
Unison’s layout is not based on a formal grid pattern, but instead is dictated by roads, property lines, and landscape features. A comparison of the current configuration of the village with depictions of the village on mid-nineteenth-century maps shows that Unison has remained unchanged since that time.
Although there was settlement and religious activity in the area during the eighteenth century, it was not until after 1802 that most of the buildings in Unison were constructed. The period of greatest development in the village occurred shortly after its establishment and continued until the Civil War. During that time, houses were built along with commercial, religious, and transportation-related resources.
For the period of its greatest activity, Unison served the surrounding rural area as a commercial, religious, and social center. While its location miles away from major highways and railroad lines curbed its growth during the latter half of the nineteenth century, these same influences later helped to preserve it.
The 44 contributing resources in the district are made up primarily of residences and their associated domestic and farm-related outbuildings. Some of the other contributing resources include a church, former school, store, and saddle-maker’s shop.
The Unison Baseball Team - 1957
photo courtesy of the Thomas Balch Library - Rust Archives
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