Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Its Register listing is the Mason-Watkins House. Below: 1 old photo or paper from 1999 on and old-book passages.
Surry dates its founding to 1769 (Wikidata). Its post office opened in 1821.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Surry’s history is told.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archiveUSACE Surry Mountain Lake and DamFrom Wikipedia’s history of Surry.
Surry was chartered in 1769, and named for Charles Howard, 10th Duke of Norfolk, and Earl of Surrey. The first census taken in Surry, in 1790, reported 448 residents.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Surry, cut from the printed page as they were published.
The earliest manuscript record of the church in town has probably been destroyed, but a later record, much worn and torn in places, gives all the needed facts. It begins thus : Surry, Dec. 18, 1793. At a meeting of the Church in Surry the subscribers being appointed a committee by vote of the Church to make inquiry with regard to the time when the church was first incorporated in Surry, the persons who subscribed the covenant, and collect all other matters, as far as may be.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Walpole. The following petition, however, was by a vote of the town, granted on March 2, 1801: "The Petition of the Subscribers to the Legal Voters of the Town of Surry Humbly Shewith That as they Annually Pay their Proportion of School Taxes in said Town of Surry and that they are so situated that they are not conveaned by the school in their District, therefore they Pray that Said Town will set them off or grant them the privilege to pay their proportion of School Money to a Distinct in Walpole where
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
One decade in the archive so far: the 1990s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Nobody well known was born in Surry itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Surry had its own post office from 1821 to 1959.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
In 1769, according to Wikidata. Surry’s post office opened in 1821.
One place: the Mason-Watkins House (listed 1982).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (5), Wikidata (1), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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