Oak Hill dates to 1820, and 2 of its places are on the National Register
More historic than 59% of U.S. towns · #35 of 61 in West Virginia. What drives it
Most of Oak Hill was built recently: 8% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1974. Its Register listings are the Oak Hill Railroad Depot and the Oak Hill High School. Below: maps from 1913 on and the census since 1910.
Founding year: Wikidata; Wikipedia’s history section gives the same year. First post office: 1857.The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Oak Hill’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Oak Hill is more historic than 59% of U.S. towns, #35 of 61 in West Virginia. Its age holds the grade up; its share of homes from before 1940 pulls it down.
B
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Oak Hill’s overall grade.
West Virginia towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical West Virginia town has 29.6 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Oak Hill’s 2.5 sits near the middle of its state (40% of West Virginia towns have fewer) while its 2 listings outnumber those of 60% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from C+ to B+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±3.0 points). Two sources give 1820.
Founding year: Wikidata (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Oak Hill’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Lost post offices, old corners, places now gone and burying grounds
Oak Hill’s post office has been open since 1857. Three other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
Oak Hill
1857–today
Concho
1893–1942
Rend
1900–1905
Erskine
1902–1910
Minden
1905–today
18501940today
Hamlets and corners on the map
ConchoEast Oak HillErskineHarlem HeightsMindenOak Hill JunctionOgdenRocklickRosedale
Gone or out of use
Church of GodchurchCollins High SchoolschoolEast End SchoolschoolOak Hill East End Elementary SchoolschoolOak Hill Elementary SchoolschoolOakville Schoolschool
1cemetery inside Oak Hill
High Lawn Memorial Park
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Help out
Start Oak Hill’s collection
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Oak Hill’s history is told.
Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Oak Hill was settled in 1820. The community was so named on account of an oak tree at the elevated town site. It was incorporated as a town in 1905.
Oak Hill is the supposed place of death of Hank Williams. According to his driver Charles Carr, they had stopped at a gas station in Oak Hill and found Williams dead in the backseat. On March 26, 2016, the city was honored with a historical marker to pay tribute to Williams' memory.
Passages that mention Oak Hill, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of fayette county west virginia1926 · page 690Read the page →
Read the text
One of the finest churches in the county, located in the city of Oak Hill, the Oak Hill Baptist Church was erected by the skill of negroes. The Oak Hill hospital, and the Fayette wholesale furniture Company building; the Simmons high school building and the Shepherds hotel, located in Montgomery are monuments of their skill and labor.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
History of fayette county west virginia1926 · page 475Read the page →
Read the text
Commensurate with the growth and development of Oak Hill as a commercial and religious center has been the growth of her pubhe school system, until today her schools stand second to none in the county and have an enrollment greater than that of any other town in the county. The history of education in Oak Hill carries us back to the year 1850, when the first school was established. The “nay school,’’ as it was called, was started in a log structure near the present site of the Merchants and Miners Bank. It was a sub-
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.
Timeline
Oak Hill, 1820 to 1976
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In 1820, according to Wikidata and Wikipedia’s history of the town. Oak Hill’s post office opened in 1857, and the census of 1910 counted 764 people here.
How does Oak Hill rank for history?
Oak Hill is more historic than 59% of U.S. towns, #35 of 61 in West Virginia. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Oak Hill?
Two places: the Oak Hill Railroad Depot (listed 1995) and the Oak Hill High School (2020).
How old are the homes in Oak Hill?
8% of Oak Hill’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±3.0 points), against a typical 13% for a West Virginia town; the median home was built in 1974.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (2), Wikidata (2), the National Register of Historic Places (2), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System, Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress) 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.
2026
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