A relic of a leading Virginia industry, this plain but substantially built brick building is perhaps the state’s best-preserved antebellum tobacco factory. Located in the heart of Virginia’s bright-leaf tobacco belt, the two-story factory was constructed around 1855 for planters Joshua Hightower and Beverly Barksdale II, probably by the Halifax County builder Dabney M. Cosby, Jr. Uncommonly large for its rural location, the factory originally manufactured plug or chewing tobacco.