Historical Background Many of the churches of Allegheny were constructed around the late 19th and early 20th century when access to sawmills encouraged a boom of church building. The earliest surviving church building is the 1870 Piney Creek Baptist Church. Baptists and Methodist churches dominate the landscape.” Typically these turn of the century churches are plain, front-gabled, rectangular structures clad in weatherboard. Many of the churches have projecting vestibules. Baptist Churches are more plain that Methodist. The Antioch Methodist Church in Roaring Gap is one of a few churches with steeples. Two churches stand out as more elaborate than most: Mt. Carmel Baptist Church and Glade Valley Presbyterian. With their Gothic-influenced windows and bell towers, these two churches stand out. The Antioch Methodist Church in Roaring Gap was established on this site in 1850. Among the early church leaders was the Reverend Morgan Bryant, renowned preacher in Western North Carolina, and Reverend Thomas Smith. By 1880 the congregation had diminished and the original log structure was in a state of disrepair. About 1895 the men of the community led by John Simmons and his brother Thomas built the wood frame church that stands today.32 The cemetery serves as the final resting-place for the first settlers of Alleghany County, Absolom and Agnes Smith, who came to the area between 1770 and 1775. The Smiths eloped to this area from Norfolk, Virginia, where Absolom was indentured to a wealthy landowner. When Absolom fell in love with the landowner’s daughter, Agnes, the two fled to North Carolina where Virginia laws had no jurisdiction.–NCDOT