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Mission of the Jacksonville Center

The Jacksonville Center's mission is to showcase, facilitate and educate in support of artistic endeavors and rural creativity in our region.

History of the Jacksonville Center

The Floyd Community Center for the Arts, Inc., doing business as The Jacksonville Center, is a private not-for-profit corporation registered in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the spring of 1995. It has a 501(c)3 designation from the Internal Revenue Service.

In early 1995, a group of citizen volunteers gathered to form a non-profit corporation called Floyd Community Center for the Arts, Inc., otherwise known as and doing business as, The Jacksonville Center. The aim of this organization was, and remains, to promote new and to augment existing cultural activities in the Floyd community and the surrounding region.

Prior to its incorporation as the Town of Floyd in 1896, the locality was known as Jacksonville, in honor of former U.S. President, Andrew Jackson. Just outside the town limits along VA Route 8 South and five miles from the Blue Ridge Parkway is an old dairy barn complex known locally as "The Old Jacksonville Barn." In 1995, this site became the focus for the group's vision, lent its name to the organizers' efforts and today houses cultural programs and activities ranging from art exhibits to youth programs. A small business incubator focused on arts, crafts and culturally-related businesses was added in 2003.

This direct connection with the area's history is appropriate for a group dedicated to the preservation of rural culture, past, present and future. As a part of a growing network of heritage tourism and cultural preservation hubs, the Jacksonville Center serves the larger community of Virginia's southern Appalachian Region.