Situated on an isolated plateau astride Brush Mountian, Hensley Settlement flourished for nearly five decades as a community of 12 scattered Appalachian farmsteads. It was established about 1904 by Sherman Hensley. He and his family constructed the buildings, mostly of hewn chestnut logs with shake roofs. They split rails for fences. In the decade after 1925, the settlement reached a peak population of about 100 people. When they had to obtain necessities they could not produce, they walked or rode horseback out and back over steep, narrow mountain trails. During the late 1940s and early 1950s the settlement was abandoned. The buildings deteriorated quickly. Since 1965 the National Park Service has restored three of the farmsteads with their houses, barns, fences, and fields, as well as the schoolhouse and cemetery.