In the Norfolk and Western Railroad's Tourists' and Excursionists' Guide Book to Summer Homes (1882), this former boardinghouse was noted as “the Banner House, near the depot, can accommodate from 10 to 15 persons.” The two-story gable-roofed building features a four-bay facade divided by pilasters from which spring heavy wooden eaves brackets. The one-story wraparound porch is later. Now divided into apartments, the building represents an important but rapidly disappearing type commonly associated with railroad towns. Diagonally opposite Banner House, the former depot (1854) of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad, now a museum, is a long wooden building with a bay window on the track side for the station master to watch for approaching trains.