Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Hurt, VA

Hurt is an incorporated town in Pittsylvania County, Virginia, one of only three incorporated towns in the county alongside Chatham and Gretna, and it is part of the Danville metropolitan area.

The town's population was 1,267 at the 2020 census, little changed from 1,304 at the 2010 census.

The town's official motto is 'Small Town... Big Ideas.'

Hurt exists because of a bequest: landowner John L. Hurt Jr., who died in 1964, willed his estate lands to the community on the condition that citizens incorporate as a town within three years of his death, and Hurt incorporated in 1967 and received the land.

The community is named for the Hurt family — Colonel John R. Hurt was an early citizen, and Major John L. Hurt supervised gunpowder production at Clement Hill during the Civil War.

The land under Hurt was originally part of a 1741 land grant from King George II to Benjamin Clement, and gunpowder was manufactured at Clement Hill during both the Revolutionary War and the Civil War.

To bring jobs to town, John L. Hurt Jr. sold roughly 600 acres with water rights on the Staunton River to a textile company, and a textile mill — operated over the years by Pacific Mills' Klopman Division of Burlington Industries and later ITG — became the town's industrial anchor.

Hurt sits at the northern end of Pittsylvania County on the Staunton (Roanoke) River, separated from the larger neighboring town of Altavista in Campbell County only by the river.

The town covers about 3.51 square miles; U.S. Route 29 Business passes through it, while the main U.S. Route 29 bypasses Hurt and Altavista to the west.

Two Hurt properties, Hill Grove School and Locust Hill, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.