Breaks is a small

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

and

census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

(CDP) located mostly in Buchanan County,

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

, United States. A small portion of the CDP is in Dickenson County. Breaks is located very close to the

Kentucky Kentucky (, ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north, West Virginia to the ...

border and is east of

Breaks Interstate Park Breaks Interstate Park, also known as "the Breaks," is a bi-state state park located partly in southeastern Kentucky and southwestern Virginia in the Jefferson National Forest, at the northeastern terminus of Pine Mountain. The land is manage ...

. Breaks gets its name in reference to the "break" in Pine Mountain, a mountain range that spans the Kentucky-Virginia border and ends near the community of Breaks. It was first listed as a CDP in the 2020 census with a population of 144. It was in Breaks that

U.S. Senator The United States Senate is a chamber of the bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and House have the authority under Article One of the ...

George Allen called

S. R. Sidarth The controversies of the 2006 United States Senate election in Virginia involved both Republican incumbent senator George Allen and Democratic opponent Jim Webb. However, a majority of these controversies negatively impacted Allen and are beli ...

, a volunteer for the

Jim Webb James Henry Webb Jr. (born February 9, 1946) is an American politician and author. He has served as a United States senator from Virginia, Secretary of the Navy, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs, Counsel for the United States ...

campaign and an

Indian American Indian Americans are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly from India. The terms Asian Indian and East Indian are used to avoid confusion with Native Americans in the United States, Native Americans in the United States, who ar ...

, a

macaca The macaques () constitute a genus (''Macaca'') of gregarious Old World monkeys of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. The 23 species of macaques inhabit ranges throughout Asia, North Africa, and Europe (in Gibraltar). Macaques are principally fru ...

. This started a controversy that gained national attention.

Demographics

Breaks has a population of 377 people who are all white with 64.1% who are married, 34% married with children and 18.9% have children but are single.

Attractions

Russell Fork The Russell Fork, 1975 Board on Geographic Names decision is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed June 13, 2011 tributary of the Levisa Fork in southwestern Virginia and sout ...

, a popular whitewater rafting stream * Willowbrook Country Club, a nine-hole golf course

Demographics

Breaks first appeared as a

census designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

in the 2020 U.S. Census.

References

Census-designated places in Buchanan County, Virginia Census-designated places in Dickenson County, Virginia Census-designated places in Virginia Unincorporated communities in Buchanan County, Virginia Unincorporated communities in Dickenson County, Virginia Unincorporated communities in Virginia {{DickensonCountyVA-geo-stub