The colorful canvas of Alabama's Paint Rock Valley (photos)

PAINT ROCK VALLEY, Alabama – Paint Rock Valley has an identity crisis, but not of its own making. The Valley, a 30-mile area made up of several tiny communities off Alabama Highway 65, is often confused with the tiny burg of Paint Rock, located several miles east along U.S. 72.

More confusing still is that both are located in Jackson County and neither The Valley nor Paint Rock is an incorporated town, making finding information online difficult.

Paint Rock Valley native Jean Arndt, retired from teaching English at Grissom High School in Huntsville, said the area is located along the Paint Rock River and includes the small communities of Garth, Trenton, Hollytree, Princeton, Swaim, Francisco and Estillfork, among others. She grew up in Trenton and attended Paint Rock Valley High School, which is, perhaps unsurprisingly, built of river rocks.

Most communities are mere dots on the map, if they can be found on maps, but Hollytree, Princeton and Estillfork still have post offices and their own zip codes. The Trenton Post Office was closed in 2011.

Arndt hopes to remind Alabamians of the quaintness and beauty of these small communities and shared photos taken on a recent road trip. The photos were taken by Arndt's friend, Marlene Rikard, a professor at Samford University in Birmingham.

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