The Laurel Fork flows for its entire length in eastern Randolph County. It rises on a divide on the Randolph-Pocahontas county border separating the watershed of the Cheat River from that of the Greenbrier, and flows north-northeastwardly in a meandering course between Middle Mountain and Rich Mountain, through the Monongahela National Forest, to its mouth at the Dry Fork just south of the Tucker County border, approximately four miles (6 km) northwest of Harman.[5] The lowermost seven miles (11 km) of the river are characterized by continuous Class 3 rapids.[6]
Two adjacent wilderness areas of the Monongahela National Forest (separated only by a road), the north and south units of the Laurel Fork Wilderness, are located along the river. These areas of the watershed were logged of all virgin timber by 1921, by a company known as the Laurel River Lumber Company, which also constructed a railroad along the river.[7] According to the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, nearly 87% of the Laurel Fork watershed is forested, primarily deciduous.[3]
^ abU.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. The National MapArchived 2012-03-29 at the Wayback Machine, accessed August 15, 2011
^Julian, Norman. 2006. "Cheat River." The West Virginia Encyclopedia. Ken Sullivan, editor. Charleston, WV: West Virginia Humanities Council. ISBN0-9778498-0-5.
^DeLorme (1997). West Virginia Atlas & Gazetteer. Yarmouth, Maine: DeLorme. pp. 37-38, 47. ISBN0-89933-246-3.