Basic City was an incorporated town located in Augusta County, Virginia, in the United States. Formed in 1890, it was named after a process for steel manufacture. This process was to be implemented in Basic City, and gave rise to land speculation. There was an explosion of manufacturing and commercial development in Basic City between 1890 and 1893 as two railroads crossed here, the Norfolk and Western and the Chesapeake and Ohio. Basic City was once bigger than the surrounding city of Waynesboro, Virginia. As the national economy experienced a depression between 1893 and 1896, sources of investment money disappeared and many new industries in Basic City experienced bankruptcy and closed.