Dunbar is a city in Kanawha County, West Virginia, along the Kanawha River. The population was 7,907 at the 2010 census estimate. Dunbar was incorporated on April 19, 1921, by an Act of the West Virginia Legislature. Dunbar is on land that was originally occupied by Native Americans with 11 mounds identified in the residential areas. The land was granted to George Washington for his military service and was named for Mary Dunbar after she inherited the land from Washington, although other sources say it was named for Dunbar Baines, a prominent area banker. Dunbar was a farming community until industries began to evolve in the City with the opening of glass and bottling plants in 1912. The Gravely Plow was invented in Dunbar in 1916.