Encyclopedia
The
Commonwealth of Kentucky is a
U.S. state located in the
Southern United States, although it is sometimes included, geographically, in the
Midwest. In 1792, it became the fifteenth state to join the Union. Kentucky is known as the "Bluegrass State", a nickname based on the fact that bluegrass is present in many of the lawns and pastures throughout the state. Kentucky is well known for
thoroughbred horses,
horse racing, local
bourbon whisky distilleries,
bluegrass music,
coal and college basketball.
Geography
- See also: List of Kentucky counties
Kentucky borders states of both the
Midwest and the
Southeast.
West Virginia and
Virginia lie to the east;
Tennessee to the south;
Missouri to the west; and
Illinois,
Indiana, and
Ohio to the north.
The Commonwealth's northern border is formed by the
Ohio River, and the western border is formed by the
Mississippi River. Other major rivers in Kentucky include the
Kentucky River,
Tennessee River, the Cumberland River, the Green River, and the
Licking River.
Kentucky is the only U.S. state to have non-contiguous parts exist as an
enclave of other states. Far western Kentucky includes a small part of land,
Kentucky Bend, on the Mississippi River bordered by Missouri and accessible via Tennessee, created by the
New Madrid Earthquake. Also there is a section of Kentucky across the Ohio connected to Indiana near
Evansville.
Kentucky can be divided into five primary regions: the
Cumberland Plateau in the east, the north-central
Bluegrass region, the south-central and western
Pennyroyal Plateau, the
Western Coal Fields and the far-west
Jackson Purchase.
The Bluegrass region is commonly divided into two regions, the Inner Bluegrass—the encircling 90
miles around
Lexington—and the Outer Bluegrass, the region that contains most of the Northern portion of the state, above the Knobs. Much of the outer Bluegrass is in the Eden Shale Hills area, made up of short, steep, and very narrow hills.
Significant natural attractions
[i]
...
", the only such phenomenon in the Western Hemisphere, may be seen in the mists of the falls.
Fork of the Nolin River [i]. ...
.
History
- See also: Kentucky in the Civil War, Kentucky Historical Society
Although inhabited by
Native Americans in prehistoric times, when explorers and settlers began entering Kentucky in the mid-1700s, there were no permanent Native American settlements in the region. Instead, the country was used as hunting grounds by
Shawnees from the north and
Cherokees from the south. Much of what is now Kentucky was purchased from Native Americans in the treaties of
Fort Stanwix and
Sycamore Shoals . Thereafter, Kentucky grew rapidly as the first settlements west of the
Appalachian Mountains were founded, with settlers entering the region via the
Cumberland Gap and the
Ohio River. The most famous of these early explorers and settlers was
Daniel Boone, traditionally considered one of the founders of the state. Shawnees north of the Ohio River, however, were unhappy about the settlement of Kentucky, and allied themselves with the British in the
American Revolutionary War . Kentucky was a battleground during the war; the
Battle of Blue Licks, one of the last major battles of the Revolution, was fought in Kentucky.
After the American Revolution, the counties of
Virginia beyond the Appalachian Mountains became known as Kentucky County. Eventually, the residents of Kentucky County petitioned for a separation from Virginia. Ten constitutional conventions were held in the Constitution Square Courthouse in
Danville between 1784 and 1792. In 1790, Kentucky's delegates accepted Virginia's terms of separation, and a state constitution was drafted at the final convention in April 1792. On June 1, 1792, Kentucky became the fifteenth state to be admitted to the union and Isaac Shelby, a military veteran from Virginia, was elected the first Governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
While remaining loyal to the Union, Kentucky was a border state during the
American Civil War. The state did not secede, and was officially neutral until a new legislature took office on August 5, 1861 with strong Union sympathies. The majority of the Commonwealth's citizens also had strong Union sympathies. On September 4, 1861,
Confederate General
Leonidas Polk broke Kentucky's neutrality by invading
Columbus, Kentucky. As a result of the Confederate invasion, Union General
Ulysses S. Grant entered
Paducah, Kentucky. On September 7, 1861, the Kentucky State Legislature, angered by the Confederate invasion, ordered the Union flag to be raised over the state capitol in
Frankfort, declaring its allegiance with the Union. In November of 1861, during the Russellville Convention, Southern sympathizers attempted to establish an alternative state government with the goal of secession but failed to displace the legitimate government in Frankfort. On August 13, 1862, Confederate General
Edmund Kirby Smith's Army of East
Tennessee invaded Kentucky and on August 28, 1862, Confederate General
Braxton Bragg's Army of
Mississippi entered Kentucky beginning the Kentucky Campaign. Bragg's retreat following the
Battle of Perryville left the state under the control of the Union Army for the remainder of the war.
On January 30, 1900, Governor
William Goebel was mortally wounded by an assailant while in the process of contesting the election of 1899, initially assumed to be won by William S. Taylor. For several months, J. C. W. Beckham, Goebel's running mate, and Taylor fought over who was the real governor until the
U.S. Supreme Court decided in May that Beckham was the rightful governor. Taylor fled to
Indiana and was later indicted as a co-conspirator in Goebel's
assassination.
Government and politics
Currently, Kentucky's governor, Ernie Fletcher, both
U.S. Senators,
Jim Bunning and
Mitch McConnell, and out of six
Congressional Districts, five
U.S. Representatives are members of the Republican Party. The Kentucky Constitution provides for three branches of government: legislative, judicial, and executive. Kentucky's
General Assembly has two chambers: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The executive branch is headed by the Governor. The judicial branch of Kentucky is made up of trial courts, called District and Circuit Courts; an intermediate appellate court, called the Kentucky Court of Appeals; and a court of last resort, the Kentucky Supreme Court. The Attorney General is
Greg Stumbo.
Where politics are concerned, Kentucky historically has been very hard fought and leaned slightly toward the Democratic Party. It was never included among the "Solid South," 59% of the state's voters are officially registered as Democrats, although that majority has slimmed substantially in recent election cycles. Kentucky has voted Republican in five of the last seven presidential elections but has supported the Democratic candidates of the South. The Commonwealth supported Democrats
Jimmy Carter in 1976, and
Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996, but Republican
George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004. Bush won the state's 8 electoral votes overwhelmingly in 2004 by a margin of 20 percentage points and 59.6% of the vote. The most solidly Democratic counties are in the mountainous eastern unionized coal mining region, especially Pike, Floyd,
Knott,
Menifee,
Letcher,
Perry and
Breathitt, and the cities of
Lexington and
Louisville. The
Jackson Purchase area in the far west was historically a Democratic stronghold but has moved Republican recently. Paducah author Irvin S. Cobb once wrote of the purchase area: "There was no doubt about our district. Whatever might betide, she was safe and sound - a Democratic Rock of Ages." The area was once referred to as the
Gibraltar of Democracy.
Demographics
| Historical populations |
|---|
Census
year | Population |
|---|
|
| 2000 | 4,041,769 |
| 1990 | 3,685,296 |
| 1980 | 3,660,777 |
| 1970 | 3,218,706 |
| 1960 | 3,038,156 |
| 1950 | 2,944,806 |
| 1940 | 2,845,627 |
| 1930 | 2,614,589 |
| 1920 | 2,416,630 |
| 1910 | 2,289,905 |
| 1900 | 2,147,174 |
| 1890 | 1,858,635 |
| 1880 | 1,648,690 |
| 1870 | 1,321,011 |
| 1860 | 1,155,684 |
| 1850 | 982,405 |
| 1840 | 779,828 |
| 1830 | 687,917 |
| 1820 | 564,317 |
| 1810 | 406,511 |
| 1800 | 220,955 |
| 1790 | 73,677 |
As of 2005, Kentucky has an estimated population of 4,173,405, which is an increase of 31,570, or 0.8%, from the prior year and an increase of 131,120, or 3.2%, since the year 2000. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 77,156 people and an increase due to net migration of 59,604 people into the state. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of 27,435 people, and migration within the country produced a net increase of 32,169 people.
As of 2004, Kentucky's population included about 95,000 foreign-born .
The five largest ancestries in the commonwealth are:
American ,
German ,
Irish , English ,
African American .
Blacks, who made up one-fourth of Kentucky's population prior to the
American Civil War, declined in number as many moved to the industrial North in the Great Migration. Today they are mostly concentrated in the southwest , the Bluegrass, and the cities of Louisville and Lexington. "American ancestry" is the largest reported ancestry group throughout most of the commonwealth in the Census and most of these people are of British or
Scotch-Irish descent.
Religion
Of Kentucky's 4,041,769 residents in 2000, 33.68% were members of
evangelical protestant churches, 10.05% were catholics, 8.77% belonged to mainline protestant churches, 0.05% were members of
orthodox churches and 0.88% were affiliated with other theologies - and 46.57% were not affiliated with any church.
Those churches with 1% or more of the population were the
Southern Baptist Convention , the
Catholic Church , the
United Methodist Church , the evangelical Independent Christian Churches/Churches of Christ , the mainline Christian Church , and the evangelical Church of Christ .
Transportation
Roads
Five major
interstate highways service Kentucky.
