KENTUCKY 



3223 



KENTUCKY 



+ .. KENTUCKY, one of the south-central 

 states of the American Union, named from a 

 Cherokee Indian word, which means prairie 

 or the barrens. It was the first district beyond 

 the Alleghany Mountains to be settled and the 

 second state admitted to the Union after the 

 original thirteen, the first being Vermont. It 

 is popularly known as the BLUE GRASS STATE. 

 Few names have ever been more justified, for 

 one who travels through the extensive area cov- 

 ered by this native grass will always associate 

 Kentucky with blue grass. Besides, all the 

 products which have made Kentucky famous 

 its breed of horses, its tobacco, its whisky are 

 identified with the region where the nutritious 

 blue grass grows. The state flower is the gold- 

 enrod. 



Size and Location. In size, Kentucky, with 

 an area of 40,598 square miles, of which 417 

 square miles are water, ranks as thirty-sixth 

 among the states of the Union. The state 

 nearest to it in area is Ohio, which is 442 

 square miles larger. Kentucky is very irregu- 

 lar in shape. Its northern boundary is formed 

 by the winding course of the Ohio River. Its 

 greatest breadth, between the celebrated Cum- 

 berland Gap and Covington, on the Ohio, is 

 171 miles; while the distance between the 

 southern border and Paducah is only forty 

 miles. Its greatest length from east to west 

 is about 500 miles. 



Its People. In population, Kentucky, with 

 2,289,905 inhabitants in 1910, ranks fourteenth 

 among the states of the Union, coming be- 

 tween Wisconsin and Iowa. The estimated 

 population, January 1, 1917, was 2,386,866. It 

 had in 1910 an average of fifty-seven persons 

 to the square mile, and ranked twelfth among 

 the states as regards density of population. 

 The Canadian province of Ontario has about 

 the same population as Kentucky, but since 

 1912 the latter has had an area nine times as 

 great. From 1900 to 1910 the population in- 

 creased only by 62,731 .people, or about 6.6 

 per cent; this constitutes its lowest increase 

 for any decade since 1820. Of the total popu- 



lation in 1910, 2,027,941 were whites, and 261,- 

 656, or 11.4 per cent, were negroes. Kentucky, 

 like most of the Southern states, has a small 

 foreign-born population, amounting only to 1.7 

 per cent of the total. Only about one-quarter 

 of the people live in towns and cities with a 

 population of 2,500 or over. 



The chief cities are Frankfort, the capital; 

 Louisville, the largest city in the state; Cov- 

 ington, Lexington, Newport, Paducah, Owens- 

 boro, Henderson, Hopkinsville, Bowling Green, 

 Ashland, Middlesboro, Winchester, Dayton, 

 Bellevue, Maysville, Mayfield, Paris, Danville 

 and Richmond. 



Religion. The Baptists are the strongest re- 

 ligious denomination, numbering about thirty- 

 five per cent of the tot d population. The 

 Methodists, Roman Catholics and Disciples of 

 Christ have about the same number of adher- 

 ents, each including about twenty per cent of 

 the population. The greater part of the re- 

 mainder of the state's church members belong 

 to the Presbyterian Church. 



Education. The educational conditions in 

 Kentucky have long been unsatisfactory, on 

 account of its large, scattered rural popula- 

 tion, but of recent years measures have been 

 introduced that have produced a noticeable 

 improvement. A strict compulsory education 

 law was voted in 1912, and the office of rural 

 supervisor of schools was created at the same 

 time. There is also an official known as "the 

 school improvement league organizer," work- 

 ing in the same direction. The educational 

 institutions are under the supervision of a state 

 school superintendent, elected for four years, 

 and each county has its own superintendent. 

 There are separate schools for white and negro 

 children. An important feature of the school 

 system has developed in the numerous corn 

 clubs among boys, to encourage scientific cul- 

 tivation of corn, and the tomato clubs among 

 girls, for teaching domestic science (see BOYS' 

 AND GIRLS' CLUBS). 



At the head of the higher educational insti- 

 tutions is the state university at Lexington; 



