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Rowan County, Kentucky

Historic newspapers, landmarks, and county history layers for genealogists and local historians.

—newspaper titles
—digitized titles
15historic places
—earliest paper
1856formed
24,662pop. 2020
285cemeteries
—CW battlefields

At a glance

Summary

The National Register of Historic Places includes 15 listed properties in the county, first listed in 1983. Most listings are in or near Morehead.

Summary generated automatically from the source data on this page.

Newspapers

Library of Congress

Newspaper directory data for Kentucky is not yet loaded on this site. Browse Rowan titles at the Library of Congress.

National Register of Historic Places

NPS NRHP

12 of 15 listings mapped; some locations are restricted by NPS to protect sensitive sites.

15 listed properties
PropertyCityTypeListed
Brushy Voting House No. 6MoreheadBuilding1998
Cranston Voting House No. 12MoreheadBuilding1998
Downtown Morehead Historic DistrictMoreheadDistrict2022
Farmers Voting House No. 2MoreheadBuilding1998
Haldeman Voting House No. 8MoreheadBuilding1998
Hayes Voting House No. 16MoreheadBuilding1998
Hogtown Voting House No. 4MoreheadBuilding1998
Morehead Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Freight DepotMoreheadBuilding2016
Morehead State UniversityMoreheadDistrict1994
Morehead Voting House No. 10MoreheadBuilding1998
Morehead Voting House No. 7MoreheadBuilding1998
Pine Grove Voting House No. 5MoreheadBuilding1998
Plank Voting House No. 15MoreheadBuilding1998
Rowan County CourthouseMoreheadBuilding1983
Rowan County Courthouse (Boundary Increase)MoreheadBuilding2017

Source: National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Property links open NRHP nomination files at the National Archives.

County formation

Newberry AHCB

Rowan was formed in 1856 (1856-05-01) from Fleming, Morgan.

ROWAN created from FLEMING and MORGAN.

Source: Newberry Library, Atlas of Historical County Boundaries.

Population by decade

Census

Rowan County population from 1860 to 2020 (Census historical series).

25k13k2,2821860188019201940196020002020
1860188019001920194019501960198020002020
2,2824,4208,2779,46712,73412,70812,80819,04922,09424,662

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau historical county population (Forstall 1790–1990) and public-domain / CC0 county population series through 2020.

Cemeteries & historical places

USGS GNIS

285 cemeteries and 3 historical populated places (ghost towns / former settlements) recorded in USGS GNIS for this county.

Cemeteries — 80 of 285 listed
NameLatLon
Abbott Cemetery38.05088-83.42936
Abbott-Sturgill Cemetery38.22408-83.32011
Adams - Plank Cemetery38.35481-83.40538
Adams Cemetery38.35479-83.4049
Adams Cemetery38.14503-83.37428
Adkins Cemetery One38.15189-83.25213
Adkins Cemetery Two38.18752-83.2853
Alfrey Cemetery38.10289-83.50715
Anderson Cemetery38.32648-83.45405
Anderson Family Cemetery38.31981-83.44816
Armstrong Family38.16706-83.43338
Back - Peyton Cemetery38.07168-83.43125
Bailey Cemetery38.2683-83.3328
Baldridge Cemetery Two38.15731-83.4545
Barnett Cemetery38.16796-83.24664
Barnette Family Cemetery38.17524-83.34817
Barrick Cemetery Two38.18174-83.33577
Barrick Cemetery Two38.18178-83.33591
Barricks Cemetery One38.18331-83.33382
Benjamin Caudill Cemetery38.18355-83.28017
Bently Cemetery38.14449-83.3746
Blanton - White Cemetery38.2901-83.41901
Bowman Cemetery38.12868-83.37117
Boyd Cemetery38.17809-83.33705
Bradley-Moore Cemetery38.28481-83.50701
Brown Cemetery Five38.2252-83.51338
Brown Cemetery Four38.06094-83.44255
Brown Cemetery One38.15903-83.45163
Brown Cemetery Three38.38128-83.4093
Brown Cemetery Two38.29046-83.33898
Brown-Fannin Cemetery38.17326-83.23245
Bruce - Tussey Cemetery38.19083-83.31398
Bryant-Goodman Cemetery38.17829-83.24941
Buckner Cemetery38.38035-83.42574
Bumgardner Cemetery38.25079-83.49325
Burton Cemetery38.30579-83.36473
Butts Cemetery38.18352-83.35125
C Jackson Cemetery38.22183-83.49531
Carey Cemetery38.12341-83.54018
Carpenter Cemetery38.15537-83.43678
Caskey Cemetery38.18912-83.51083
Cassity Cemetery One38.12329-83.53868
Cassity Cemetery Two38.14247-83.53213
Catron Cemetery38.19234-83.25753
Caudill Cemetery38.16837-83.44138
Caudill Cemetery38.23495-83.44267
Caudill Cemetery Three38.12678-83.29352
Caudill Cemetery Two38.23985-83.54233
Caudill South Cemetery38.15821-83.31797
Caudill-Norwood Cemetery38.15598-83.29473
Caudill-Porter Cemetery38.17328-83.29595
Christian Cemetery38.19449-83.29762
Christian Cemetery38.21851-83.31817
Clack Cemetery38.15838-83.42456
Clark Cemetery One38.16081-83.2515
Clark Cemetery Two38.31451-83.39491
Clearfield Cemetery38.16192-83.43094
Click Cemetery38.16234-83.22099
Coffey - Riddle Cemetery38.20199-83.47346
Community Cemetery38.13627-83.28141
Conely Cemetery Two38.26464-83.37406
Conn Cemetery One38.13605-83.25207
Conn Cemetery Three38.20451-83.33163
Conn Cemetery Two38.16929-83.25107
Cooper CemeteryTwo38.25784-83.49486
Cornett Cemetery38.0392-83.44477
Cox Cemetery One38.18063-83.26791
Cox Cemetery Two38.13264-83.22608
Cranston Cemetery38.26141-83.43496
Craycraft Cemetery38.13916-83.54815
Crisp Family Cemetery38.11379-83.31233
Crisp Farm Cemetery38.11558-83.31605
Crix Cemetery38.13806-83.33268
Davis Cemetery One38.16037-83.47766
Davis Cemetery Two38.22314-83.46701
Dawson Cemetery38.19896-83.31013
De Hart Cemetery One38.14615-83.23682
De Witt Cemetery38.17308-83.5175
DeHart Cemetery Three38.18501-83.2761
DeHart Cemetery Two38.20703-83.46928
Historical populated places — 3 of 3
NameLatLon
Big Brushy38.26135-83.49136
Mount Hope38.05073-83.44483
Slatey38.14824-83.59991

Source: USGS Geographic Names Information System (public domain). Cemeteries from the 2021 NationalFile archive; historical places from GNIS HistoricalFeatures topical extract.

Historical markers

HMdb link

Marker text and photos from the Historical Marker Database (HMdb) are not embedded here. HMdb allows non-commercial reuse with attribution, but commercial/compensated use needs written permission; this is a commercial site, so we only link out.

Search HMdb for Rowan County, Kentucky

Terms: hmdb.org/copyright.asp. Linking is encouraged by HMdb.