McCreary County

Let me start off by saying again, time is against us.  But the "rules" of our game are, that we put our feet on the ground in each county, snap a picture or two and try to learn something we didn't know.  That being said, one of the first stops on this weekend's jaunt was McCreary County.  Before we get into what we did, first a little history:

McCREARY COUNTY BACKGROUND

McCreary County was the last of the 120 Kentucky Counties to be formed.  It wasn't formed until 1912, less than 100 years ago.  It was taken from portions of Wayne, Whitley and Pulaski counties and was named for then Kentucky Governor, James B. McCreary.  The early days of the county were heavily influenced by the coal and lumber industries.  Today, tourism plays a big part in the county.  It lays within the Daniel Boone National Forest and shares one of Kentucky's rarest treasures with neighboring Whitley County, that being Cumberland Falls.  McCreary County also is home to a U.S. Federal Prison, located in Pine Knot.  

There is one definative characteristic to McCreary County that makes it different from the other 119 counties.  It is the only one that does not contain an incorporated city.  However, there are several communities within McCreary County, including Whitley City, Pine Knot and Stearns.  Whitley City is the county seat and with no incorporated cities, the fiscal court the governing body for the entire county.

OUR VISIT

We visited McCreary County as we were passing through, on Sunday evening.  It was starting to get dark, and we were not real sure where to go or what to see.  Then I noticed a sign that pointed to a Federal Prison.  We didn't even know there was a prison there, so we took off looking for it.  At this point, we were still in Whitley County and we drove for what seemed like forever.  We were about to give up, when I said lets go 5 more miles and if we don't see anything, we will turn back.  Around the very next bend, we saw the county line, so we kept on driving.  About the time we were ready to give up again, we saw a sign pointing towards the prison.  Once we made the turn, we saw the lights and knew we weren't far away.  Not wanting to fool around on federal property we stopped along the road and took a picture of the NO TRESPASSING sign.  When we turned around, we headed on into Pine Knot.  It's a small community of about 1,800 people. 

Unfortunately, it was getting dark and we didn't know where else to go.  If anyone has suggestions on where to visit, please let us know.  We are talking like the 120 in 12 may be an ongoing adventure, once we've seen all 120.

As a side note, we did visit Cumberland Falls, but not the McCreary County side.  I'll talk about that in my Whitley County post.