Google Earth--South America, KY

Google Earth--South America, KY


For those of you who research and have not used Google Earth, I wanted to bring it to your attention. A while back I discovered Google Earth on Matt Cutts’ blog. Matt Cutts is the Google Guy, and he is from Kentucky! Matts blog

I was searching Knox County KY for some names, since Whitley County was formed from Knox, I searched in Whitley as well, and found the names I was looking for lived in the South America district. I thought how strange it seemed for a place in Kentucky to be named South America. With more searching I found that South America is located at Frakes, Kentucky. Frakes is in now Bell County on KY 190 and Pine Creek, 14 and a half miles SW of Pineville. See Google Books, Kentucky Kentucky Place Names by Robert M. Rennick

I then went to Google Earth and searched for Frakes, KY. This map has many features, I just use the free one (you have to download it). I could spend days with this feature and enjoy seeing the lay of the land where my families lived, mostly hills and hollows (hollers). Google Earth url

Berea College has some information in their Southern Appalachia Archives on the Henderson Settlement which was located in South America: Hiram Frakes, a Methodist minister, founded Henderson Settlement in 1925, chiefly as a community center and educational institution. It is located in southern Bell County, Kentucky, a few miles northeast of Jellico, Tennessee. The area was quite isolated at the time and had come to be known locally as “South America.”

Here is one census where you can look for names; 1860 Whitley County KY census, South America, look for numbers 634-645.