1 June: Kentucky

On this date in 1792, Kentucky was admitted to the union, becoming the 15th state. 10 things you might not know about Kentucky:

1. Experts disagree on how the state got its name. They do agree the name is of Native American origin, but which tribe and which word is open for debate. The three contenders are: the Wyandot name for the area, Kah-ten-tah-teh, which translates as “Land of Tomorrow”; the Shawnee name for the area, Kain-tuck-ee, meaning “At the Head of the River”; or the Iroquoian or Mohawk word Kentucke meaning “among the meadows.”
2. It used to be a county in Virginia, established in 1776. However, the state capital, Richmond, was so far away that the people of Kentucky County didn't feel it served them adequately and started angling to go it alone, finally granted in 1792.
3. The state capital is Frankfort, which became capital in 1792 after pledging more manpower toward the construction of a statehouse than any other city. The first settlement in what is now Kentucky was Harrodstown (now Harrodsburg), which was founded in 1774. It was named after James Harrod who led a team of area surveyors.
4. It's nicknamed the Bluegrass state after a type of grass which grows there. It's usually Green, like any other grass, but in spring it produces bluish buds which make fields of it look Blue. This in turn gave rise to the state Music – Bluegrass Music. This became popular when a singer named Bill Monroe took traditional European music and made it faster, added different instruments such as the banjo and mandolin and sang with a voice which was a “high lonesome sound.”
5. The state tree was once the Kentucky coffee tree, but this changed in 1976 and it's now the tulip tree. The state motto is "United We Stand, Divided We Fall"; the state animal is the grey squirrel; the state fish: Kentucky spotted bass; state fruit: blackberry; state butterfly: viceroy; state drink: Milk; state flower: goldenrod; state gemstone: freshwater pearl; state musical instrument: Appalachian dulcimer; state dance: clogging. There are two state songs: My Old Kentucky Home, and a Bluegrass state song, Blue Moon of Kentucky.
6. Bourbon Whiskey is a big thing here. In fact, there are more barrels of the stuff currently ageing in cellars than there are people living in the state.
7. 17 square miles of Kentucky isn't actually physically attached to the rest of the state at all. This was the result of a surveying error in the late 18th century. It's now known as the Kentucky Bend, and is located in an oxbow bend of the Mississippi River at the state’s south-westernmost point. It connects with Tennessee directly to the south, but not with the rest of Kentucky at all. There are about 17 people living there who conduct most of their day to day business in Tennessee but when it comes to voting, they have to make a 40 mile trip to get into Kentucky.
8. Another anomaly is that the most fertile land in the state is in Barren County.
9. Some of the things Kentucky is home to: the oldest continuously held horse race in the country (Kentucky Derby); the world’s largest Fireworks display (Thunder Over Louisville, the opening ceremony for the former); the world’s longest cave (Mammoth Cave, 400 miles which have been explored and much more which hasn't); the first commercial oil well; the first commercial winery in the USA (opened in 1799 near Lexington and is called First Vineyard); Middlesboro, the only city in the United States built within a meteor crater; The first Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant (a service station opened by Harland Sanders in 1930, in the town of Corbin); and the largest amount of gold stored anywhere in the world ($6 billion worth at Fort Knox).
10. Famous people from Kentucky include Abraham Lincoln, President of the Union, and Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy; Mildred and Patty Hill, who wrote the tune to “Happy Birthday to you”; actors George Clooney, Johnny Depp, Jennifer Lawrence, Melissa McBride (The Walking Dead, and also Chris Hardwick who hosts its companion show, Talking Dead); Film Director John Carpenter; boxer Muhammad Ali; singers Billy Ray Cyrus and The Everley Brothers; mystic Edgar Cayce and Casey Jones the railway engineer.

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