Kentucky State Records

The state of Kentucky is also called "Bluegrass State". Their moto is United we stand, divided we fall and Deo gratiam habeamus (Let us be grateful to God). The official languages are English. Before statehood it was called Kentucky County, Virginia. Kentucky's government is comprised of the Governor, who is currently Steve Beshear (D), Lieutenant Governor, who is currently Jerry Abramson (D), Senators: Mitch McConnell (R), Rand Paul (R), House Delegation: 4 Republicans, 2 Democrats (list).The legislature is General Assembly.

Total area for Kentucky is 40,409 sq mi (104,659 km2) (Ranked 37th in the U.S.). The width is 140 miles (225 km) and the length is 379 miles (610 km). In terms of latitude and longitude we have: 36° 30′ N to 39° 09′ N and 81° 58′ W to 89° 34′ W. According to the 2010 United States Census, the total population is 4,369,356 (2011 est) (Ranked 26th in the U.S.). The highest point is Black Mountain 4,145 ft (1263 m) and the lowest point is Mississippi River at Kentucky Bend 257 ft (78 m).

The abbreviations used for this state are KY US-KY. Additional information and the official website of the state is found at kentucky.gov.

Kentucky (i/kɪnˈtʌki/), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state located in the Upper South of the United States. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth (the others being Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts). Originally a part of Virginia, in 1792 Kentucky became the 15th state to join the Union. Kentucky is the 37th most extensive and the 26th most populous of the 50 United States.

Kentucky is known as the 'Bluegrass State', a nickname based on the fact that bluegrass is present in many of the pastures throughout the state, because of the fertile soil. It is a land with diverse environments and abundant resources, including the world's longest cave system, Mammoth Cave National Park; the greatest length of navigable waterways and streams in the contiguous United States; and the two largest man-made lakes east of the Mississippi River. It is also home to the highest per capita number of deer and turkey in the United States, the largest free-ranging elk herd east of Montana, and the nation's most productive coalfield. Kentucky is also known for horse racing, bourbon distilleries, bluegrass music, automobile manufacturing, tobacco and college basketball.

It is generally accepted that the historic Native American tribes who hunted in what is now Kentucky referred to the region as Catawba, or some similar variant. Some have said that the land was described in this way to Daniel Boone by a native Chief. According to The Kentucky Blue Book,[citation needed] Dragging Canoe, a young Cherokee chief opposed to selling ancestral hunting grounds, warned the whites that they were purchasing a 'dark and bloody ground.' The origin of Kentucky's modern name (variously spelled Cane-tuck-ee, Cantucky, Kain-tuck-ee, and Kentuckee before its modern spelling was accepted) comes from an Iroquois word meaning 'meadow lands', referring to the buffalo hunting grounds in Central Kentucky's savanna. Members of the Haudenosaunee, the Iroquois Confederacy, were historically based in New York and Pennsylvania. They penetrated to this area of the Ohio River Valley and drove other tribes out in order to control more hunting land. In addition to buffalo, they trapped beaver for the lucrative fur trade with the French and English, long before European-American settlement in this area.