$5 Bought Paducah
Paducah, McCracken County, Kentucky
Marker Inscription
$5 Bought Paducah. In 1827, Gen. Wm. Clark purchased 37,000 acres of land, including the site on which Paducah now stands, for $5. This land, part of a Revolutionary War grant to his brother, George Rogers Clark, was secured from George Woolfolk, of Louisville, who had been named administrator of George Rogers Clark's estate when he died. Marker presented by Hart's Bread, 1967.
Erected by Kentucky Historical Society
The Story
In 1827, explorer General William Clark bought 37,000 acres—including the ground where Paducah now stands—for the astonishing sum of $5. The land came to him through his late brother, Revolutionary War hero George Rogers Clark, whose estate administrator sold it off. The tiny purchase price makes for a memorable tale about how the raw frontier changed hands.
Why it matters
The story ties one of the West's founding towns to the Clark brothers—one who explored the continent, one who won it in revolution—and to the sweeping, often cheap land transfers that built the early American frontier.
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Related people
- · William Clark
- · George Rogers Clark
- · George Woolfolk
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Lewis & Clark in McCracken County
Paducah, KY
In November 1803, as Lewis and Clark led the nucleus of the Corps of Discovery down the Ohio River toward their rendezvous with the West, they passed through what is now McCracken County. Camping near present-day Paducah and stopping at Fort Massac just across the river in Illinois, they recruited men for the journey, including the skilled interpreter George Drouillard. Years later, in 1827, William Clark returned to establish the town of Paducah itself.
Paducah's Indian Name
Paducah, KY
Paducah is the only major Kentucky city bearing an Indigenous name, honoring the legendary Chief Paduke. His people, a group associated with the Chickasaw, lived and hunted in this area until their land was ceded in the 1818 Jackson Purchase. When General William Clark—of Lewis and Clark fame—platted the town in 1827, he set aside its earlier name, Pekin, in favor of Paducah.
Linn Boyd Home
Paducah, KY
Linn Boyd (1800-1859) rose from the Kentucky legislature to become one of the most powerful men in antebellum Washington, serving as Speaker of the U.S. House from 1851 to 1855. He authored the resolution to annex Texas and was even proposed for Vice President at the 1856 Democratic Convention. Elected Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky in 1859, he died before he could take office.
Jackson Purchase
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In 1818, the young United States acquired an 8,500-square-mile wedge of land between the Tennessee, Ohio, and Mississippi Rivers from the Chickasaw Nation for $300,000, in a treaty brokered by General Andrew Jackson and Kentucky Governor Isaac Shelby. Known ever after as the Jackson Purchase, the tract opened westernmost Kentucky and Tennessee to American settlement. Its clean river boundaries still define the region's eight Kentucky and twenty Tennessee counties.