18th and 19th centuries The town of Frankfort likely received its name from an event that took place in the 1780s. Native Americans attacked a group of early European colonists from
Bryan Station, who were on their way to make salt at Mann's Lick in Jefferson County. Pioneer Stephen Frank was killed at the Kentucky River and the settlers thereafter called the crossing "Frank's Ford". This name was later
elided to Frankfort. In 1786,
James Wilkinson purchased a tract of land on the north side of the Kentucky River, which developed as downtown Frankfort. He was an early promoter of Frankfort as the state capital. Wilkinson felt Frankfort would be a center of transportation using the Kentucky River to ship farm produce to the Ohio River and then to the Mississippi and on to New Orleans. After Kentucky became
the 15th state in 1792, five commissioners from various counties were appointed, on June 20, 1792, to choose a location for the capital. They were John Allen and John Edwards (both from
Bourbon County), Henry Lee (from
Mason), Thomas Kennedy (from
Madison), and
Robert Todd (from
Fayette). A number of communities competed for this honor, but Frankfort won. According to early histories, the offer of Andrew Holmes' log house as capitol for seven years, a number of town lots, £50 worth of locks and hinges, 10 boxes of glass, of nails, and $3,000 in gold helped the decision go to Frankfort. Frankfort had a United States
post office by 1794, with Daniel Weisiger as postmaster. On October 1, 1794, Weisiger sent the first quarterly account to Washington.
John Brown, a Virginia lawyer and statesman, built a home now called
Liberty Hall in Frankfort in 1796. Before Kentucky statehood, he represented Virginia in the
Continental Congress (1777−78) and the
U.S. Congress (1789−91). While in Congress, he introduced the bill granting statehood to Kentucky.
After statehood, he was elected by the state legislature as one of the state's
U.S. Senators. In 1796, the
Kentucky General Assembly appropriated funds to provide a house to accommodate the governor; it was completed two years later. The
Old Governor's Mansion is claimed to be the oldest official executive residence still in use in the United States. In 1829,
Gideon Shryock designed the
Old Capitol, Kentucky's third, in
Greek Revival style. It served Kentucky as its capitol from 1830 to 1910. The separate settlement known as
South Frankfort was annexed by the city on January 3, 1850. The
Argus of Western America was published in Frankfort from 1808 until 1830. During the
American Civil War, the Union Army built fortifications overlooking Frankfort on what is now called
Fort Hill. The
Confederate Army also occupied Frankfort for a short time, starting on September 3, 1862, the only such time that Confederate forces took control of a Union capitol. On February 3, 1900,
William Goebel was assassinated in Frankfort while walking to the
capitol on the way to the Kentucky Legislature. Former Secretary of State
Caleb Powers and several others were later found guilty of a conspiracy to murder Goebel; however, all were later pardoned.
20th century The
Mayo–Underwood School, the successor to the Clinton Street High School, was a public school for African American students in Frankfort and operated from 1929 until 1964. and to make way for the Capital Plaza. The Capital Plaza comprised the
Capital Plaza Office Tower, the tallest building in the city, the Capital Plaza Hotel (formerly the Holiday Inn, Frankfort), and the Fountain Place Shoppes. The
Capital Plaza Office Tower opened in 1972 and became a visual landmark for the center of the city. By the early 2000s, maintenance of the concrete structures had been neglected and the plaza had fallen into disrepair, with sections of the plaza closed to pedestrian activity out of concerns for safety. In 2018 the Capital Plaza was demolished and a new state office building was constructed to take its place. The new building was named The Mayo-Underwood State Office Building to honor the namesake school that was razed for the sake of the original Capital Plaza. Frankfort grew considerably with state government in the 1960s. A modern addition to the State Office Building was completed in 1967. The original building was completed in the 1930s on the location of the former Kentucky State Penitentiary. Some of the stone from the old prison was used for the walls surrounding the office building.
21st century Although there was some rapid economic and population growth in the 1960s, both tapered off in the 1980s and have remained fairly stable since that time. In August 2008, state government officials recommended demolition of the Capital Plaza Office Tower and redevelopment of the area over a period of years. Ten years later, the demolition of the office tower was completed on Sunday, March 11, 2018, and was televised by
WKYT-TV on
WKYT-DT2, as well as streamed live on
Facebook. Demolition of the nearby convention center, which opened in 1972 and has hosted sporting events, concerts, and other local events, was completed in spring 2018. in order to create a more pedestrian-oriented scale at the complex, to encourage street activity. Frankfort is home to three
distilleries including the
Buffalo Trace Distillery (
Kentucky Bourbon), Castle & Key Distillery (spirits), and Three Boys Farm Distillery (bourbon and whiskey). In 2018, thousands of teachers protested in the city in response to
Senate Bill 151 having been passed on March 29, 2018. The bill was shortly overturned on December 13, 2018, by the
Kentucky Supreme Court as unconstitutional, which prevented the bill from going into effect on January 1, 2019. ==Geography==