City of Paducah | |
---|---|
City | |
Broadway downtown
|
|
Location of Paducah within Kentucky. |
|
Coordinates: 37°4′20″N 88°37′39″W / 37.07222°N 88.62750°WCoordinates: 37°4′20″N 88°37′39″W / 37.07222°N 88.62750°W | |
Country | United States |
State | Kentucky |
County | McCracken |
Settled | c. 1821 |
Established | 1830 |
Incorporated | 1838 |
Named for | the Comanche Indians |
Government | |
• Type | Council-Manager |
• Mayor | Brandi Harless |
• City Manager | Jeffrey Pederson |
Area | |
• City | 51.8 km2 (20.0 sq mi) |
• Land | 51.5 km2 (19.9 sq mi) |
• Water | 0.3 km2 (0.1 sq mi) |
Elevation | 104 m (341 ft) |
Population (2010) | |
• City | 25,024 |
• Metro | 98,765 (2,000) |
Demonym(s) | Paducahan |
Time zone | CST (UTC-6) |
• Summer (DST) | CDT (UTC-5) |
ZIP Code | 42001-42002-42003 |
Area code(s) | 270 & 364 |
FIPS code | 21-58836 |
GNIS feature ID | 0500106 |
Website | www |
Paducah (/pəˈduːkə/) is a city in and the county seat of McCracken County, Kentucky, United States. The largest city in the Jackson Purchase region, it is located at the confluence of the Tennessee and the Ohio Rivers, halfway between St. Louis, Missouri, to the northwest and Nashville, Tennessee, to the southeast. The population was 24,864 in 2015, down from 25,024 during the 2010 U.S. Census. Twenty blocks of the city's downtown have been designated as a historic district and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Paducah is the hub of its micropolitan area, which includes McCracken, Ballard and Livingston counties in Kentucky and Massac County in Illinois.
Paducah was first settled as Pekin by James and William Pore c. 1821. The community – favorably located at the confluence of several waterways – occupied a site previously noted as a Chickasaw trading center.
The town was laid out by William Clark (of the famed Lewis and Clark Expedition) in 1827 and renamed Paducah. Although local lore long connected this to an eponymous Chickasaw chief "Paduke" and his tribe of "Paducahs," authorities on the Chickasaw have since made clear that there was never any chief or tribe of that name, or anything like it, nor any words like them in the Chickasaw tongue. Instead, it is probable that Clark named the town for the Comanches (known at the time as the Padoucas, from a Spanish transcription of the Kaw Pádoka or Omaha Pádoⁿka).