Appalachian Community Histories – Kodak, Perry County: Meem-Haskins, Mail, and Mining Memory
Kodak in Perry County, Kentucky, is one of those eastern Kentucky communities that appears small in population but large in documentary interest. The modern federal record still recognizes Kodak as a populated place in Perry County, and the Kentucky Geological Survey’s Perry County map labels it as a named community. At the same time, older records show that Kodak’s history was shaped by coal, by postal service, and by the shifting relationship between place names and company names in the mountain coalfields.
What makes Kodak especially interesting is that the paper trail does not sit neatly in one category. It appears in federal place-name work, in postal-history research, in county history, in church listings, in school references, in mining law, and in late twentieth-century mine safety records. Taken together, those sources show Kodak not as an isolated dot on a map, but as a coal-camp community that developed recognizable institutions and then remained visible in the record long after its earliest post office years.
A Name on the Map
The firmest starting point is the federal place-name record. The Geographic Names Information System lists Kodak as an unincorporated populated place in Perry County, Kentucky, and also preserves Meem-Haskins as a variant name. That variant matters because it suggests that Kodak circulated under more than one name in historical usage, a pattern common in coal communities where a post office name, a railroad name, and a company name did not always match each other. Modern county-level recognition also remains in place, since Perry County’s official communities list still includes Kodak among the county’s named places.
The cartographic record supports that continuity. The Kentucky Geological Survey’s county map for Perry County labels Kodak alongside nearby coalfield communities, showing that the name remained geographically legible in a modern statewide mapping context. H. F. Randolph’s county history also treated Kodak as a recognized settlement and gave it a population of 13, which is small but important because it shows Kodak entering the older county historical literature as a real place rather than a fleeting company label.
The Kodak Post Office and a County-Line Problem
Kodak’s early official standing came through the post office. Postal-history research surfaced in La Posta states that the Kodak post office was established on April 10, 1901, with George Brown as the first postmaster. That single detail is important because it anchors Kodak in the formal federal geography of the early twentieth century. In the coalfields, the opening of a post office often marked the transition from hollow or camp to a place recognized in wider government systems.
But Kodak’s postal history is also messy in a revealing way. The same postal-history research notes that by February 1906 the Kodak post office was definitely moved into Letcher County, if it had not already been there for part of its life. That does not erase Kodak’s Perry County identity in later records, but it does explain why some early Kodak references can feel unstable. The community sat in a borderland where county lines, postal routes, and industrial geography did not always align cleanly. Anyone researching Kodak closely should expect to check both Perry County and Letcher County sources for the earliest years.
Coal Camp Kodak and the Meem-Haskins Name
If the post office gave Kodak official standing, coal gave it historical substance. The 1928 Kentucky Department of Mines annual report lists Kodak in the Perry County mining section, which places the community squarely inside the county’s coal economy during the interwar years. That is one of the strongest period sources for proving that Kodak was not just a name carried forward by memory. It was part of an active mining landscape.
The variant name Meem-Haskins helps explain another layer of that coal history. GNIS preserves Meem-Haskins as an alternate name for Kodak, and wartime newspaper coverage referred to Meem-Haskins Coal Corporation as being near Kodak in Perry County. By the early 1930s, Meem-Haskins Coal Corporation was also appearing in Perry County litigation, showing that the company was substantial enough to enter the state court record. The safest reading is that Kodak and Meem-Haskins were historically intertwined, with Kodak functioning as the community name and Meem-Haskins reflecting an industrial or company identity that some records and memories carried alongside it.
That kind of naming overlap was common in the coalfields. A place might be called one thing by residents, another by the railroad, and another by a company payroll or legal record. Kodak fits that pattern well. Its documentary trail suggests a community whose identity was shaped by coal-company presence without being reduced entirely to it.
School and Church Life
Kodak was not only a work site. Mid twentieth-century records show community life taking institutional form through church and school. A 1958 Hazard Herald church listing included the Church of True and Living God at Kodak, complete with regular weekly service times. That is a valuable local source because it places Kodak inside the everyday religious world of Perry County and shows the community participating in the rhythms of worship, prayer meetings, and Sunday school.
School evidence points in the same direction. The University of Kentucky’s North of Center finding aid for African American schools in Perry County identifies Kodak School from the Kentucky School Directory, 1961-62. A separate Hazard Herald snippet notes that Kyle Hammonds, principal of the Kodak school, had organized a band. Together these references show Kodak as a lived-in community with educational structure, staff, and student activity. They also suggest that Kodak’s school history may have included important Black educational dimensions, making it a promising place for deeper archival work in school directories, county school records, and local newspapers.
The continuity of the Kodak Church of the True and Living God also appears in later reporting and obituary notices, which show the congregation enduring into the twenty first century. That later evidence should not replace the older church listings, but it does reinforce the impression that Kodak’s religious life was not fleeting. The church remained one of the institutions that carried the community name forward.
Kodak in Law and Late Mining Records
Kodak remained visible in the record even after the classic early coal-camp era. In 1960, Kodak Coal Co. v. Smith reached the Kentucky Court of Appeals, proving that a company operating under the Kodak name was significant enough to enter the state’s mining-law history. Later legal commentary summarized the case as one involving auger mining and broad-form deed questions, which places Kodak within one of the most consequential legal struggles in eastern Kentucky coal-country land use.
The strongest late twentieth-century evidence comes from the federal government. MSHA’s fatal accident investigation report for the Kelly Fork Mine identified the mine as located at Kodak in Perry County, stated that it entered operation in March 1979, and noted that coal was hauled to the Charlene Tipple at Kodak. That report is stark because it is a safety investigation, but it is also historically useful. It shows Kodak still functioning as an active industrial place in the late twentieth century and confirms that mining remained central to its identity long after the first post office and the early coal-camp years.
Kodak’s Place in Perry County History
Kodak’s history is not the history of a large town, but it is exactly the kind of Appalachian community that rewards close reconstruction. The modern federal and county record still knows the name. Postal history shows Kodak taking official shape in 1901, even if the office’s county placement later became complicated. Mining reports place Kodak in Perry County’s coal economy by the 1920s. The Meem-Haskins variant points to the way company identity could overlay community identity. Church and school notices reveal ordinary life beyond the mine. Later legal and MSHA records show that Kodak remained part of the region’s industrial landscape well into the twentieth century.
In that sense, Kodak represents a familiar eastern Kentucky pattern. A small coalfield place entered the record through the post office and the mine, developed its own school and church life, absorbed alternate naming tied to company power, and yet endured as a community name in Perry County memory and official geography. Its paper trail is scattered, but it is strong enough to show that Kodak was more than a camp. It was, and remains, a place.
Sources and Further Reading
U.S. Geological Survey. “Kodak.” Geographic Names Information System, Feature ID 495867. Accessed April 5, 2026. https://edits.nationalmap.gov/apps/gaz-domestic/public/summary/495867.
Rennick, Robert M. “Perry County – Post Offices.” La Posta: A Journal of American Postal History 34, no. 3. Accessed April 5, 2026. https://www.lapostapub.com/Backissues/LP34-3.pdf.
Kentucky Department of Mines. Annual Report. 1928. https://kgs.uky.edu/kgsweb/olops/pub/general/DanielReportMines1928.pdf.
Kentucky Department of Mines. Annual Report. 1927. https://kgs.uky.edu/kgsweb/olops/pub/general/jonesminereport1927.pdf.
Randolph, H. F. Perry County – General History. Morehead State University Digital Collections. Accessed April 5, 2026. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1053&context=kentucky_county_histories.
Kentucky Geological Survey. Perry County, Kentucky. Map and Chart 164, Series XII, 2007. https://kgs.uky.edu/kgsweb/olops/pub/kgs/mc164_12.pdf.
Library of Congress. “The Hazard Herald (Hazard, Ky.) 1911-1975.” Chronicling America. Accessed April 5, 2026. https://lccn.loc.gov/sn85052003.
The Hazard Herald (Hazard, Ky.). July 3, 1958. Internet Archive. Accessed April 5, 2026. https://archive.org/stream/kd9ns0ks6w6g/kd9ns0ks6w6g_djvu.txt.
University of Kentucky. “African American Schools in Perry County, KY.” Notable Kentucky African Americans Database. February 3, 2022. https://nkaa.uky.edu/nkaa/items/show/2945.
Kentucky Supreme Court. Kodak Coal Co. v. Smith, 338 S.W.2d 699 (Ky. 1960). https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/kodak-coal-co-v-891955755.
Mine Safety and Health Administration. “Fatal Accident Investigation Report: Kelly Fork Mine.” 1997. https://arlweb.msha.gov/FATALS/1997/FTL97C21.HTM.
Perry County, Kentucky. “Perry County Communities.” Accessed April 5, 2026. https://perrycounty.ky.gov/things-to-do/Pages/Communities.aspx.
Author Note: Kodak is the kind of Perry County place whose history survives in fragments, so I wanted to pull those fragments together carefully. Small communities like this often carried more life, work, faith, and memory than the surviving paper trail first suggests.