Appalachian Community Histories – Burnetta, Pulaski County: The Weddle Family, Thomas Pierce, and a Community That Endured
In the countryside of western Pulaski County, Kentucky, between Faubush and Nancy, lies Burnetta, a small community whose history reaches back to an ambitious nineteenth-century settlement, a network of country stores and mills, and the families who built their lives along the surrounding roads and creeks. Although Burnetta is remembered primarily as a rural community, the land around it was once associated with Harrison, an incorporated town that briefly prospered before its commercial center shifted elsewhere. The later establishment of the Burnetta post office in 1886 gave the area a new identity, one that remained in official use for much of the next seventy years.
The history of Burnetta is especially interesting because its surviving records reveal several distinct periods of community development. During the nineteenth century, Harrison emerged as an early commercial center in western Pulaski County. Later, the establishment of neighboring postal communities, particularly Faubush and Burnetta, reflected changes in settlement and transportation. By the early twentieth century, churches, Sunday schools, country businesses, and family relationships had become central to the community’s identity, even during the years when its post office was temporarily closed.
Kentucky place-name historian Robert M. Rennick reconstructed much of this history through postal records, historical maps, and local accounts. His research, together with surviving photographs, newspapers, death certificates, and cemetery records, provides a way to recover the story of a community whose history might otherwise remain scattered across several generations of family records.
The Founding of Harrison and the Early Settlement of Western Pulaski County
The history of the Burnetta area begins well before the community received its present name. In 1841, John Milton Weddle, a Virginia-born landowner, established and laid out the town of Harrison in western Pulaski County, naming the settlement in honor of his son. The town was incorporated the following year and, according to Rennick’s historical research, developed into a community with approximately 300 residents.
For a time, Harrison represented an important commercial center for the surrounding agricultural countryside. Its businesses included several stores, a tannery, a mill, and a saloon, while Mount Pisgah Baptist Church served the religious needs of local residents. Rennick also described the settlement as an early contender for the county seat, suggesting that its founders envisioned a more substantial future than the community would ultimately achieve.
Harrison’s development reflected the importance of small trading communities in nineteenth-century Kentucky. Farmers living throughout the countryside depended upon local merchants and mills, while churches and other neighborhood institutions brought families together across distances that could otherwise make social and commercial activity difficult.
The Weddle family played an important role in the area’s early history, and their surname continued to appear in local records long after Harrison’s original period of development. Nevertheless, the town did not retain its initial position as a center of commerce.
Sometime after the Civil War, businesses began relocating approximately half a mile westward toward a large spring near the head of Pierce Branch of Faubush Creek. Rennick could not establish the precise reason for this movement, although the relocation gradually shifted commercial activity away from Harrison’s original center.
On May 6, 1879, Hugh Frank McBeath, a storekeeper from Harrison, established a post office near the spring and named it Faubush. The creation of this neighboring postal community provided a new commercial and geographical center for residents of the surrounding countryside, while the old Harrison settlement gradually lost the importance it had possessed during its earliest decades.
The later Burnetta post office was established at or near the site of old Harrison. Consequently, Burnetta’s history cannot be separated entirely from the earlier town, even though the two names represent different periods in the development of the same general area.
The Establishment of the Burnetta Post Office in 1886
Burnetta acquired its official postal identity on November 9, 1886, when James S. Weddle became the community’s first postmaster. The establishment of the office connected residents of the former Harrison area to the expanding rural postal network and formally recognized Burnetta as a distinct mailing location in Pulaski County.
For scattered agricultural communities, a local post office was an important institution. Correspondence, newspapers, commercial orders, legal notices, and communications with relatives depended upon dependable access to the mail. A post office could also become associated with a country store or another established local business, allowing residents to combine the collection of their mail with their ordinary commercial activities.
Weddle’s appointment continued the association between the family name and the surrounding area, although the precise relationship between James S. Weddle and Harrison’s founder, John Milton Weddle, requires further genealogical research.
The establishment of Burnetta also occurred during a period when western Pulaski County was developing a particularly extensive network of rural postal communities. Faubush had received its own post office in 1879, and other settlements, including Naomi and Norfleet, would acquire postal identities in the following decades.
Unlike an incorporated town, a rural postal community did not necessarily possess a concentrated business district or clearly defined municipal boundaries. Its name could apply to scattered households and farms across a considerable area, making the post office an especially important institution for establishing a recognizable geographical identity.
Where Did Burnetta Get Its Name?
Although the establishment of Burnetta’s post office is well documented, the origin of the community’s name remains uncertain.
Rennick identified two possible explanations preserved by county historians. The first suggests that Burnetta was named for one or more Burnett families living in the area, reflecting the common Kentucky practice of naming settlements and postal establishments after local families.
The second explanation connects the name to Burnetta Duck, who later married Christopher C. Gossett. Rennick recorded this possibility but was unable to confirm that she was the community’s namesake.
Neither explanation has been conclusively established by the available evidence. The original postal application, early postmaster correspondence, and contemporary references to the proposed name would be particularly useful for investigating the question further.
The uncertainty surrounding Burnetta’s name illustrates a common problem in reconstructing the histories of small Appalachian communities. Although postal records can preserve the dates on which an office opened or closed, they do not always explain why a particular name was selected or whose suggestion ultimately received federal approval.
Burnetta in the Late Nineteenth Century
By 1895, Burnetta had become sufficiently established to appear in Rand McNally’s Business Atlas and Shippers’ Guide. A modern bibliographical index of that publication records Burnetta as having a post office but no listed railroad service.
This distinction is important because it places Burnetta among the many Kentucky communities whose commercial and postal connections did not depend upon having a railroad station of their own. The atlas entry does not establish that no railroad existed anywhere in the surrounding region, but it does indicate that Burnetta was not listed as a railroad shipping point in that publication.
The surviving evidence suggests that Burnetta continued to function as a rural settlement associated with the agricultural countryside of western Pulaski County. Its geographical position connected it to the neighboring communities of Faubush, Nancy, and the settlements developing along nearby roads and waterways.
Historical mapping provides another way to trace Burnetta’s continued existence. A 1911 Rand McNally map identifies the community, while later United States Geological Survey maps preserve its location in relation to Faubush, Nancy, and the surrounding topography. Together, these sources show that Burnetta’s geographical identity continued beyond the establishment of its original post office.
The First Post Office Closes in 1913
Burnetta’s original post office remained in operation until the middle of April 1913, when federal postal service under the community’s name was discontinued.
The closure ended the first period of Burnetta’s official postal history, which had begun nearly twenty-seven years earlier with James S. Weddle’s appointment. The surviving published research does not establish the exact reason for the discontinuance, and it would be necessary to examine the original Post Office Department records to determine whether changing mail routes, operational considerations, or other factors contributed to the decision.
The disappearance of an independent post office, however, did not mean that the surrounding community had ceased to exist. Burnetta’s residents continued maintaining their farms, raising families, attending religious gatherings, and participating in the social life of the neighboring countryside.
One particularly valuable surviving photograph demonstrates the continuation of that community during the years when Burnetta lacked its own post office.
A Community Preserved in a 1916 Sunday School Photograph
On May 14, 1916, photographer Jim Slaughter captured a large gathering identified as the Burnetta Sunday School Class. The photograph, preserved in the Pulaski County Public Library’s digital photograph collection, provides an unusually detailed visual record of the community during the early twentieth century.
The accompanying identification names dozens of adults and children belonging to families whose surnames appear repeatedly in the surrounding area’s historical records. Among them were members of the Warner, Pierce, Sowder, Tarter, Weddle, Dunsmore, Jasper, Owen, Roy, Compton, and Gossett families.
The photograph includes several generations, with children seated in the front and larger groups of young people and adults arranged behind them. Its surviving identifications connect individuals who later carried different married surnames, providing useful evidence for researchers tracing family relationships across the region.
Particularly significant is the presence of Tom Pierce, along with other members of the Pierce family. Thomas Wesley Pierce would become an important figure in the next stage of Burnetta’s postal history when the community’s post office was reestablished in 1921.
The photograph also identifies Ollie Sowder, Kirk Sowder, and several other members of the family whose names appear in later cemetery and newspaper records. These connections demonstrate the historical value of a photograph that might otherwise appear to be a simple record of a religious gathering.
The original photograph does not, by itself, establish the founding date of Burnetta Baptist Church or identify every institution represented by the gathering. Nevertheless, its date and detailed caption provide direct evidence of an organized Sunday school community in Burnetta five years before the post office reopened.
The surviving image is available through the Pulaski County Public Library’s photograph collection.
Family Life and Community Connections in the 1920s
Original newspaper reports provide additional evidence of Burnetta’s continued existence during the period between the closure and reopening of its post office.
On August 27, 1920, The Somerset Journal published news from the neighboring community of Pointer that included several references to Burnetta residents and their families.
The newspaper reported that Miss Effie Collins was visiting the home of H. K. Sowder at Burnetta. In the same community column, the paper noted that Dekata Warner and his family had been visiting his father, Sam Warner, who lived near Burnetta.
These seemingly ordinary reports provide valuable evidence about rural community life. Newspaper correspondents frequently recorded visits between relatives, the arrival of guests from other states, church attendance, illnesses, marriages, and other events that were important to local residents but rarely appeared in larger historical accounts.
The August 1920 column also mentioned visitors from Akron, Ohio, in the surrounding community, demonstrating the wider geographical connections maintained by families living in western Pulaski County. Such reports provide opportunities to investigate family migration and relationships extending beyond Kentucky.
Other contemporary records preserve further information about Burnetta residents. An abstract of Kentucky death certificate number 29074, dated 1923, identifies Jacob Warner as a Burnetta resident who had been born on July 3, 1834, and died on November 19, 1923.
The certificate identified Warner as a farmer and recorded S. M. Warner of Burnetta as the informant. Dr. Brent Weddle of Nancy attended him, while Sam Warner was identified as the undertaker. Jacob Warner was buried in Weddle Cemetery on November 20, 1923.
These details connect Burnetta to several of the families appearing in the 1916 Sunday school photograph and the 1920 newspaper reports. They also demonstrate how original death certificates can preserve occupations, postal addresses, family relationships, and the names of physicians and undertakers serving a rural community.
Thomas Wesley Pierce and the Return of the Burnetta Post Office
After more than eight years without its own post office, Burnetta regained federal postal service on December 3, 1921.
Thomas Wesley Pierce, identified by Rennick as a local mill owner and storekeeper, became the postmaster of the reestablished office. His appointment connected postal service with the commercial institutions that remained important to the surrounding countryside.
The combination of a country store, mill, and post office was particularly useful in an agricultural community. Mills provided services needed by local farmers, while stores offered access to purchased goods and opportunities for commercial exchange. The addition of a post office made such a business an even more important gathering place for surrounding households.
Pierce’s presence in the 1916 Sunday school photograph, several years before his appointment, establishes that he was already part of the community’s documented social life when the post office was reopened.
The reestablishment of Burnetta’s post office also demonstrates that the name retained its usefulness as a geographical identifier despite the interruption in service. Rather than adopting an entirely new postal name, the community resumed using the identity that had first received federal recognition in 1886.
The second period of postal operation would prove substantial, continuing for more than three decades and carrying Burnetta’s official postal history into the middle of the twentieth century.
Burnetta Cemetery and the Preservation of Local Families
Burnetta’s cemetery provides another important connection to the community’s history, preserving the names and dates of residents whose lives extended across the settlement’s nineteenth- and twentieth-century development.
The Pulaski County KYGenWeb cemetery directory identifies Burnetta Cemetery as a distinct burial ground, separate from Burnett Chapel Methodist Cemetery. This distinction is particularly important for genealogical researchers because the similarity of the names does not establish any direct relationship between the two locations.
A published cemetery transcription records Henry Kirk Sowder, born October 4, 1882, and died March 1, 1959, among those buried at Burnetta Cemetery. The same transcription identifies his wife, Ollie Francis Sowder, who was born May 29, 1890, and died December 12, 1964.
The names correspond to Kirk and Ollie Sowder in the surviving 1916 Sunday school photograph, connecting the community’s historical photographic record to its burial records. Although published transcriptions should be checked against original gravestones and vital records, these surviving materials provide a useful starting point for reconstructing local family histories.
Other burial grounds in the surrounding countryside, including Weddle Cemetery, preserve additional evidence of families connected to Burnetta and nearby Faubush. The death certificate of Jacob Warner, for example, identifies Weddle Cemetery as his burial place in 1923.
Together, the cemeteries, photographs, and original vital records provide a means of tracing individuals across several generations and identifying the relationships that connected Burnetta with surrounding communities.
The Final Closure of the Post Office in 1955
Burnetta’s second period of postal operation ended on February 15, 1955, when the post office permanently closed.
The closure brought an end to a postal history that had begun in November 1886 and continued, with one interruption, through nearly seven decades of significant changes in rural Kentucky.
By the middle of the twentieth century, Burnetta occupied a landscape increasingly connected by improved roads and changing patterns of transportation. Neighboring communities, including Faubush and Nancy, remained important geographical reference points, while the rural postal network that had once included numerous small independent offices was gradually changing.
The United States Geological Survey’s 1954 Faubush quadrangle provides a valuable contemporary geographical record of Burnetta at approximately the time its post office closed. The map identifies the community within the surrounding network of roads, hills, creeks, churches, and neighboring settlements.
Unlike the postal records, which primarily document the administrative history of a post office, the topographic map preserves the physical landscape in which residents lived. Comparing the 1954 edition with later surveys, including the 1973 Faubush quadrangle, makes it possible to investigate changes in roads, geographical names, and the surrounding countryside.
The original 1954 map can be examined through the
historical USGS Faubush quadrangle.
Burnetta Baptist Church and the Community’s Continuing History
Although Burnetta lost its independent post office in 1955, the community’s name continued to survive through its religious institutions, cemetery, and the families who remained connected to the surrounding area.
Burnetta Baptist Church provides one example of that continuing identity. The congregation remained an important local institution during the latter part of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century, although its precise founding date requires additional research in original church records.
A published obituary for Eula Pauline Compton, who died on October 12, 2020, identifies her as a longtime member of Burnetta Baptist Church. Born in Nancy in 1928, Compton graduated from Eastern Kentucky University and worked as an elementary teacher in the Pulaski County school system for thirty-six years.
Her obituary illustrates the continuing connections between Burnetta, Nancy, and the wider county. Even after the disappearance of Burnetta’s independent post office, residents and families associated with the area continued participating in the educational, religious, and social institutions of Pulaski County.
Burnetta’s Place in Pulaski County History
The history of Burnetta illustrates how a small Kentucky community could inherit the landscape of an earlier town, acquire a new identity through the federal postal system, and preserve that identity long after its independent post office disappeared.
The establishment of Harrison in 1841 represented an ambitious effort to develop a commercial center in western Pulaski County. The subsequent movement of businesses toward Faubush reflected changes in local settlement patterns, while the establishment of Burnetta in 1886 provided the former Harrison area with a new postal identity.
The community’s history, however, extended well beyond its post office. The surviving 1916 Sunday school photograph documents a substantial gathering of local families during the years when Burnetta lacked its own postal establishment. Newspaper reports from 1920 reveal relationships between neighboring households, while original death certificates and cemetery records preserve the names, occupations, and burial places of residents whose lives spanned much of the area’s development.
Thomas Wesley Pierce’s reestablishment of the post office in 1921 connected the community’s commercial and postal institutions for another generation. Its permanent closure in 1955 ended that official chapter, but Burnetta continued to survive as a geographical name and a community associated with its church, cemetery, and surrounding families.
Burnetta’s history is therefore more than the story of a discontinued post office. It is the history of an earlier incorporated town, a changing agricultural countryside, and several generations of families whose photographs, correspondence, newspaper notices, and burial records continue to preserve the identity of a small Pulaski County settlement.
Sources & Further Reading
Slaughter, Jim. “Burnetta Sunday School Class.” Photograph, May 14, 1916. Pulaski County Public Library Photograph Collection. https://www.flickr.com/photos/pcplphotos/25452667886.
The Somerset Journal. “Pointer.” August 27, 1920. Contemporary newspaper report mentioning the Sowder and Warner families of Burnetta. Transcribed by Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/8_27_1920_2.htm.
Commonwealth of Kentucky. “Death Certificate of Jacob Warner.” Certificate no. 29074, November 19, 1923. Transcription in Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/obits/dc/death.htm.
Rand McNally & Company. Rand, McNally & Co.’s Enlarged Business Atlas and Shippers’ Guide. 25th ed. Chicago: Rand McNally & Company, 1895. WorldCat catalog record. https://search.worldcat.org/title/62623263.
Rand McNally & Company. Map of Pulaski County, Kentucky. Chicago: Rand McNally & Company, 1911. Reproduced by My Genealogy Hound. https://mygenealogyhound.com/maps/kentucky-maps/KY-Pulaski-County-Kentucky-1911-Rand-McNally-map-Somerset-Burnside-Science-Hill.html.
United States Geological Survey. Faubush, Kentucky. 7.5-minute topographic quadrangle, 1954. Historical Topographic Map Collection. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:KY_Faubush_708647_1954_24000_geo.pdf.
United States Geological Survey. Historical Topographic Map Collection. Historical maps of Kentucky, including the Faubush quadrangle. https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/.
Rennick, Robert M. “The Post Offices of Pulaski County, Kentucky, Part 2.” La Posta: A Journal of American Postal History 38, no. 4 (August–September 2007): 58–67. https://www.lapostapub.com/Backissues/LP38-4.pdf.
Rennick, Robert M. Kentucky Place Names. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1984. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt13x1s3p.
Rennick, Robert M. “Pulaski County: Post Offices.” County Histories of Kentucky, no. 388. Morehead State University, 2000. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/388/.
Rennick, Robert M. “Pulaski County: Place Names.” Robert M. Rennick Manuscript Collection, no. 123. Morehead State University. Cataloged December 5, 2016. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_ms_collection/123/.
Works Progress Administration and Robert M. Rennick. “Pulaski County: Post Offices & Place Names.” County Histories of Kentucky, no. 284. Morehead State University, 1939. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/284/.
Pulaski County Public Library. Digital Archives of the Pulaski County Public Library. Somerset, KY. Historical newspapers, census schedules, court records, tax lists, and genealogical materials. https://pulaskilibrary.advantage-preservation.com/.
Kentucky Historical Society. Kentucky Newspapers on Microfilm: Counties Nelson–Robertson. Frankfort: Kentucky Historical Society. Includes historical Pulaski County newspapers and surviving issues of The Somerset Journal. https://www.kyhistory.com/digital/api/collection/LIB/id/1469/download.
University of Kentucky Libraries. Kentucky Digital Newspaper Program. Lexington: University of Kentucky. https://kentuckynewspapers.org/program/.
National Archives and Records Administration. Record of Appointment of Postmasters, 1832–September 30, 1971. Record Group 28, Microfilm Publication M841. Washington, DC: National Archives. Research guide for original federal appointment records. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices/postmasters-1832-1971.html.
National Archives and Records Administration. Post Office Department Records of Site Locations, 1837–1955. Microfilm Publication M1126, Record Group 28. Washington, DC: National Archives. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices/locations-1837-1950.html.
PostalHistory.com. “Pulaski County, Kentucky: Historical Post Offices.” Postal-history directory identifying Burnetta’s operation from 1886 to 1955. https://www.postalhistory.com/postoffices.asp?county=Pulaski&state=KY&task=display.
Pulaski County KYGenWeb. “Pulaski County Cemeteries.” Genealogical directory of historic burial grounds throughout Pulaski County. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/cemetery/cemeteries.html.
Fink, Lonnie, contributor. “Kentucky Cemetery Records.” Genealogical transcription containing burial information for Henry Kirk Sowder and Ollie Francis Sowder at Burnetta Cemetery. https://www.oocities.org/~jdanielson/ky-cem.htm.
PeopleLegacy. “Burnetta Cemetery in Pulaski County, Kentucky.” Cemetery and burial-record directory. https://peoplelegacy.net/cemetery/burnetta_cemetery-3j1q01/.
Lake Cumberland Funeral Home. “Eula Pauline Compton.” Obituary, October 2020. Legacy.com. https://www.legacy.com/funeral-homes/obituaries/name/pauline-compton-obituary?pid=196938710&v=batesville.
“Winfred C. Compton.” Obituary. Legacy Remembers, September 19, 2022. Documents his farming career, involvement with the Western Pulaski Water Board, and more than fifty years as a deacon and treasurer of Burnetta Baptist Church. https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/legacyremembers/winfred-compton-obituary?id=52844617.
RoadsideThoughts. “Burnetta, Kentucky: Miscellaneous References and Mentions.” Historical bibliography identifying the 1895 business atlas, 1911 map, and historical postal records. https://roadsidethoughts.com/ky/burnetta-xx-pulaski-mentions.htm.
United States Geological Survey. Geographic Names Information System. Reston, VA: United States Geological Survey. https://www.usgs.gov/tools/geographic-names-information-system-gnis.
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Kentucky.” Official listing of Kentucky counties within the Appalachian Region. https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-states/kentucky/.
Author Note: Burnetta’s history reminds us that a community can survive long after its original town and post office disappear, preserved through photographs, churches, cemeteries, and the memories of its families. If your family has connections to Burnetta or the earlier settlement of Harrison, I encourage you to share your photographs, documents, and stories so that more of this Pulaski County community’s history can be preserved.