Appalachian Community Histories – Mazie, Lawrence County: Postmasters, Churches, Cemeteries, and Life Along Kentucky Highway 32
Along Kentucky Highway 32, near the western edge of Lawrence County, lies a place that can be easy to pass without understanding what it once represented. Mazie was never a large incorporated town with a courthouse square, a commercial district, or rows of public buildings. It was a rural Appalachian community formed from homes, family roads, branches, churches, cemeteries, and a post office that gave the surrounding countryside a shared address.
That post office became the clearest public symbol of Mazie. For generations, the name appeared on letters, maps, official records, newspaper notices, funeral announcements, and the memories of families who lived between the Lawrence County seat at Louisa and the county line toward Elliott County. Even after the federal government closed the local office, the name survived.
Mazie’s history is not preserved in a single county history or a long collection of town records. It must be assembled from scattered evidence. Postal files, old maps, local newspapers, highway records, church references, cemetery listings, deeds, and personal notices each preserve a different part of the story. Taken together, they reveal how a small place could matter deeply without ever becoming a municipality.
A Community on the Western Edge of Lawrence County
Mazie stands along the corridor that connects western Lawrence County with Martha, Blaine, Busseyville, and Louisa. The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet’s official road description identifies Kentucky Highway 32 as entering Lawrence County from the Elliott County line and passing through Mazie before continuing east through those communities to Louisa. County road records also preserve Mazie in the names Mazie Branch Road, Mazie Circle, and Mill Creek Road Mazie. The survival of these road names shows that Mazie was not merely the name of a vanished post office. It became part of the geographic language of the county.
Historical maps place Mazie within a countryside of narrow valleys, branching creeks, ridges, farms, churches, schools, and scattered family burial grounds. A 1911 Lawrence County map already labels Mazie west of Martha, while the United States Geological Survey’s 1953 Mazie quadrangle covers portions of both Lawrence and Elliott counties. The map’s very title demonstrates that Mazie had become an important reference point for describing the surrounding landscape.
This location helped define the community. Mazie belonged to Lawrence County, but its position near Elliott County meant that families, roads, postal routes, churches, and kinship networks did not always follow a neat county boundary. Like many communities in eastern Kentucky, Mazie was understood less by an incorporated border than by the roads people traveled, the churches they attended, the post office they used, and the families who lived along nearby branches.
The Post Office Gave Mazie a Public Identity
The strongest documentary trail for Mazie begins with the United States postal system. Robert M. Rennick’s study, Lawrence County: Post Offices and Place Names, was created as a historical survey of the county’s communities, place names, and post offices. Rennick’s work is especially valuable because rural post offices often provide the first consistent federal record for places that were never incorporated.
A rural post office was more than a place where letters were sorted. It connected isolated households to relatives who had moved away, newspapers from Louisa and beyond, government notices, pensions, money orders, catalogs, election information, and the wider commercial world. The postmaster was often one of the most recognizable public figures in the community. In a place without a town hall, the post office could become the institution that made the community visible to outsiders.
The National Archives preserves the records needed to reconstruct that history more fully. Microfilm Publication M841, Record of Appointment of Postmasters, records the establishment and discontinuance of post offices, changes in their names, and the names and appointment dates of postmasters. Microfilm Publication M1126 contains Post Office Department reports concerning office locations from 1837 through 1950. These federal records are the best authority for establishing Mazie’s complete list of postmasters, the precise opening history of the office, and any changes in its location.
The origin of Mazie’s name remains less certain in the most readily accessible records. The presence of the Maxie family in the community and the service of Britt Maxie as postmaster naturally invite speculation, but similarity between a surname and a place name is not proof. Rennick’s original research cards, federal postal appointment books, and site location reports remain the best places to look for a documented naming story.
The Postmasters of Mazie
Local death notices preserve the names of several people who served behind the Mazie postal counter. These notices do not provide a complete succession of postmasters, but they reveal how closely the office was tied to long periods of personal service.
George W. Phillips, a farmer born near Blaine in 1872, was remembered at his death in 1952 as a former postmaster at Mazie for several years. His life joined farming, church membership, and federal service, a combination common among rural postmasters whose public work was rooted in the same community where they lived.
Britt Maxie served even longer. His 1959 obituary reported that he had been postmaster at Mazie for thirty-one years before retiring. His funeral was held at Mazie Baptist Church, linking the postal history of the community directly with its religious life. A tenure of that length meant that Maxie likely handled the correspondence of several generations, including letters from family members who had left eastern Kentucky for industrial cities and military service.
Dorothy Williams Sparks was also remembered as a Mazie postmaster of thirty-one years. Born in 1932, she remained a resident of Mazie until her death in 2020. Her service demonstrates that the office continued to depend on local people well into the late twentieth century. It also suggests how the post office survived as a personal institution, known not simply by its federal designation but by the person who opened it, sorted the mail, and knew the families on the route.
These postmasters helped turn a geographic name into a lived community. Their work placed Mazie on envelopes and government rolls, but their importance was also social. They stood at the point where private family life met the outside world.
Church, Burial Grounds, and Community Memory
Postal records show how Mazie communicated with the nation. Churches and cemeteries show how the community remembered itself.
The Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society identifies Christian Baptist Church as also being known as Mazie Church. Local obituary records also refer to Mazie Baptist Church, including the 1959 funeral of Britt Maxie. The exact relationship between these names should be confirmed through church minutes, deeds, and congregational records, but the surviving references make clear that Mazie possessed a recognized place of worship that served as a community landmark.
Cemetery listings preserve the community name across several family burial places. The society associates Bishop Cemetery, Dave Boggs Cemetery, James Boggs Cemetery, and Ran Boggs Cemetery with Mazie. These small burial grounds are historical records written into the land. Their stones can identify the families who remained in the area, connect married names across generations, and guide researchers toward death certificates, obituaries, deeds, military records, and church memberships.
This is especially important in a place like Mazie, where the boundaries of the community were never drawn on an incorporation map. A cemetery recorded as being at Mazie helped define who belonged to the place. So did a funeral conducted at Mazie Church, a road bearing the community name, or a newspaper notice addressed to Mazie, Kentucky.
The Land Beneath Mazie
Mazie’s history was shaped by the physical character of eastern Kentucky. The community developed among steep slopes, creek bottoms, narrow roads, and scattered areas suitable for homes and farms. These conditions influenced where families built, how roads followed the valleys, and why a post office could serve households spread across a broad rural area.
In 1977, geologist William F. Outerbridge published the Geologic Map of the Mazie Quadrangle, Eastern Kentucky for the United States Geological Survey. The map documented the formations and structural features beneath the area at a scale of 1:24,000. It provides an important basis for understanding the relationship between settlement, roads, water, coal-bearing strata, and extractive activity around Mazie.
Oil and natural gas also formed part of the surrounding landscape. A Kentucky Transportation Cabinet corridor study noted a concentration of oil and gas wells between Martha and Mazie on the Mazie quadrangle. These wells connected the community to a longer regional history in which mineral rights, drilling leases, access roads, and energy development could alter both the economy and ownership of rural land.
The history of Mazie therefore cannot be separated from the land. Farms, roads, churches, cemeteries, postal routes, wells, and utility lines all followed the opportunities and restrictions created by the terrain.
Electricity and the Mazie Substation
One of the clearest records of Mazie’s twentieth-century infrastructure is the Mazie Substation. A property schedule filed with the Kentucky Public Service Commission describes the site as approximately 4.5 miles west of Martha on Highway 32. The tract contained 0.756 acre and was conveyed from Grayson Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation to East Kentucky Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation by a deed dated January 1, 1967, recorded in Lawrence County Deed Book 148, page 46.
The deed does not by itself establish the date when electric service first reached every household around Mazie, but it does document the community’s place within the modern rural power network. By the middle decades of the twentieth century, eastern Kentucky communities were being reshaped by electric lighting, household appliances, powered tools, refrigeration, radio, and later television. The substation made Mazie not only a postal name but also a practical point within the region’s electrical system.
That infrastructure remains another reason the name endured. Even as schools consolidated, stores closed, and postal service changed, maps and utility records continued to use Mazie as a location.
Newspapers Preserved Everyday Mazie
The Big Sandy News is one of the most important sources for recovering Mazie’s daily history. Published in Louisa, the newspaper reached deeply into Lawrence County and the wider Big Sandy region. The Lawrence County Public Library now provides a large digital archive containing the Big Sandy News, the Big Sandy News-Recorder, and the Lawrence County Recorder, while the Library of Congress preserves earlier issues through its historic newspaper collection.
Within those pages are the events that rarely entered formal histories. Births, marriages, deaths, school programs, church meetings, road work, accidents, military departures, family reunions, farm news, elections, fires, illnesses, and visits between relatives can all help reconstruct Mazie household by household.
The obituaries of George Phillips and Britt Maxie show the value of those newspapers. A short death notice may preserve a birthplace, occupation, church, burial place, family network, and years of public service. Repeated across decades, such notices can reveal the people who gave Mazie its continuity.
The Closing of the Mazie Post Office
The most precise date in Mazie’s documented history is the end of its independent post office. United States Postal Service records state that the Mazie Post Office was discontinued effective May 28, 2004. The ZIP Code, 41160, was retained. Mazie was then established as a place name under Blaine effective August 6, 2005, and residents were permitted to continue using “Mazie KY 41160” as the final line of an address.
The wording of that federal notice is significant. The post office closed, but Mazie was not erased. Instead, the Postal Service formally preserved it as an approved place name. Mail administration moved elsewhere, yet the community retained the right to identify itself on an envelope.
For a rural place, that distinction matters. A post office closure can appear to mark the death of a community when viewed only through federal records. In reality, people may continue to live there, bury relatives there, attend church nearby, travel roads bearing the name, and describe themselves as being from the place long after the postal counter disappears.
The History Still Waiting to Be Recovered
Much of Mazie’s history remains scattered in records that have not been brought together. The federal postmaster appointment books can establish the full postal chronology. Site location reports may identify where the office stood and whether it moved. Deeds can trace the land beneath the post office, church, substation, and family farms. Census schedules can reconstruct neighboring households. School census records may identify children and districts. Cemetery stones and death certificates can connect generations. Newspaper columns can restore the names of teachers, ministers, merchants, farmers, soldiers, and families who otherwise survive only in private memory.
Oral history is equally important. The people who remember the old post office, the mail carriers, the church, local stores, road conditions, oil and gas work, school consolidation, and the families along the branches hold evidence that may exist nowhere else. Those memories should be recorded while they can still be compared with maps, photographs, letters, and public documents.
Mazie’s story demonstrates one of the central challenges of Appalachian history. Small communities often disappear from public attention long before they disappear from the lives of the people connected to them. Their records are divided among courthouses, libraries, archives, churches, cemeteries, family collections, and government agencies. Recovering their history requires treating each small reference as part of a larger whole.
Mazie Kept Its Name
Mazie did not need incorporation, a large population, or a commercial center to become a real community. Its identity grew from repeated use. The name was written on mail, printed in newspapers, placed on maps, spoken at funerals, attached to roads, used for a church, assigned to a substation, and carried by residents who continued to call the place home.
The closing of the post office in 2004 ended one chapter, but the following year’s postal decision preserved Mazie as an accepted place name. That administrative act reflected a deeper truth. A community is not only a building where mail is sorted. It is a landscape of memory, family, labor, worship, burial, and belonging.
Mazie remains part of Lawrence County because its name still explains where people came from, where their relatives lived, where roads lead, and where generations were laid to rest. For a small Appalachian place, that continuity is its history.
Sources & Further Reading
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Appalachian Counties Served by ARC.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-counties-served-by-arc/
East Kentucky Power Cooperative, Inc. “Third Supplemental Indenture: Property List, Including the Mazie Substation Site.” Filed with the Kentucky Public Service Commission, June 8, 2018. https://psc.ky.gov/pscscf/2018%20cases/2018-00115/20180608_attachment%202%20to%20response%208%20-%20third%20supplemental%20indenture.pdf
FamilySearch. “History of Lawrence County, Kentucky: As Told by Those Who Live It, and Others Who Heard Their Stories.” FamilySearch Catalog. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/615888
FamilySearch. “Lawrence County, Kentucky Genealogy.” FamilySearch Research Wiki. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Lawrence_County%2C_Kentucky_Genealogy
Kentucky Public Service Commission. “East Kentucky Power Cooperative Application and Property Schedule.” 2011. https://psc.ky.gov/pscscf/2011%20cases/2011-00204/20110614_east%20ky%20power%20app.pdf
Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. “Extension of KY 645 Regional Corridor Study.” Frankfort: Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, 2006. https://transportation.ky.gov/Planning/Planning%20Studies%20and%20Reports/Ky%20-%20645%20Regional%20Corridor%20Study%202_Report%20Text.pdf
Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. “Lawrence County State Primary Road System.” Current as of August 6, 2025. https://transportation.ky.gov/Planning/State%20Primary%20Road%20System%20Lists/Lawrence.pdf
Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. “State Primary Road System: Lawrence County, Kentucky.” Map revised December 2024. https://transportation.ky.gov/Planning/SPRS%20Maps/Lawrence.pdf
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1952 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/2-uncategorised/424-obit-1952
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1954 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/2-uncategorised/426-obit-1954
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1959 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.lckghs.com/index.php/en/obituaries/2-uncategorised/431-obit-1959
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1968 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.lckghs.com/index.php/en/obituaries/2-uncategorised/442-obit-1968
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1975 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/en/obituaries/2-uncategorised/448-obit-1975
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “1999 Obituaries and Newspaper Abstracts.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/en/obituaries/2-uncategorised/388-obit-1999
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “Churches of Lawrence County, Kentucky.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/en/churches
Lawrence County Genealogical and Historical Society. “Lawrence County Cemeteries.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lckghs.com/index.php/en/cemeteries/lawrence-county
Lawrence County Public Library. “Big Sandy News Digital Collection.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lcplky.org/big-sandy-digital-collection/
Lawrence County Public Library. “Big Sandy News Obituary Indexes.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://lcplky.org/genealogy/big-sandy-news-obituary-indexes/
Lewis and Ferguson Funeral Home. “Obituary for Dorothy Williams Sparks.” December 2020. https://www.lewisandfergusonfuneralhome.com/obituary/Dorothy-Sparks
Library of Congress. “The Big Sandy News.” Chronicling America. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn83004226/
National Archives and Records Administration. “Appointment of Postmasters, 1832–September 30, 1971.” Microfilm Publication M841, Records of the Post Office Department, Record Group 28. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices/postmasters-1832-1971.html
National Archives and Records Administration. “Post Office Records.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices
National Archives and Records Administration. “Post Office Reports of Site Locations, 1837–1950.” Microfilm Publication M1126, Records of the Post Office Department, Record Group 28. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices/locations-1837-1950.html
National Archives and Records Administration. “Records of the Post Office Department.” Record Group 28. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/028.html
National Archives and Records Administration. “The Official Register of the United States, 1816–1959.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2004/winter/genealogy-official-register.html
National Archives and Records Administration. “1950 Census.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://1950census.archives.gov/
Outerbridge, William F. “Geologic Map of the Mazie Quadrangle, Eastern Kentucky.” Geologic Quadrangle Map GQ-1388. Reston, VA: United States Geological Survey, 1977. https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/gq1388
Rennick, Robert M. “Lawrence County: Post Offices and Place Names.” County Histories of Kentucky 244. Morehead State University, 2000. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/244/
Rennick, Robert M. Kentucky Place Names. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1984. https://www.kentuckypress.com/9780813101798/kentucky-place-names/
Rennick, Robert M. “Robert M. Rennick Kentucky Place Name Collection.” Morehead State University. Accessed July 19, 2026. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/robert_rennick_collection/
Tackett, Regina, Patricia Jackson, and Janice Thompson. History of Lawrence County, Kentucky: As Told by Those Who Live It, and Others Who Heard Their Stories. Dallas: Curtis Media, 1991. https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/615888
United States Geological Survey. “Mazie Quadrangle, Kentucky.” 7.5-Minute Series, 1:24,000. 1953. Robert M. Rennick Topographical Maps Collection, Morehead State University. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_maps_all/483/
United States Geological Survey. “TopoView: Historical Topographic Maps.” Accessed July 19, 2026. https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/
United States Postal Service. “Postal Bulletin 22169.” December 8, 2005. https://about.usps.com/postal-bulletin/2005/pb22169.pdf
Works Progress Administration. “Lawrence County: Brief History.” County Histories of Kentucky 349. Morehead State University, 1939. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/349/
Works Progress Administration and Historical Records Survey. “Lawrence County: General History.” County Histories of Kentucky 245. Morehead State University, 1939. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/245/
Author Note: This article is part of an effort to preserve the histories of small Appalachian communities whose stories survive across postal records, maps, newspapers, cemeteries, and family memory. Readers with photographs, church records, post office materials, school memories, or family stories connected to Mazie are encouraged to help strengthen the community’s historical record.