Appalachian Community Histories – Mudlick Fork, Perry County: Branches, Schools, and a Community Kept on the Map
Mudlick is one of those Perry County names that looks simple until the records are opened. It appears as Mudlick, Mud Lick, Mudlick Branch, Mudlick Fork, Mudlick School, and Mudlick Hollow. Some of those names point to the same neighborhood world. Others point to different streams or map features that should not be merged without proof.
The safest way to begin is with the map record. GNIS-derived listings place Mudlick as a historical populated place in Perry County at about 37.3473 north latitude and 83.2675 west longitude. The same feature lists also place Mudlick Branch nearby, along with Mudlick Fork and Mudlick School, which shows that the name belonged not only to a stream but to a lived-in community landscape. Those records matter because small Appalachian places often survived in official memory through schools, branches, cemeteries, roads, and hollows rather than through incorporated town lines.
Finding Mudlick in Perry County
The Perry County government still lists Mudlick Fork among the county’s communities, alongside nearby names such as Grapevine, Krypton, Napfor, Saul, Chavies, Avawam, Buckhorn, and Big Creek. That modern list does not tell the whole history, but it confirms that Mudlick Fork remains part of the county’s recognized community geography.
The location is best understood as part of the larger northwestern and central Perry County map world, where creek valleys, road forks, and ridge gaps connect communities more than straight-line distance does. A TopoQuest feature list tied to the Hazard area places Mudlick, Mudlick Branch, Mudlick Fork, and Mudlick School in relation to other Perry County places such as Typo, Whitaker, Walkertown, Pigeonroost, and Two Notch. A separate Hurricane, Kentucky, feature list places the same cluster in relation to Krypton, Napfor, Grapevine, Avawam, and other nearby communities.
That is why a Mudlick article has to be careful. A person searching only one spelling may miss the school. A person searching only Mudlick Fork may miss Mudlick Branch. A person searching only Mud Lick may end up in the wrong Kentucky county. In Perry County, the name should be followed across the map, not treated as one single dot.
The School and the Branch
The school record is one of the most important clues that Mudlick was more than a physical feature. Mudlick School is listed as a historical school in Perry County at about 37.3366 north latitude and 83.2530 west longitude. In rural Appalachian records, a school name often marks the center of a neighborhood better than a post office or town plat. Children walked from nearby hollows, families gathered for programs, and a schoolhouse often doubled as a public landmark in memory long after the building closed.
Mudlick Branch adds another layer. One Mudlick Branch is listed near 37.3434 north latitude and 83.2716 west longitude, close to the historical Mudlick place and school. Another Mudlick Branch appears on the Buckhorn map at about 37.3151 north latitude and 83.3866 west longitude. That second listing is important because it shows why researchers should not assume every Mudlick Branch reference belongs to the same exact hollow.
There is also a separate Mud Lick stream in Perry County, shown on the Buckhorn quadrangle at about 37.272869 north latitude and 83.494631 west longitude, with an elevation around 1,004 feet. That stream should be checked separately from the historical Mudlick community near the Krypton and Hazard-area feature clusters.
What the Old Maps Preserve
Historical topographic maps are especially useful for places like Mudlick because they show names that may not appear in county histories. The USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection contains maps published from 1884 to 2006 and was built to preserve and make older topographic quadrangles available to the public.
The Krypton, Kentucky, quadrangle is especially important for Mudlick research. YellowMaps identifies the Krypton map as a USGS 7.5-minute topographic map at 1:24,000 scale and lists historical versions including the 1954 map updated in 1955, the 1961 map updated in 1962, and the 1972 map updated in 1973. Those editions are the kind of source that can show when a school, road, branch, or community label was being used by federal mapmakers.
The map record also helps explain why Mudlick should be read as a landscape name. In Perry County, settlement often followed water. A branch name could become a road name. A school name could become the way people described where they lived. A cemetery name could preserve a neighborhood long after mail routes, school districts, and coal operations changed.
Coal, Timber, and the Wider Perry County Setting
Mudlick’s deeper setting is Perry County’s coalfield landscape. The Kentucky Geological Survey describes Perry County as part of the Eastern Kentucky Coal Field and notes that coal mining remained a major county industry in its planning map report. The same report places Perry County within a map system built from USGS quadrangle studies, including Krypton, Buckhorn, Hazard, Big Creek, Hyden East, and other quadrangles important to this part of the mountains.
James M. Hodge’s 1918 study, Coals of the North Fork of Kentucky River in Perry and Portions of Breathitt and Knott Counties, is another useful background source even when Mudlick itself is not the main subject. It is a Kentucky Geological Survey-era coal report covering the North Fork Kentucky River country and the coal-bearing region around Perry, Breathitt, and Knott counties. For a small place like Mudlick, this kind of source gives the larger economic and environmental context: the creeks, ridges, coal seams, and transport problems that shaped settlement patterns before modern roads.
That context matters because Mudlick was not isolated from the forces that shaped nearby Perry County communities. Coal, timber, roads, schools, churches, and family cemeteries formed the pattern. Even where the written record is thin, the map shows a place woven into the same countywide story as Grapevine, Saul, Krypton, Avawam, Buckhorn, and Big Creek.
Cemeteries, Obituaries, and Family Memory
Cemetery and obituary records help put families back into the map. Mudlick Cemetery is listed near Highway 15 on Gambill Road, close to the Breathitt and Perry County line. That kind of cemetery record should be treated as a lead rather than final proof, but grave photographs, inscriptions, and burial listings can become primary evidence when checked carefully.
Recent obituaries also connect the name to Grapevine. A Maggard Funeral Homes obituary for Aaron Gambill, born in Perry County in 1948, gives interment at Mudlick Cemetery in Grapevine, Kentucky. Other funeral notices likewise use Mudlick Cemetery as a local burial place. These records do not write the full history of the community, but they help show how the Mudlick name remained active in family geography and funeral memory.
For family research, Perry County census schedules are another important line of evidence. FamilySearch notes that federal population schedules for Perry County are available for 1830, 1840, 1850, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1900, 1910, 1920, and 1930. Those records can help connect households to nearby precincts, roads, post offices, and neighbors, even when Mudlick itself is not written as a formal town name.
Newspapers and the Local Record
The Perry County newspaper record is one of the best next places to search. Perry County Public Library announced that its newspaper and yearbook digital archive includes Perry County newspapers from the late 1800s to 1977 and yearbooks through 2015. The archive is keyword searchable and allows users to crop, download, and create files from the scanned material.
That archive should be searched under every spelling: Mudlick, Mud Lick, Mudlick School, Mudlick Branch, Mudlick Fork, Grapevine, Saul, Avawam, Krypton, Buckhorn, and family names tied to the cemetery and road network. Local newspapers may hold school notices, land sales, road orders, obituaries, church events, court notices, and community columns that never made it into county histories.
The Hazard Herald is especially valuable for this kind of work. Newspaper archive records describe it as a Hazard, Kentucky, paper with searchable pages from 1911 to 1975. For a place like Mudlick, the important items may not be feature stories. They may be a school honor roll, a funeral notice, a road improvement notice, or a legal description that mentions a branch by name.
Mudlick Hollow and American Hollow
Mudlick also entered a wider cultural record through American Hollow, Rory Kennedy’s 1999 documentary for HBO. The film followed the Bowling family in eastern Kentucky, and later descriptions identify Iree Bowling as living in Mudlick Hollow. The Paley Center catalog lists American Hollow as an HBO documentary broadcast in 1999 with subject headings including Appalachia, family in Kentucky, and rural conditions.
That source should be used with care. A documentary can preserve voices, faces, houses, and everyday scenes that written records miss. It can also frame a place through an outsider’s lens. For Mudlick, the best use of American Hollow is not to let it stand as the whole story, but to place it beside maps, cemetery records, newspapers, deeds, census schedules, and local memory. Together, those records show a community that was both a real place on the Perry County map and a remembered hollow in the lives of families who called it home.
Why Mudlick Is Hard to Write, and Why It Matters
Mudlick is not hard to write because there is no evidence. It is hard to write because the evidence is scattered. The name appears in several forms. It belongs to branches, a fork, a school, a cemetery, and a historical populated place. It sits near other communities whose names may appear more often in newspapers or postal records. It also overlaps with the remembered geography of Saul, Grapevine, Avawam, Krypton, and Buckhorn.
That scattered record is typical of small Appalachian communities. Many were never incorporated. Some had no separate post office. Some were known by a creek, a family cemetery, a schoolhouse, or the road that followed a branch into the hills. When those institutions changed, the place did not disappear. It simply became harder to find.
Mudlick’s history is therefore a lesson in how to read Perry County. Start with the map, but do not stop there. Follow the school. Follow the cemetery. Follow the obituaries. Follow the newspaper notices. Follow the road orders and deeds if the courthouse record is available. The story of Mudlick is not one large event. It is the record of a mountain place that survived through names repeated by surveyors, teachers, families, undertakers, mapmakers, and neighbors.
Sources & Further Reading
United States Geological Survey. “Historical Topographic Maps: Preserving the Past.” National Geospatial Program. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.usgs.gov/programs/national-geospatial-program/historical-topographic-maps-preserving-past
United States Geological Survey. “USGS TopoView.” National Geologic Map Database. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/
Commonwealth of Kentucky. “GNIS: Populated Places.” Kentucky Open GIS. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://opengisdata.ky.gov/maps/c839ecf831424e25bae5c91b6d3a86a4
Commonwealth of Kentucky. “Kentucky Geographic Names Information System.” ArcGIS. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=6608785568984422b671677eb224f432
TopoQuest. “Hazard, KY.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://topoquest.com/place/kentucky/populated-place/hazard/512617
TopoZone. “Mudlick Branch Topo Map in Perry County KY.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.topozone.com/kentucky/perry-ky/stream/mudlick-branch-11/
TopoZone. “Mud Lick Topo Map in Perry County KY.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.topozone.com/kentucky/perry-ky/stream/mud-lick-15/
AnyPlaceAmerica. “Mud Lick Topo Map in Perry County, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.anyplaceamerica.com/directory/ky/perry-county-21193/streams/mud-lick-514132/
Kentucky Geological Survey. Generalized Geologic Map for Land-Use Planning: Perry County, Kentucky. Lexington: University of Kentucky, 2007. https://kgs.uky.edu/kgsweb/olops/pub/kgs/mc164_12.pdf
Hodge, James M. Coals of the North Fork of Kentucky River in Perry and Portions of Breathitt and Knott Counties. Frankfort, KY: Kentucky Geological Survey, 1918. https://archive.org/details/coalsofnorthfork00hodgrich
Perry County Public Library. “The New Perry County Newspaper & Yearbook Digital Archive Is Live!” January 9, 2024. https://perrycountypl.org/the-new-perry-county-newspaper-yearbook-digital-archive-is-live/
Perry County Public Library. “Resources.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perrycountypl.org/resources/
Library of Congress. “The Hazard Herald, Hazard, Ky.” Chronicling America. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn85052003/
Library of Congress. “The Hazard Herald, Hazard, Ky., December 17, 1914.” Chronicling America. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn85052003/1914-12-17/ed-1/
Internet Archive. “The Hazard Herald: 1958-06-09.” Kentucky Digital Newspaper Program. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://archive.org/details/kd9cn6xw4g1h
Newspapers.com. “The Hazard Herald Archive.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.newspapers.com/paper/the-hazard-herald/39867/
Rennick, Robert M. “Perry County: Place Names.” Robert M. Rennick Manuscript Collection, Morehead State University, 2016. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_ms_collection/121/
Rennick, Robert M. “Perry County: Post Offices.” County Histories of Kentucky, Morehead State University, 2000. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/273/
Rennick, Robert M. “Kentucky River Post Offices.” Robert M. Rennick Manuscript Collection, Morehead State University, 2003. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_ms_collection/159/
Randolph, H. F. “Perry County: General History.” County Histories of Kentucky, Morehead State University. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1053&context=kentucky_county_histories
Perry County, Kentucky. “Perry County Communities.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perrycounty.ky.gov/things-to-do/Pages/Communities.aspx
Perry County, Kentucky. “About Perry County.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perrycounty.ky.gov/Pages/about.aspx
Perry County Historical Society. “Perry County History.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perrycountyhistoricalsociety.com/index/archives-2/perry-county-history/
Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1992. https://www.kyenc.org/
Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Atlas and Gazetteer. “Perry County, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.kyatlas.com/21193.html
FamilySearch. “Perry County, Kentucky Genealogy.” FamilySearch Research Wiki. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Perry_County%2C_Kentucky_Genealogy
FamilySearch. “Land Records, 1821–1964: Perry County, Kentucky.” FamilySearch Catalog. Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.familysearch.org/en/search/catalog/190103
Perry County Clerk. “Records Center.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perry.countyclerk.us/records-center/
Perry County Clerk. “Online Land Records.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://perry.countyclerk.us/records-center/online-land-records/
National Archives. “Appointment of Postmasters, 1832–September 30, 1971.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices/postmasters-1832-1971.html
National Archives. “Post Office Records.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.archives.gov/research/post-offices
Find a Grave. “Mudlick Cemetery.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/2397622/mudlick-cemetery
Maggard Funeral Homes. “Aaron Gambill Obituary.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.maggardfuneralhomes.com/obituaries/Aaron-Gambill?obId=28056897
KYGenWeb. “Perry County, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://kygenweb.net/perry/
KYGenWeb. “Cities, Towns & Maps: Perry County, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://kygenweb.net/perry/citiestowns.htm
Genealogy Trails. “Schools: Census, 1906, Perry County, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://genealogytrails.com/ken/perry/school_1906.html
Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. “American Hollow.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.fullframefest.org/film/american-hollow-2/
Paley Center for Media. “America Undercover: American Hollow.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.paleycenter.org/collection/item?item=T%3A59758
May, Roger. “Review: American Hollow.” Roger May Photography, March 10, 2016. https://www.rogermayphotography.com/walkyourcamera/review-american-hollow
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Perry, Kentucky.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.arc.gov/states_counties/perry/
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Appalachian Counties Served by ARC.” Accessed May 18, 2026. https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-counties-served-by-arc/
Author Note: Mudlick is the kind of Perry County place that can be missed if you only search one spelling or one map feature. I wrote this as a record trail for readers who want to follow the branch, the school, the cemetery, and the families without merging separate Mudlick names too quickly.