Frenchburg, KY

Frenchburg is the home rule-class city at the center of Menifee County, Kentucky, and the county's only incorporated city. U.S. 460 and Kentucky 36 meet here in a wooded Eastern Kentucky valley, with Beaver Creek running through the community before heading toward the Licking River and Cave Run Lake. Frenchburg was laid out in 1869 as the seat of the newly formed county and was named for Robert French, a local lawyer and judge. The city incorporated in 1871.

Beaver Creek made its power clear on June 27, 1882, when a flood swept away all but three buildings and killed six people. Frenchburg rebuilt as the courthouse town, with Menifee County High School, Menifee Central, the county library, and the courthouse giving Main Street its civic work. The Frenchburg School Campus, established through the educational and religious work of physician and preacher Edward Owings Guerrant, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Today the city remains a gateway to Cave Run Lake, Red River Gorge, and Daniel Boone National Forest, with county government and forested ridges sharing the same local map.