Only in Kentucky can the real Rosie the Riveter grow up in a town that no longer exists because the state submerged it. Hi, I'm Michael. And I'm learning a little bit more about Kentucky. One county at a time. All 120 of them. And today, I'm learning about Pulaski County. Pulaski County sits in south-central Kentucky, covering about 658 square miles, making it the third-largest county in the state by land area. The terrain is hilly and dissected, part of the Mississippian Plateau, with limestone bedrock underneath much of the county. The western edge of the county is defined by Lake Cumberland, a 101-mile reservoir with more than two trillion gallons of water held behind Wolf Creek Dam. The lake was completed in 1950. It changed everything about this county, and not only in the ways that are easy to celebrate. Pulaski County was established on December 21, 1798, carved from Lincoln and Green counties. It was named for Count Casimir Pulaski, a Polish military officer who came to America after hearing that the colonies were fighting for independence. He became a brigadier general in the Continental Army. He died on October 11, 1779, from wounds sustained at the Siege of Savannah. He was twenty-four years old. Seven states have counties named for him. The county seat is Somerset, established in 1801 on forty acres donated by a settler named William Dodson. The site was chosen because of a nearby spring. The path to that spring became the town's most traveled street. Somerset's name honors Somerset County, New Jersey, reflecting where many of the early settlers had come from. A post office opened in 1803. The city incorporated in 1887. Within a decade of the railroad arriving in 1875, Somerset's population had jumped from under 600 to over 2,600. The Southern Railway depot south of downtown created a whole new neighborhood, and the city has been the commercial center of south-central Kentucky ever since Free Frank McWorter was born into slavery in Pulaski County in 1777. His enslaver allowed him to hire out his own labor on the side and keep a portion of the earnings. During the War of 1812, when saltpeter was desperately needed to make gunpowder, McWorter managed a saltpeter mining operation so effectively that he accumulated money beyond what his enslaver took. In 1819, he purchased his own freedom. Then he kept going. Over the next several decades, Free Frank McWorter purchased the freedom of sixteen members of his family, one by one, each requiring years of labor and saving. He eventually moved to Illinois, where he founded New Philadelphia, the first town in the United States platted by a Black man. He applied for the town's plat in 1836. He continued purchasing family members from slavery until he died in 1854. His last act before his death was to put aside money for his son's freedom. The son was freed after McWorter died. By late 1861, Confederate forces had established a defensive line across southern Kentucky, stretching from the Big Sandy Valley in the east through Cumberland Gap, through Mill Springs on the Cumberland River, through Bowling Green, all the way to Columbus on the Mississippi. It was an ambitious line. It was meant to hold Kentucky for the Confederacy and position Confederate forces for a push north. Confederate Brigadier General Felix Zollicoffer was responsible for the eastern end of that line. In November 1861, he moved his forces to the south bank of the Cumberland River at Mill Springs, near the community now called Nancy, about eight miles west of Somerset. Then, for reasons that military historians have debated ever since, he moved most of his men to the north bank, where they would be closer to Union forces. His superiors ordered him to move back south of the river. He couldn't. He didn't have enough boats to cross quickly if threatened. #learningontiktok #TikTokLearningCampaign #LearnOnTikTok - @michaelmoeller