The Curious Case of Kentucky's Exclave

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In the early 1800s, a series of powerful earthquakes along the New Madrid Fault line caused major disruptions, including altering the course of the Mississippi River and creating a geographic anomaly known as the Kentucky Bend or New Madrid Bend - a 30-square-mile exclave of Kentucky that is completely surrounded by Missouri and Tennessee. This tiny, sparsely populated region has a mailing address in Tennessee and can only be accessed by driving through another state.

Why it matters

The Kentucky Bend is a unique geographic and historical curiosity that highlights how natural disasters can dramatically reshape state borders and create isolated enclaves. It's an example of how the natural world can override human-drawn political boundaries, and a reminder of the power of major seismic events to dramatically alter the landscape.

The details

The Kentucky Bend was created by a series of massive earthquakes that struck the New Madrid Fault region in 1811 and 1812. These quakes were so powerful that they altered the course of the Mississippi River, caused church bells to ring over 1,200 miles away, and even created a new lake - Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee. The quakes also cut off a 30-square-mile piece of Kentucky, separating it from the rest of the state and surrounding it with Missouri and Tennessee. This isolated territory, known as the Kentucky Bend or New Madrid Bend, now has a population of just 9 people, with a mailing address in the nearby Tennessee town of Tiptonville.

• The major earthquakes that created the Kentucky Bend occurred in 1811 and 1812.
• In 1990, a climatologist named Iben Browning predicted another major earthquake along the New Madrid Fault, causing a wave of panic, though the predicted quake never materialized.