1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Owensboro

OWENSBORO, a city and the county-seat of Daviess county, Kentucky, U.S.A., on the Ohio river, 112 m. by rail W.S.W. of Louisville. Pop. (1890) 9837; (1900) 13,189, of whom 3061 were negroes; (1910 census) 16,011. The city is served by the Illinois Central, the Louisville & Nashville, and the Louisville, Henderson & St Louis railways, and by steamboat lines to river ports. At Owensboro are the Owensboro College for women (nonsect.), opened in 1890, Saint Francis Academy, and a Roman Catholic school for boys. Two miles S. of the city is Hickman Park (20 acres), a pleasure resort, and E. of the city is a summer Chautauqua park. Owensboro is situated in a good agricultural region; coal, iron, building stone, clay, oil, lead and zinc abound in the vicinity; and the city has a notably large trade in tobacco (especially strip tobacco) and has various manufactures. The value of the city's factory products increased from $1,740,128 in 1900 to $4,187,700 in 1905, or 140.6%. The municipality owns and operates its electric-lighting plant and water-works. Owensboro was settled about 1798, and for several years was commonly known as Yellow Banks; in 1816 it was laid out as a town and named Rossborough, and two years later the present name was adopted in honour of Colonel Abraham Owen (1769–1811), a Virginian who removed to Kentucky in 1785, served in several Indian campaigns, and was killed in the battle of Tippecanoe. Owensboro was incorporated as a city in 1866.