Powderly, Kentucky
16 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1911 and the latest in 1997. It stands in the Greenville census division. It lies in ZIP code area 42367. It stands on Whiskey Run. The Survey maps it on the Greenville quadrangle. 788 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 449 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresPowderly grew from 745 to 788 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 745 | |
| 2020 | 788 | +43 (+6%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
9 surveys from 16 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1911 USGS Drakesboro quadrangle1:48000
- 1913 USGS Drakesboro quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1952 USGS Greenville quadrangle1:24000
- 1954 USGS Evansville quadrangle1:250000
- 1957 USGS Evansville quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1961 USGS Evansville quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1963 USGS Greenville quadrangle1:24000, 4 printings
- 1983 USGS Madisonville quadrangle1:100000
- 1997 USGS Greenville quadrangle1:24000
Fires near this place
68 since 1997Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 68 fires within 5 miles of Powderly between 1997 and 2019, burning about 1,783 acres in total. 2 started naturally. 8 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Recreation and ceremony | 21 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 19 |
| Debris and open burning | 14 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 8 |
| Railroad operations and maintenance | 2 |
| Natural | 2 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 1 |
| Smoking | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 September 2002 | Recreation and ceremony | 4.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 27 September 2004 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 24 September 2008 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 22 September 2010 | Debris and open burning | 15 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 7 August 2002 | Equipment and vehicle use | 4.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 24 August 2007 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 2.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 24 August 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 8.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
| 19 August 1999 | Natural | 2.0 acres | Kentucky Division of Forestry | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
8 since 1995Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Powderly in 8 storm reports between 1995 and 2024: 4 thunderstorm wind, 1 tornado, 1 heavy rain, 1 hail. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 1998 | Tornado (F1) | Powderly | $100,000 | A rotating thunderstorm tracked from near the Hopkins County line at Bremen southeast across most of the county. A funnel cloud associated with this storm touched down in the Central City/Powderly area and lifted near Beechmont. The main effect of this storm was downed trees and limbs. About a half dozen buildings were damaged by falling trees or limbs. A garage collapsed in Powderly. Several vehicles were damaged, including two that were blown off the road. An estimate of the number of trees down ranged between 50 and 100. No injuries were reported. |
| January 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Powderly | $25,000 | About 15 trees fell on roads and into power lines. |
| May 1995 | Thunderstorm Wind | Powderly | $10,000 | Fifty to sixty mph winds were reported in Powderly. Several trees and power lines were blown down. |
| July 2024 | Thunderstorm Wind | Powderly | $3,000 | Thunderstorm winds blew down a tree and several tree limbs down in Greenville. |
| July 2024 | Flash Flood | Powderly | - | Water covered N Main St on the north side of Greenville. Overnight rainfall measured 3 inches at a Greenville CoCoRaHS gage while a Mesonet gage 3 miles NW of Powderly measured 4.14 inches. |
| April 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Powderly | - | A trained spotter observed branches were breaking off trees. |
| April 2010 | Heavy Rain | Powderly | - | A trained spotter reported 1.05 inches of rain in 40 minutes. Minor road flooding occurred countywide. |
| May 2017 | Hail | Powderly | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hillside | 0.8 miles | 16 | |
| Mercer | 1.5 miles | 16 | |
| Prospect (historical) | 1.6 miles | 16 | |
| Nebo | 1.9 miles | 16 | |
| Liberty Hill (historical) | 2.4 miles | 15 | |
| Morehead | 2.5 miles | 16 | |
| Greenville | 2.7 miles | 16 | |
| Luzerne | 3.0 miles | 16 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Powderly | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2307994 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 501233. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.








