Photograph of Old State Capitol — Photograph by Daderot, CC0 1.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Old Statehouse

A National Historic Landmark. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

From the record

“The Old State Capitol in Kentucky, also known as Old Statehouse, is the former capitol building of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. The building is located in Kentucky's capital, Frankfort, and housed the Kentucky General Assembly from 1830 to 1910.”
Wikipedia article Old State Capitol (Kentucky), CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 53 National Register listings published here for Franklin County · listed in 1971 · category: Building · a National Historic Landmark.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

National Historic Landmark. The highest federal designation, held by about 2,600 places in the country against roughly 100,000 Register listings.
What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Still standing. The Park Service records this property as extant.
Address. On Broadway, bounded by Madison, Clinton, and Lewis Sts., Frankfort, 40601
When was it listed? March 1971
Category. building
Census division. Frankfort
Architectural style. Greek Revival architecture
National Register reference number. 71000346 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

1 since 2019

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Old Statehouse in 2019, burning about 3 acres in total. 1 started naturally. None was 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
Natural	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
3 July 2019	Natural	3.0 acres	Kentucky Division of Forestry	JIM BEAM

Every fire recorded in Franklin County

Mines and quarries near this property

4 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 4 workings within 5 miles of Old Statehouse: 2 prospects, 1 producer, 1 past producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken, Clay. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status
Branch Junction Clay	Clay	Prospect
Franklin County Mine	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Glenns Creek	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Thorn Hill Clay Bed	Clay	Prospect

Every working recorded in Franklin County

Storms near this property

60 of 84 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Frankfort, the town this property stands in, in 84 storm reports between 1994 and 2025: 50 thunderstorm wind, 21 hail, 9 flash flood, 2 flood. The reports record 2 deaths and 1 injury. 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
April 2025	Flash Flood	Frankfort	1 killed	A 9 year old boy was on his way to the school bus stop when he was swept away by water. His body was located approximated 2 hours later about half of a mile downstream.
September 2006	Flash Flood	Frankfort	1 killed	Several roads were closed due to high water. A female drowned in her vehicle which was found in a creek in the Avenstoke Road area.
August 2003	Lightning	Frankfort	1 hurt	A Franklin County firefighter was struck by lightning inside the Owenton Road Fire Station.
May 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$5,000,000	Twelve small aircraft destroyed by Capital City Airport, reported by Department of Emergency Service, relayed by TV36.
May 2010	Flood	Frankfort	$1,000,000	The Kentucky River at Frankfort crested at 42.8 feet around 7 PM EST on May 4. Flood stage at Frankfort is 31 feet. Major flooding occurs at this level with basements of homes and businessed in downtown Frankfort flooded. The Bellepoint area was cut off by high water.
May 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$500,000	Power lines down and damage to Lowe's Hardware store.
April 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$50,000	Numerous trees and power lines were downed across the city of Frankfort. The exterior wall of an apartment building collapsed.
May 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$50,000	Trees and power lines down. House damaged along U.S. 60 in Western Frankfort reported by city police.
June 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$30,000	Local law enforcement reported that a tree fell across a house in east Frankfort. Several people sent pictures via social media of trees down in the Silver Lake neighborhood just east of Frankfort. A spotter with a weather station recorded a wind gust of 55 mph.
September 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$20,000	Officials reported a tree down on the Dollar General store.
June 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$15,000	Local broadcast media reported trees and power poles snapped.
December 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$10,000	Many reports arrived concerning downed trees, power lines and blown transformers south of Wilkinson Road and north of east Main Street in Frankfort.
April 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$10,000	There was unspecified damage to a barn due to thunderstorm winds. Large hail also fell, but the size was not reported.
May 2010	Flash Flood	Frankfort	$5,000	A couple of county roads were temporarily obstructed by debris and rocks from water flowing over the roads.
July 1994	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	$500	Numerous power lines were downed by high winds on King's Daughters Drive.
June 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A tree was blown down by strong thunderstorm winds along Wilkinson Boulevard near the Capital Plaza Hotel.
August 2022	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	Wilkinson Boulevard at Reilly Road and 1250 Lewis Ferry Road were closed due to flooding.
November 2022	Hail	Frankfort	-	Quarter sized hail was observed in downtown Frankfort.
July 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	There was a report of a tree down.
July 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A transformer was sparking due to a tree down on Reilly Road.
March 2019	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A few trees were snapped near Alumni Stadium at Kentucky State University.
June 2018	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were reported down on Versailles Road.
November 2018	Flood	Frankfort	-	Rolling Acres Drive was closed due to flooding.
April 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were reported down in the area.
June 2017	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	Meadowbrook Road covered by 6 to 8 inches of high flowing water.
April 2016	Hail	Frankfort	-	One inch diameter hail was reported by the public via social media.
July 2015	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A Franklin County law enforcement official reported that winds from a complex of thunderstorms had gusts around 50 knots.
June 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	The Franklin County emergency manager reported several trees down in Frankfort.
December 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	The ASOS site at the Frankfort airport measured a wind gust of 59 mph.
July 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A large tree fell on a house near Nole Avenue. Local emergency management relayed multiple reports of trees and power lines down across Frankfort. Several roads become briefly impassable in the Thornhill neighborhood.
September 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	In Frankfort, a tree was downed at the intersection of Clinton and Ann Streets.
April 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Capital Ave. was closed by a downed tree.
April 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were down on roadways throughout the city. A sign was blown into a window at a business in the 800 block of Louisville Rd.
April 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Multiple trees were downed countywide. Power outages were reported both east and west of Frankfort.
March 2011	Hail	Frankfort	-	A spotter reported nickel size hail near the Boone National Guard Center.
October 2010	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	A NWS employee reported estimated winds of 60 mph as well as a roll cloud.
August 2009	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	Numerous roads were flooded in the county. They included Camp Pleasant Road and Seeder Road in the Peaks Mill area. there was a high water rescue on Oklahnd Branch road.
June 2008	Hail	Frankfort	-	Estimated hail size by Emergency Manager.
July 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees and power lines were reported down across the county.
January 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Thunderstorm winds downed trees on Grand Avenue.
July 2006	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	U.S. Highway 421 in southeast Franklin County was flooded in spots.
August 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were downed.
May 2004	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	Some streets were flooded in the city.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Numerous trees were downed.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Numerous trees were downed.
June 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees and power lines were downed.
May 2004	Flash Flood	Frankfort	-	Flag Fork Road off Highway 421 was washed out.
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Several large trees were blown down.
June 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were downed and blocking highway 421.
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Trees were down along Highway 460.
May 1995	Tornado	Frankfort	-	Tornado touchdown along Route 421 reported by county dispatch.
June 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	Power lines blown down.
March 2012	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
April 2011	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
July 2011	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
May 2010	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
April 2009	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
February 2009	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	no account filed
June 2009	Hail	Frankfort	-	no account filed
April 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Frankfort	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Franklin County

Newspapers printed here

6,420 digitised pages

3 papers published in this town, digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read: 926 issues, 6,420 pages. Every page is searchable, so a name or a street can be looked for directly in what the town printed about itself at the time.

Newspaper	Published
The Weekly Roundabout	1877 to 1882
The Frankfort Roundabout	1882 to 1908
Frankfort Weekly News and Roundabout	1908 to 19??

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Old Statehouse Historic District	under 500 feet	1980
Old Governor's Mansion	0.2 miles	1971
Swigert-Taylor House	0.2 miles	2009
Capital Plaza Hotel	0.2 miles	2024
Frankfort Commercial Historic District	0.2 miles	1979
Old U.S. Courthouse and Post Office	0.2 miles	1974

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 71000346 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Franklin County	All 53 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
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.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
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.