South Fork Kentucky River

Template:Short description Template:Use American English Template:Template other South Fork Kentucky River is a river in Kentucky in the United States.Template:Sfn It is a fork of the Kentucky River that it joins just downstream of Beattyville.Template:Sfn Template:Cn-span

It was not originally named South Fork.Template:Sfn Two of its three major tributaries are the forks at its head, the Red Bird River and Goose Creek, whose confluence is at Oneida. Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Before the 19th century, Goose Creek also incorporated what is today known as South Fork Kentucky River.Template:Sfn

Navigability

Several largely ineffective attempts were made in the 19th century to make South Fork navigable all of the way upstream to the Goose Creek Salt Works.Template:Sfn An Act of the legislature on 1811-01-10 enabled a lottery to raise Template:USD towards making this reach of the river navigable, and several times the scheme was allowed more time, but by 1813 still nothing had come of it.Template:Sfn Between 1837 and 1845 Template:USD was spent clearing obstructions from this reach.Template:Sfn

One of the biggest impediments was an area known as The Narrows, a reach of the river downstream of the Goose Creek/Red Bird fork where it descended by .Template:Sfn

Basin and hydrology

A survey of the reach between the Salt Works and the Soft Fork mouth was performed in 1836–1837.Template:Sfn It recorded the entire length as descending in total,Template:Sfn with the South Fork portion being and of that.Template:Sfn It recorded the width as varying between .Template:Sfn

Floods

The Kentucky River basin, including South Fork and its tributaries, suffered a major flood in January and February 1957, although that did not exceed the highest on record for South Fork specifically, as Goose Creek's record at that point had been the flood of June and July 1947.Template:Sfn Peak water levels at Manchester were lower than those of the 1947 flood.Template:Sfn However at Booneville the peak levels were higher than those of 1947.Template:Sfn

25 homes and 34 commercial buildings were flooded in Manchester; with an estimate cost of the damage exceeding Template:USD.Template:Sfn 20 homes and 10 other buildings were flooded in Oneida, with approximately 80% of the town under water, in some places by as much as .Template:Sfn 31 homes and 1 other building were flooded in Booneville.Template:Sfn

Tributaries and other locations

• Its major tributaries include:
  • Sexton's Creek downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at , whose further tributaries and locations are in its own article
  • Road Run downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
    • Columbus Bishop Branch upstream,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Rooster Branch downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Rocky Branch downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Lower Teges Creek downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Upper Teges Creek downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Crane Creek downstream of Oneida at altitude ,Template:Sfn mouth at headwaters at
  • Red Bird River,Template:Sfn mouth at , whose further tributaries and locations are in its own article
  • Goose Creek,Template:Sfn mouth at , whose further tributaries and locations are in its own article

General

A road connects a left branch of Crane Creek via a gap to the Wildcat Branch of Goose Creek.Template:Sfn A road connects a left branch of Upper Teges Creek to Crane Creek.Template:Sfn

See also

• List of rivers of Kentucky

Sources

• (Template:Trim The coals of Goose Creek and its tributaries at the Internet Archive)