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1903 Map of Tell City

Name: 1903 Topographic Map of Tell City
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1945
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1945

About this map

The Ohio River serves as the dominant artery of commerce and the state boundary on this turn-of-the-century survey, dividing the riverfront industrial centers of Tell City and Hawesville. Steam and rail connections define the era's geography, with the Southern R.R. (Cannellton Branch) serving the Indiana side while the Louisville Henderson and St. Louis R.R. skirts the Kentucky bottoms near Lewisport.

Inland from the river, the landscape transitions from the broad floodplains of Corn Island and Sandy Slough into the dissection of the southern hills. Scattered crossroads communities such as Knottsville, Yelvington, and Pellville anchor the rural landscape, connected by a network of drainage basins including Blackford Creek and Yellow Creek. Distinctive landforms like Spice Knob provide navigational markers for researchers tracing early twentieth-century land use and the specific placement of farmsteads and rural schools throughout Perry, Spencer, and Hancock counties.