Eddyville Cleanup and Restoration

Throughout Kentucky, Eddyville is best known as a metonym for the Kentucky State Penitentiary, although the prison itself is actually 3 miles (5 km) south of the present town on the shore of Lake Barkley in "Old Eddyville" on KY 730. 

Eddyville, the seat of Lyon county, was settled around 1798 and named for the eddies in the nearby Cumberland River. It became the seat of Livingston county when it was formed in 1799, then the seat of Caldwell county in 1809, and finally the seat of Lyon county when it was formed in 1854. Starting in 1959 the town was moved about three miles north to its current site to make room for the new Lake Barkley. Eddyville was incorporated in 1812. The Eddyville post office opened in 1801. The population in 2010 was 2,554. Completed in 1886, it is Kentucky's oldest prison facility and the only state-owned facility with supermax units. The penitentiary houses Kentucky's male death row inmates and the state's execution facility. Following the completion of Kentucky Dam in the 1940s, rumors began that a dam would be built on the lower Cumberland. This meant relocating Eddyville and Kuttawa. By the mid-1950s, the people's fears were confirmed. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began surveying for the construction of Barkley Dam. The entire population of Eddyville was in a turmoil with decisions to be made. This ordeal caused many angry feelings among some of the residents, which lasted a lifetime. SERVPRO will take care of the Fire-Water damage the area may have "like it never even happened"