One mountain over: Could a ‘halfback wave’ solve the Eastern Kentucky depopulation problem?

By: James Branscome

Outlets: Kentucky Lantern

Published: May 12, 2026

Words: 1,104

Last Updated: 2 months, 2 weeks ago

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In March 1775, Daniel Boone left the Yadkin River valley of North Carolina, crossed the Blue Ridge, threaded the Cumberland Gap, and blazed the Wilderness Road into what would become Kentucky. He had spent years in the Yadkin country — the same foothills now thick with golf-course retirement communities and second homes selling for seven figures. When he moved west, he moved one mountain over.

Two and a half centuries later, the path Boone walked …

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