Some Kentucky maps still list towns like Sugartit, Hell for Certain, and Monkey’s Eyebrow. How the places got their names is a story in itself.
Kentucky can make giving directions sound like something you should apologize for.
Sugartit was a crossroads between Florence and Union. Hell for Certain is in Leslie County. Big Bone Lick welcomes school groups.
The names practically write their own jokes. The explanations take more gigging, sometimes literally. Big Bone Lick owes its name to prehistoric animal remains and natural salt sources. Rabbit Hash comes with a flood story and a meal. Monkey’s Eyebrow has several explanations. None is quite settled.
To separate documented history from a good story, Kentucky Historical Society historian Stuart Sanders turns to a familiar reference.
“My go-to source for this is Robert Rennick’s book ‘Kentucky Place Names,’” Sanders says. The 1984 book covers about 2,000 communities and post offices. Some names describe the land. Others preserve family connections or tales passed between neighbors.
These six are among Kentucky’s hardest names to forget.
1. Monkey’s Eyebrow
Where: Ballard County, Western Kentucky
Monkey’s Eyebrow sounds like a name that should have a good explanation. Instead, it has several.
Many involve a hill said to resemble an eyebrow, according to the Kentucky Atlas & Gazetteer. The atlas does not settle on a definitive account.
The community sits on a Sand Ridge, about 2 miles from the Ohio River. Its busiest period probably came in the early 1900s, when a river landing, a mill, and several stores supported local commerce. It never incorporated or established a post office.
The name has also made its way into country music biographies. Country and bluegrass singer-songwriter Kelsey Waldon grew up in Monkey’s Eyebrow, a hometown credit that stands out even before the music starts.
2. Sugartit
Where: Boone County, Northern Kentucky
The explanation for Sugartit involves a baby’s pacifier. That may not have been your first guess.
A “sugar tit” was a homemade soother made by tying a little sugar inside a piece of cloth for an infant to suck. The definition explains the expression, although it does not establish exactly how the name became attached to a Northern Kentucky crossroads.
The community appeared as Pleasant Ridge in an 1883 atlas and later went by Gunpowder, according to local television station WCPO’s account, which cites earlier Cincinnati Enquirer reporting.
The Boone County Public Library’s historical collection places Sugartit at the intersection of Pleasant Valley Road and the turnpike between Florence and Union. Development eventually absorbed the old settlement.
Pleasant Ridge might have saved everyone a few questions. Sugartit gave them a reason to ask.
3. Big Bone Lick
Where: Boone County, Northern Kentucky
Big Bone Lick has an explanation fit for a science class, provided everyone can get through the name first.
The bones belonged to prehistoric animals. The lick provided salt that attracted wildlife. Indigenous people knew the area long before European explorers began describing the enormous remains scattered through the valley.
A 1744 map identified the location as a place where elephant bones had been found, according to the National Park Service. Those discoveries helped make the site an important part of the study of Ice Age life in North America.
Today, Big Bone Lick State Historic Site interprets that history through exhibits and educational programs. The name still gets a snicker from students across the state.
4. Hell for Certain
Where: Leslie County, Southeastern Kentucky
Federal postal officials had their limits. Hell for Certain exceeded them.
The Leslie County community kept the name, but local post offices used others, including Osha, Omarsville, and Kaliopi. The Kentucky Atlas & Gazetteer documents those changes and notes that postal officials would not allow Hell for Certain as a post office name.
The community lies along Hell for Certain Creek, about 10 miles northwest of Hyden. Its postal history is easier to establish than the circumstances that first inspired the name.
5. Bugtussle
Where: Monroe County, South-Central Kentucky
Bugtussle’s name story begins with traveling wheat threshers sleeping in barns. The accommodations apparently left an impression.
In her “Gardens to Gables” account of visiting the community, architectural historian Janie-Rice Brother recounts an explanation from Rennick’s book. Workers moved from farm to farm to thresh wheat, sleeping in haylofts. The story held that they stayed so long that the bugs grew large enough to tussle in the hay.
The insect story remains local lore.
During her 2019 visit near the Tennessee line, Brother found an old general store bearing the Bugtussle name, along with road signs and mailboxes identifying the community. She left the haylofts unexamined.
6. Rabbit Hash
Where: Boone County, Northern Kentucky
Rabbit Hash sounds like supper because, in the local telling, it was.
According to the Rabbit Hash General Store’s account, the name connects to an 1847 flood. Rising water pushed rabbits onto higher ground, where they became a ready source of meat for a stew called hash.
The store presents that explanation as a traditional account. Other retellings place the story in a different flood year. Later floods destroyed many local records, leaving gaps in the written history.
Kentucky’s map has a few more punchlines
Kentucky has plenty more amusing place names, including Flippin, Shoulderblade, Mousie, Marrowbone, Pig, Possum Trot, and Whoopflarea.
A funny name can be a community’s most enduring landmark. Stores close, post offices move, and roads change. The name gives people a reason to ask what was there, once they’ve finished laughing.
