More historic than 33% of U.S. towns · #103 of 142 in Kentucky. What drives it
Most of Masonville was built recently: 3% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 2002. Below: maps from 1906 on and old-book passages.
Founding year: the first Masonville post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).
History grade
What drives Masonville’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Masonville is more historic than 33% of U.S. towns, #103 of 142 in Kentucky. Its age holds the grade up; its National Register listings pull it down.
C
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Masonville’s overall grade.
Kentucky towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Kentucky town has 29.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Masonville’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (12% of Kentucky towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from D to B−. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±4.0 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Masonville’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of Masonville yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.
Masonville is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Daviess County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 2,129 as of the 2020 census, doubling from 1,014 in the 2010 census. It is included in the Owensboro Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Its first post office opened in 1842. Between the 2010 and 2020 censuses its population grew from 1,014 to 2,129 (+110%).
Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.
From the old history books
What they wrote about Masonville in 1883
Passages that mention Masonville, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of Daviess County, Kentucky, together with sketches of its cities, villages, and townships, educational religious, civil military, and political history, portraits of prominent persons, biographies of representative citizens, and an outline histor1883 · page 682Read the page →
Read the text
8, 1840, and was a daughter of Washington and Rebecca (Harrison) Cook. After his marriage, Mr. Hite settled on his farm in Masonville Precinct. He soon after sold it and leased one in Upper Town Precinct for six or seven months ; then returned to Masonville and remained four or five months; then rented a farm in Murray Precinct six years; then purchased his present farm in Masonville Precinct, where he and family still reside, and where he owns a fine farm of 140 acres, seventy-five acres under cultivation.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
History of Daviess County Kentucky1883 · page 663Read the page →
Read the text
Richard Congers. The church building is located in the village of Masonville, and was erected in 1869; it is a one-story frame, 36 x 50 feet, and cost about $1,000. The dedicatory sermon was preached by Rev. Benjamin Franklin, of Cincinnati. The ground occupied by the church was donated by Dr. Samuel Haynes, one of the first residents of Masonville, now deceased. The church has a membership of about thirty.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Masonville had its own post office from 1842 to 1907.
Masonville
1842–1907
18401930today
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Questions about Masonville’s history
What year was Masonville founded?
The Masonville post office opened in 1842, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Masonville rank for history?
Masonville is more historic than 33% of U.S. towns, #103 of 142 in Kentucky. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
How old are the homes in Masonville?
3% of Masonville’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±4.0 points), against a typical 5.9% for a Kentucky town; the median home was built in 2002.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (1), U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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