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Little Colly

Ghost town · Letcher County, Kentucky

Whitesburg quadrangle, USGS topographic map (1915, 1:62,500)
Whitesburg quadrangle, USGS topographic map (1915, 1:62,500) · U.S. Geological Survey, Historical Topographic Map Collection · Public domain

Little Colly is a ghost town in Letcher County, Kentucky. It is one of 21 former communities in Letcher County on the federal names register. That ranks the county 22nd among the 101 Kentucky counties with a vanished settlement on record.

The U.S. Geological Survey lists Little Colly as a historical populated place on the Mayking topographic quadrangle: the name is no longer in official use for a community, whether the settlement was abandoned, absorbed into a neighbouring town or renamed. The recorded location is 37.1844° N, 82.8728° W.

Key facts

USGS quadrangleMayking
Elevation1,184 ft
Nearest living townWhitesburg, KY
Distance to it5.4 miles
GNIS feature ID2336150
Coordinates37.18440, -82.87275

Open the location on a map

Then and now

Drag the slider: the old USGS map on the left, the same ground from the air today on the right. Both cover the same 1.9-mile square centred on the recorded location.

Little Colly today, aerial view
Whitesburg quadrangle, USGS topographic map (1915, 1:62,500)

Left: Whitesburg quadrangle, USGS topographic map (1915, 1:62,500), U.S. Geological Survey, Historical Topographic Map Collection. Right: The same ground today: NAIP aerial imagery, USDA Farm Service Agency, National Agriculture Imagery Program (via USGS). Both public domain.

What's there now

Little Colly is no longer a community in its own right. The nearest living town is Whitesburg, KY (population 1,998), about 5.4 miles away in a straight line, and the site sits at roughly 1,184 feet above sea level. The aerial view above shows what covers the ground today. Much of the land around former townsites is private; check access before you visit.

Nearby places

Questions

Where is Little Colly?

Little Colly is in Letcher County, Kentucky, at 37.1844, -82.8728.

How many ghost towns are in Letcher County?

Letcher County, Kentucky has 21 ghost towns on record at Wayfarrow.

Sources and licences

Facts marked "approximately" carry an uncertain date in the source. Text on this page is generated from the sources above; no encyclopedia prose is copied. Last updated 2026-11-06.