Official National Historical Registry Project of the Office of the Kentucky Colonel Celebrating the Semiquincentennial of the Kentucke Magna Charta. America's 1st Free Colonial Democracy, Commemorating May 23, 1775 through May 23, 2025 at Boonesborough on the Kentucky River upon the founding the Transylvania Colony (Old Kentucky).
Kentucky Colonel Registry © — The Only Official Historical Record of the Kentucky Colonel Commission from 1775–2025 submitted to the US Government as controlling evidence, material proof under judicial notice, and to determine an indispensable factual basis of the Kentucky Colonel in the HOKC Trademark Dispute Case filed in 2020, now under review before the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. Over 100 judicial notice exhibits have been filed including, hundreds of newspaper articles, hundreds of magazine articles, and hundreds of historical texts in Kentucky Colonel Historical Dossier Appendix E (filed in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals).
The Historical Account of this Registry was formally filed with the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit on May 27, 2025, as part of a sworn Declaration of Historical Fact and Motion for Judicial Notice. It is the first and only public record supported by authenticated, self-verifying exhibits derived from government archives, including the Library of Congress, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Chronicling America Project in 6_Cir. 23-5795 Doc. 50 proving the indigenous existence of the Kentucky Colonel. This site preserves, protects, and publishes the true civic and cultural legacy of the actual Kentucky Colonel title—independent of private corporate influence, mistaken foundations, and are grounded in law, history, and public record. Notwithstanding myth, propaganda, or folklore these facts are part of the public record and form the basis for our © Copyright.
Other Documents filed with the US Circuit Court for Judicial Notice include:
Appendix A - Sources and Origins of the Kentucky Colonel (Publication Copyright)
Appendix B - Descriptive Quotation Passages about Kentucky Colonels (Publication Copyright)
Appendix C - Images of the Kentucky Colonel (Incomplete next edition to include over 100 images)
Appendix D - Things Called Kentucky Colonels (Incomplete next edition adds 200 other uses.)
Appendix E - Exhibit Exposition and Catalogue (Complete Published, Always Subj. to Revision)
Colonial and Early American history reveals a rich tradition of civilian leadership embodied by the title of 'colonel.' These individuals, often appointed by their peers, were instrumental in establishing communities and shaping the nascent democracy of the new nation. In the decades following 1775, colonels held considerable authority, frequently transitioning into roles of governance and leadership. Their contributions laid the foundation for the societal structures and cultural identity that characterize Kentucky and much of America today.
While the exact origins of the term "Kentucky Colonel" are multifaceted, the connection to Col. Daniel Boone's pioneering role in Kentucky's establishment is undeniable according to early colonels like Colonel Cassius Clay and Colonel Reuben Durrett. This association solidified in 1833 with Colonel Nimrod Wildfire in the London production of "The Kentuckian," a play that further cemented the image of the Kentucky Colonel in the popular imagination culturally with humor and the theater. The title thus evolved into a cultural symbol, representing the spirit of independence, leadership, and the unique heritage of the Kentucky region. The idea created a social class representing a natural aristocracy of respected authority in a cultural archetype of strength, wisdom, honor, integrity, and knowledge.
The story of the First Kentucky Colonel being Daniel Boone is factually and historically correct, it is not folklore or fiction, if anyone else can be credited with the creation and origin of the pioneer government of Can-tuck-ee, Colonel Boone is right there as one of its 13 first colonels, delegates and colonist settlers drafting what has become known as the "Kentucke Magna Charta" (Transylvania Constitution) in 1775. Most of the laws established by these colonels and their colonists remain in common-law today and were included by other state constitutions.
They never would have called themselves a "Kentucky Colonel," but they were in fact the "Colonels" and they wrote laws that created the governments, made peace with the natives, surveyed the frontier and made their mark one that has survived to the present creating the customs and traditions we observe today. The fact that all this plays out in Kentucky with "colonels" as the sovereign "heads of the colony" is not a coincidence with anything more than it taking place during the Revolutionary Period before the founding of the United States or the fact that Boone originally hunted in Can-tuck-ee since June 7th, 1769.
Col. Daniel Boone is actually credited as the protagonist of the founder of the Transylvania Company, which was formed after Boone lost his son in his first settlement attempt in Kentucky. Col. Judge Richard Henderson of North Carolina befriended Boone, commissioning him a Colonel of the company that built the Wilderness Road (Wild Road) and Boonesborough. It would be almost two years before one of Boone's lieutenants, John Bowman is sent to Williamsburg to meet with Governor Patrick Henry to make the Transylvania Colony part of Virginia. The Governor made Transylvania Lt. Col. John Bowman into Commonwealth Colonel John Bowman of Kentucky County. When Col. Bowman returned to Transylvania he commissioned Daniel Boone a "Lt. Colonel" as well as many others. After that little is known of John Bowman except that he continued to commission new colonels until 1783. What we can also say about Col. Daniel Boone is that he was the "First Colonel" to be commissioned under the Patriot Law by a Private Chartered Company which was enacted on January 1, 1775, we also know he commissioned many other colonels.
In contemporary state history Col. Daniel Boone is not well-recognized by the Commonwealth of Kentucky as its founding statesman, that title would go to Isaac Shelby who worked for Col. Daniel Boone 16 years earlier as a surveyor for the Transylvania Company in August 1775. When working for Col. Boone, Shelby a young impressionable surveyor learned the secret order of the head-of-state making a colonel. Isaac Shelby the surveyor was paid in-kind with food, money and a deed for a large parcel in the Transylvania Colony before returning to Southern Virginia on the Wild Road built by Daniel Boone.
In 1776 still under the new patriot laws (enacted January 01, 1775) Shelby found a commission from the Virginia Committee of Safety appointing him captain of a company of Minutemen. In 1777, Virginia governor Patrick Henry appointed Shelby to a position securing provisions for the army on the frontier. He served a similar role for units in the Continental Army in 1778 and 1779. With his money, Shelby purchased provisions for John Sevier's 1779 expedition against the Chickamauga, a band of Cherokees who were resisting colonial expansion in the Extralegal State of Franklin (absorbed by Tennessee).
Shelby was elected to represent Washington County in the Virginia House of Delegates in 1779. Later that year, he was commissioned a major by Governor Thomas Jefferson and charged with escorting a group of commissioners to establish a frontier boundary line between Virginia and North Carolina. Shortly after his arrival in the region, North Carolina Governor Richard Caswell made him magistrate of newly formed Sullivan County and elevated him to the rank of colonel of the Sullivan County Regiment. While he was a colonel, Shelby assisted other colonels establish the State of Franklin before moving to his property in the Kentucke region. Engaging in local politics later creating the Commonwealth of Kentucky with more than a 12 other colonels who made him their first governor. Most of Kentucky's counties today are named after these historic colonial and pioneer colonels that migrated there following Boone and Shelby.
