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Digital Access Project

The Commonwealth Institute for Black Studies, the Lexington Black Prosperity Initiative, and the Fayette County Clerk's Office are proud to present the Digital Access Project (DAP). Funded by the Blue Grass Community Foundation and the Knight Foundation, the project will bring to light more than 70,000 pages of records spanning from the late 1700s through 1865. 

Many of these books include deed records identifying the names of enslaved people who were sold, purchased, transferred, or even emancipated, deed and mortgage records of enslaved people who were used as collateral to secure a debt, wills, estate appraisements, settlements, inventory, or other probate records including enslaved people as part of an estate, and county court orders which contain various information about enslaved people.

Fayette County Clerk | Lexington, KY | Digital Access Project

How to DAP step by step

Digital Access Project handbookDeed Book BCOCT

Clay Deed of Emancipation

 

 

Shea Brown and UK students at FCC archives

  Project Director Shea Brown