The history of enslaved people in Kentucky dates back to the earliest explorers of the Kaintuckee territory. Slavery was the law in the English colonies and enslaved people were part of many scouting parties. Enslaved people were also a part of the earliest settlement expeditions into the territory in 1774-75.

On April 13, 1941, the headline Narcotics Agents Arrest Five: 200 Pounds of Marijuana Seized appeared on the front page of the Lexington Herald-Leader. At the time, “(t)he haul was the largest ever made in a raid in this section of the country,” Federal narcotics agents claimed the Kentucky arrests were “believed to have broken up a ring of dope peddlers which supported a wide territory including the states of Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Kentucky.”