Biohazard Cleanup Near Downtown Robards Robards, KY

Robards is a home rule-class city in southern Henderson County, Kentucky.

The community is named for J. D. Robards, who built its first house in 1867.

The town's name changed three times over the years: it was officially Robard's Station in 1868, became Robard in 1880, and took its present form, Robards, in 1924.

A post office was established at Robards Station in 1868, when the settlement stood on the Henderson Branch of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad.

Two of the chief Civil War battles fought in Henderson County took place at Robards during the 1860s, before the town formally existed.

In its early years Robards was a tobacco and coal center: its tobacco stemmery employed about 50 men and shipped tobacco directly to Europe, and three coal mines operated in the area from the 1880s into the 1920s.

By 1887 Robards had nine stores, a steam mill, a school building, a livery stable, a hotel, and a church seating 400 people, and that year the town voted to prohibit alcohol.

Robards is remembered as the 'Sanctified Town': author Lucy Furman set her 1896 book Stories of a Sanctified Town in the community, and a road sign on U.S. Route 41 south still uses the nickname.

The 2020 census counted 449 residents in Robards, down from 515 at the 2010 census.

At the 2000 census, 564 people lived in Robards in 214 households.