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According to information filed with the National Register of Historic Places, Lower Town was annexed to Paducah by the Kentucky legislature in 1836. At the time, it stretched from the Ohio River, west to Ninth Street and from Jefferson north to Clay (Park Avenue). Today, because of land use, Lower Town starts in the east at Fourth Street. Many of the original homes in Lower Town were damaged or destroyed during the Battle of Paducah March 25, 1864, during the Civil War. However, the area bounced back, with downtown merchants and businessmen taking up residence there. Many of the large single-family homes were divided into apartments to accommodate the number of construction workers coming in the early 1950s to build the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in the western part of McCracken County. As the years progressed, Lower Town went into a decline but was revived in 2000 under the city's Artist Relocation Plan. The city bought property in Lower Town, then sold it to artists from all over the country who came to either renovate homes or build new structures on vacant property and set up galleries. By 2025, Lower Town had become mostly residential again.