Built by U.S. Steel Corp. from 1917 to 1925, Lynch became the largest company-owned town in Kentucky through World War II. A crucial need for steel during WWI led to the founding of the town at a site with millions of tons of high-quality coal. With the largest coal tipple then in existence, Lynch had the first fully electrified coal mine in the U.S. Much of the self-contained model city was dismantled in the 1960s by U.S. Steel.