Category: Uncategorized

No Destination: Boone Tunnel & Brooklyn Bridge

Travelling south/west on US-68 through Jessamine County is a beautiful, winding drive. When you reach the Kentucky River, you find a ‘modern’ bridge and cross the river. But if you carefully look to your left before reaching the bridge, you will see an old tunnel carved out of the Kentucky Palisades. The tunnel, Boone Tunnel, was the first tunnel in Kentucky constructed for highway traffic.

The tunnel provided access to a 250-foot iron-truss bridge that spanned the Kentucky River from 1871 until 1955. In that year, the bridge collapsed under the weight of a delivery truck and the deliveryman was badly injured. A judge awarded him $50,000, but the governor reduced the damages to $10,000 with the statement that “no man was worth $50,000.”

See also: Jessamine County’s Kentucky River Guidebook.

No Destination: The Pioneer Playhouse

Notable alumni of Boyle County’s Pioneer Playhouse include Lee Majors, Jim Varney and … John Travolta. I guess you could call it Kentucky’s Saturday Night Live as it has been a launching point for a few talented actors. 

Started by Col. Henson in 1950, it is the oldest outdoor theater in the state and was the first theater designated a “state theater” by the General Assembly (1962). According to its official history, Col. Henson used “unorthodox ways” to construct his playhouse:

He once bartered a fifth of whiskey for hand-hewn two hundred-year-old rafter beams and hired prisoners from the local county jail to help him lay the first foundations. 

I’d love to see a show at the Pioneer; the 2010 schedule is available here.

No Destination: Kentucky Fried Chicken

If you travel abroad and say that you are from Kentucky, the majority of people identify our home state with delicious, fried chicken. Colonel Harland David Sanders, a Colonel in the Order of Kentucky Colonels and which is not a military rank but rather a distinction for honored Kentuckians, moved from Indiana to Corbin, Kentucky in 1930 where a service station was opened. A lunchroom followed, and this was by continued expansion and growth of the Sander’s Cafe.

When the service station and cafe burned in 1939, Sanders rebuilt using a cafe-motel model. The Colonel operated the Sander’s Court and Cafe until the construction of I-75 took business away from the local roads. He auctioned the building and began to franchise his Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Today, the franchise is owned by Louisville-based Yum! Brands. Yum! also owns the old Court and Cafe and utilizes it as both an active franchise and a museum. Pictured above is a recreated kitchen from the days of the Court and Cafe. For more, check out Nate’s visit in January.

SOS: Should Kentucky eliminate references to dueling from its oath?

Should Kentucky eliminate references to dueling found in its oath of office? What are your thoughts on this?

I know that a state legislator is proposing its removal and if his bill passes, this same question will be posed in November to Kentucky voters. In the past year, I have twice taken Kentucky’s oath of office; once as a notary, the second time as an attorney. The solemn occasion of admission to practice law is held in the Supreme Court which is located on the second floor of the Capitol in Frankfort; admittedly, there was snickering during the “dueling” references.

Even so, State Sen. Julian Carroll notes that “[i]t is part of the history of this great commonwealth, and I don’t think that we ought to make any changes with respect to the reflection of that history.” What do you think? For more information, read or listen to a great story heard yesterday on NPR’s All Things Considered.

No Destination: St. Augustine Catholic Church

Although Lebanon was originally settled by Presbyterians, it quickly became a center of Catholic faith. The first Catholic Church organized here in 1815 and the first church was erected in 1825. In 1837, this church (then called St. Hubert’s) was rededicated to St. Augustine.

In 1871, the present church was completed and it certainly is a beautiful parish church. As is the case with Catholic churches generally, the doors are open during the day for people to enter and pray. [I wish this were the case with certain Protestant congregations, particularly those with historic and beautiful building!]  After praying, a snapped the picture [right] of this gorgeous house of prayer.

The church’s mission statement is great, honoring in its first paragraph both God and our great Commonwealth:

St. Augustine Catholic Church, located in the heartland of Kentucky’s holy land, being rich in history and tradition, is a diverse community of believers committed to serving God and neighbor. We are sustained by a loving devotion to the celebration of the Eucharist in fulfillment of our Baptismal call to proclaim the Good News of salvation.

See: A Short History of St. Augustine Parish.

Map Update

With my recent posts in south central Kentucky, I can now present this updated map on county visits for Nate and I:

For the Kaintuckeean, the tally is now 33 of 120 counties (27.5%). The Kentucky 120 Project remains ahead at 35 of 120 counties (29.2%). This coming weekend, we hope to target the following counties:  

  • Carroll County 
  • Henry County
  • Oldham County
  • Shelby County
  • Trimble County

Any offbeat places that I shouldn’t miss as I go with No Destination?

No Destination: Lebanon

Three miles from the middle of Lebanon is the geographic center of Kentucky, but this community of about 6,000 stands on its own. First settled in the 1700s, the town was incorporated in 1815. Named after the “Biblical Lebanon” because a number of cedar trees also grew in this area. Much of the communities growth can be attributed to the L&N Railroad that once rolled through town. The historic depot constructed in 1857 survived a burning by Gen. Morgan’s men during the Civil War, but it could not escape teenage arsonists in 1992.

The above-picture is clearly not the best, but it shows the route that the railroad once took a block north of Main Street. In the distance you can see the Marion County municipal building. A new courthouse is being built just to the south of this municipal building. Hopefully, the historic courthouse on Main Street will be preserved!

Bonus Kaintuckeean: J. Proctor Knott. A Kentucky Congressman, Governor and member of the 1891 Constitutional Convention during which he led the effort to keep Frankfort as Kentucky’s capital. He was also the first dean of Centre College’s law school. Knott County is named after him. [Marker 728]

No Destination: Gov. William Goebel

Outside Kentucky’s Old State Capitol is a statute of one governor. It isn’t Isaac Shelby (Kentucky’s first governor), but rather a man who served in office for only a few days. On January 30, 1900, shots rang out from the nearby state building striking Gov. William Goebel. A few days later, he was dead.

Goebel remains the only actively-serving governor of a U.S. state to be assassinated. Although the identity of the shooter will likely never be known, it followed the hotly contested gubernatorial election of 1900. For more, read here.

No Destination: Campbellsville

Centrally located Campbellsville – Taylor County’s seat – is eighty miles from Lexington, Louisville and Bowling Green. Established in 1817, the town’s history is quintissentially Kentucky. Began as a grist mill, grew in population as a stop on a stagecoach route and later a rail line, and the target of Civil War raids by the infamous Gen. John Hunt Morgan. Today, Campbellsville’s Main Street (pictured, above) remains active with a number of businesses due at least in part to the presence of Cumberland University.

What is now Campbellsville was on the Cumberland Trace – that route through the Cumberland Gap that would serve as the early route for western settlers; ultimately those who passed through what would become Taylor County continued past the Cumberland River to what is now Nashville, Tenn.

Taylor County was separated from Green County in 1848 (named for General Zachary Taylor in the same year that he would become President) and Campbellsville at that time was selected to be the seat of the new county. The first courthouse was erected soon thereafter and was destroyed during an 1864 raid by Confederate forces. The next courthouse was built and survived until 1965 when it was razed in favor of a “contemporary” brick design. This is another instance in which, architecturally speaking, the courthouse project currently underway in Kentucky is “a good thing” as the new Taylor County Courthouse has that “modern take at an old building” quality that at least returns a bell tower to the courthouse square. All historic markers, however, remain at the site of the 1965 courthouse.

Nate, on his courthouse visits, loves the feel of coming over the hill into a town to see the tallest building in town – his immediate indicator of the courthouse’s prominence and central role for a community. Not in Campbellsville: the tallest spire will lead you up a hill to the Campbellsville Baptist Church (pictured, right). The congregation began as early as 1791, but the name of the church was not adopted until 1852. Following a 1962 fire, the present church was constructed. It replaced a 1916 sanctuary that consisted of “a domed ceiling and four walls of stained glass.”