Category: Uncategorized

No Destination: Campbellsville University

Founded in 1906, Campbellsville University (“CU”) was founded by the Russell Creek Baptist Association. Affiliated with the Southern Baptist Church, CU enrolls of about 3,000 students of various faith backgrounds.

Regular readers may recall from last week that another community (Glens Fork) courted the Baptist association in the late 1800s before Campbellsville was selected as the home of the institution.

Originally the institution was not a college – it began as the Russell Creek Baptist Academy which was a private elementary and high school. It was in 1923 that the General Association of Kentucky Baptists met and gave authority  for a junior college to be opened. By the late 1930s, both the elementary and high schools were gone leaving only Cumberland College (renamed to CU in the 2000s). In 1960, the college gave out its first four-year degrees.

Notable alumni of CU include former Kentucky Governor Wallace Wilkinson (1987-1991) and the current head basketball coach of Mississippi State University (Rick Stansbury). Wilkinson, however, did not graduate from CU – he later transferred to UK, but never graduated. Stansbury did graduate from CU and led the school’s basketball team to the NAIA tournament.

A Third Blog

I have discussed with you before my need to write, to blog. I have blogged for many years (since 2003) on various sites I have maintained. I won’t here discuss my past blogging attempts, but want to focus on my current blogging adventures. I have decided to maintain multiple blogs with each focusing on a different matter so that readers can focus on their interests. Please follow all (if you want) and comment! [Bloggers love comments!]

My blogs:

  • The Kaintuckeean – Of my current blogs, this is the ‘oldest’ though it only dates to the middle of last year. On it, I discuss and share photos from my sojourns and discoveries around the Commonwealth of Kentucky. A lot of history, a little anthropology and a lot of what interests me. I think that Kentucky is a wonderful, beautiful state and I try and share that here.
  • 5:9 Focus – Named after the verse in Matthew’s Gospel where Jesus observes “blessed are the peacemakers.”As a Christian Ecumenical, I believe in finding harmony among all Christians and in finding common ground with other faith communities. I share insights, prayers and other ‘divine’ thoughts here.
  • PJWB – My initials. Not to creative, but this is more of my journal. Not a ‘pick my nose’ journal, but a ‘this is interesting’ journal. As I surf the web or read books or listen to music, I might discover something that I want to share. And a Facebook status doesn’t quite cut it. Plus, I might include an amazon.com link where you can buy a product and I could earn a commission. [Bloggers love making $0.02 in a day!] This also serves as my ‘home page’ with links to the other blogs more prominently placed.

I hope you will read, or at least explore, all of them. If not, writing helps me to think about what I enjoy. So, yes… I do all of this for myself! [Did you think this blog was about you? – Carly Simon] Let me know what you think. Subscribe to RSS feeds or email or twitter updates or however you can keep informed. I promise I’ll try and make it interesting!

No Destination: Green River Lake

Situated between Adair and Taylor counties, Green River Lake is a man-made lake that encompasses 8,210 acres. Created by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers through the 1969 impoundment of the Green River, the project cost approximately $33.4 million.

Despite this seemingly high cost, the Corps points out the economic benefits of the dam: annual tourism of $34.75million and savings from prevented floods over the impoundment’s first forty years (through 2009) of $129.997million.

Visiting in the winter, I saw the waters at their lower levels. This also allowed for repairs to be made to the dam. It was an interesting moment: look to the right and feel like a kid, enjoying the big trucks move dirt; look to the right and be an old man appreciating the glory of nature.

As an aside, the Green River, at 370 miles, is the longest river to flow completely within the boundaries of Kentucky. [cite] Its fount is in Lincoln County and it flows into the Ohio River in Henderson County

No Destination: Federal Hill

Visiting Bardstown for a wedding last summer, I knew one destination that I could not miss. Federal Hill, colloquially known as My Old Kentucky Home. Of course, my arrival there was moments before the state park closed so while I toured the grounds, I did not enter any of the buildings.

As folklore goes, it was on an 1852 visit with his cousins (the Rowans) here that Stephen Collins Foster was inspired to write what later became the state song. There is some debate as to the veracity of this story. Foster could have been inspired on an earlier (and well-documented) 1833 visit to Augusta, Kentucky. The song was adopted as the official state song in 1928; its words were revised in 1986 also by legislative fiat (changing the word from “darkies” to “people” after a performance of the song by a Japanese choir upon the opening of the Toyota Plant in Georgetown. It was said that the lyrics “convey connotations of racial discrimination that are not acceptable.”) Also generally eliminated by the 1986 legislation: verses 2 and 3. Verse 3 is below; you can see why it was removed:

The head must bow and the back will have to bend,
Wherever the darky may go;
A few more days, and the trouble all will end,
In the field where the sugar-canes grow;
A few more days for to tote the weary load,
No matter, ’twill never be light;
A few more days till we totter on the road,
Then my old Kentucky home, goodnight.

John Rowan, a jurist and congressman, began construction of Federal Hill in 1795 but the work was not finished until 1818.  According to The Kentucky Encyclopedia, John Rowan’s granddaughter (Madge Rowan Frost) sold the estate to the Commonwealth in 1921 who has since maintained and operated the site.

No Destination: Columbia-Union Presbyterian Church

The oldest church in Columbia was erected just beyond the town’s original boundary. Known only as the Columbia Presbyterian Church until 1925 when it took on the combined name with the Union Presbyterian Church (the county congregation, the congregations having actually merged in 1912), the church has a storied past.

The church was constructed in 1857 and contained a balcony for slaves, though the balcony was removed in1885. During the Civil War, the attic was used both as a lookout for rebel forces and as a place to make bullets. Doors inside the church were taken down following an 1863 skirmish and were used as stretchers to carry the wounded back to the church where the structure served as a temporary hospital. A 1908 renovation replaced the plain (or frosted) windows with the stained glass windows seen today.

The steps leading to the door of the sanctuary are original from 1857, hand carved from Kentucky marble (aka limestone).

See: Columbia Magazine’s Walking Tour of Columbia.

SOS: What is Your Favorite Place in Kentucky?

Today I’m asking, What is your favorite place in Kentucky? Is it a town, a county, a restaurant, a natural wonder or something else? Share in the comments a little bit about it…

SOS or Share on Saturday is a new feature I’m starting. Hopefully, lots of readers will share their links, photos, experiences and thoughts on a variety of topics. The idea is to get you, the reader, to share! Of course, I’d love for you to comment on every post that interests you!

No Destination: Daniel Trabue

Daniel Trabue was an early founder of Columbia and constructed the above house in 1823 (it has since been expanded). He served as a trustee for the town, the county sheriff, and justice of the peace. He operated a grist mill and a retail store. To be sure, the story of Columbia is not complete without reference to Trabue. But greater still, the story of Kentucky is incomplete without Trabue.

He was a fourth-generation North American Huguenot born in 1760 in Virginia’s Piedmont region. Trabue was a teenager when he encountered Indians along the Wilderness Road, was present at Daniel Boone’s court-martial following a loss to the Indians at Boonesborough. After serving three years in Kentucky, Trabue returned to Virginia to try his lot at business. It was during this time that he experienced, as a non-soldier, the events leading up to the colonist’s victory at Yorktown. By 1785, he yearned to return his young family to Kentucky and they settled in Fayette County.

In 1788, Trabue signed a petition to divide Fayette County, arguing that he was too far from the county seat of Lexington to be able to readily conduct business, caused an overburdened judicial docket and did not provide adequate representation in the Virginia legislature. The Virginia General Assembly agreed and Woodford County was born. In 1796, Trabue sold his Woodford County home and took his family from the Kentucky River basin to that of the Green River some 45-miles to the southwest in Green County.

In December 1801, the General Assembly created Adair County. Trabue’s home was one-quarter mile within Adair County and thus his “fortunes were to be tied to those of Adair County.” [cite] It was from here that he went on as an intregal part of the development and growth  of Columbia.
At the age of 67, he wrote a narrative of his life. This narrative later became the origin of “Westward into Kentucky: The Narrative of Daniel Trabue.” (I am putting this book on my Kentucky ‘wish list’). Although narratives are often fraught with historical innacurracy, his accounts still make history all the richer. As was said in the introduction of Westward (the source of much of the above history):

Daniel Trabue had indeed been a pioneer in the land beyond the mountains. As a settler there, he had helped to wrest Kentucky from nature and from the Indian’s tenuous hold and to plant the white man’s culture in Trans-Appalachia. He had done all of this, and of equal importance he had left a rich and meaningful narrative about much of what he observed and did.

No Destination: Columbia

The county seat of Adair County is full of history, and it is clear that the community is dedicated to the preservation of the same. On the courthouse “lawn” (watch out Nate; when you get to Columbia, the Courthouse is situated in the middle of the town square with nary a place to walk on) there lie several historical markers. The old courthouse remains the focal point of downtown with a preservation effort underway to deconstruct the additions erected in 1976 (presumably, this will recreate a courthouse lawn). As in so many Kentucky counties, a new judicial center has been erected taking some business out of downtown Columbia.

Even so, the downtown public square bustles with shops. The Columbia Bank has operated since 1866; cafes and shops remain active. The only sign of decay is the old Columbian Theater, whose empty marquis reminds us of the loss of small theaters at the expense of the multi-plex.

Columbia is the home of Lindsey Wilson College, a liberal arts college. The town hosts its annual festival, Downtown Days, each summer with nearly all of the town’s 4,000 inhabitants (2000 Census) coming to celebrate.

The town, first settled in 1800, was laid out as the county seat in 1802. It was the childhood home of Jane Lampton, the wife of John Marshall Clemens and the mother of “Mark Twain.” The Courthouse has many interesting features, but I will (as usual) leave those for future posts as part of the Kentucky120 Project.

No Destination: Perryville Mass Grave

In western Boyle County lies the community of Perryville, the site of Kentucky’s largest Civil War battle. On October 8, 1862, Union and Condederate forces each suffered heavy casualties as the Union army repelled Confederate forces out of Kentucky.

CSA Gen. Bragg, on a mission to secure supplies from Bardstown, was forced into battle near Perryville by a larger force of Union troops under the direction of USA Gen. Buell sent to stop the advancing Rebels. The first casualties, however, were not caused by musketfire – but by heat and sunstroke. The high temperatures and drought conditions left insufficient water for both soldier and steed.

Once the daylong battle was over, the dying – both CSA and USA – were transported to neighboring communities for treatment.  The dying lingered for months. As was the case following the Battle of Mill Springs, locals knew not what to do with the Confederate dead and a mass grave was dug. From the Perryville Enhancement Project:

As Union troops hastily buried their own dead in regimental plots, local residents were left to inter the dead Confederates. Local farmer, cabinetmaker and justice of the peace Henry P. Bottom, whose property was strewn with corpses, buried a majority of the Southern soldiers. With several field hands and neighbors, Bottom buried several hundred Confederates in two large pits. This mass grave is located in what is now the Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site.

This is a full post for one of the locales visited on my June 5, 2009 No Destination journey.

No Destination: Glens Fork

This was one of my…wait a minute, turn around, stop look again, and take a picture moments. Occasionally, you see something seemingly out of place and different. This is the Glens Fork, Kentucky Post Office.

First, it is a old post office. I wasn’t sure if it was still an active post office (according to USPS.gov it is not), but I found it intriguing. After all, Glens Fork has its own Zip Code, “42741..” It turns out that the building dates to 1932 and that the post office was reactivated in 1986 before its service was later discontinued again.

There is a lot of history to this unincorporated community in Adair County. A three-part history of Glens Fork (aka Glensfork, Glenville and Hardscratch) is interesting and informative. [Welcome Hamon, History of Glensfork, Kentucky, (Michael Watson, ed., Adair County Review, 1992-1993), available via Columbia Magazine]. The town was established by an act of the General Assembly in 1872 and it attempted to lure a Baptist College to town in 1874: “Glenville offers a thousand dollars to the proposed Baptist College, if it is located there.” (Farmer’s Journal, Nov. 11, 1874). The Baptists decided not to locate in Glens Fork, instead choosing Campbellsville for the site of its Russell Creek Academy (nka Campbellsville College).


At some point, the town’s government dissolved and this community turned into a mere crossroads at the junction of KY-55 and KY-768.