Maplewood,Bourbon County

Circa 1850 located on the US 68(Old Maysville-Lexington Turnpike & National Road) near Millersburg in Bourbon County.Millersburg is a northern Bourbon county town located where US 68 crosses Hinkston Creek. It is named for John Miller, who founded the town on his farm in 1798. The post office opened in 1804 as Millersburgh, changing to Millersburg in 1893. The population in 2000 was 842.

Cave Spring,Fayette County

Home of Capt. Robert Boggs, born 1746, Mill Creek Hundred, Del. Moved to Va. Soldier in Revolution. Came to Ky., 1774, as chainman on Col. John Floyd's survey party. One of founders of Boonesborough. Officer, Cherokee Expedition, 1776. Under Washington, 1777-81. Took up Ky. land totaling 2,276 acres. Cave Spring was begun 1784, completed 1792. Quaint, substantial Georgian stone house.

Located on Athens-Walnut Hill Road in Fayette County,near US 25.

Nina Ridge Old Country Store!

Reconstruction of a country store established in 1926. Three country meals served daily. Old store displays antiques and collectibles from the area with groceries available.

779 Nina Ridge Rd
Lancaster, KY 40444

Grand Theater Restoration

The Grand Theater in Lancaster is now undergoing reconstruction.

HISTORY

The Grand Theater was opened in February of 1925, commissioned by J.R. and S.G. Haselden. Local furniture raftsman J.A. Trumbo was hired to do much of the interior woodwork, and the original lamps located in the box seats were made from Model T car casings. The theater originally held 750 customers, and the stage and screen were complimented by large pipe organ and piano located in the pit in front of the stage. The Central Record described the opening this way: “The Grand Theater and picture house are thrown open to the public Thursday night, February 12, 1925. Lancaster and her citizenry can point with pride at one of the handsomest, most commodious, and up-to-date show houses in central Kentucky, comparing favorably with many of the more pretentious houses in Louisville or Lexington…”

My Old Kentucky Home

A great rendition of My Old Kentucky Home by Nathan Mick,Economic Development Director for Garrard County, at the dedication of the new Judicial Center

Adams-Thompson-Gabbard House Near Lancaster in Garrard County

CIRCA 1798

Colonial brick house on Crab Orchard Road five (5) miles from Lancaster.One of the early owners was a John Q. Adams (1811-1865) who is believed to have been related to the famous Adams family of Massachusetts,possibly a nephew.

Adams, a Southern sympathiser and slave holder,was ambushed by Unionists on his way to Crab Orchard in 1865.

Farmington: Joshua Speed House, Jefferson County

Built in 1810 by John Speed from a Thomas Jefferson design, this Federal style house has 14 rooms, and twin octagon rooms. The house is furnished in period.

This restored brick Federalist style mansion was the childhood home of Joshua Fry Speed, considered to be Lincoln's closest friend. His parents, John and Lucy Speed, built the house in 1810 (the year after Lincoln was born) with plans from Thomas Jefferson. The architecture features typical Jeffersonian touches, with its classic symmetry and two octagonal rooms.

Joshua was born here in 1814, the fifth of ten children (including his older brother James, who became Lincoln's second Attorney General). Like scores of other Kentuckians, Joshua went into business in Springfield, Illinois. He recalled that Lincoln walked into his store on April 15, 1837, looking for bedding. "As I looked up at him I thought then, and think now, that I never saw a sadder face."

Joshua offered him free lodging above his store and their friendship flourished. After Joshua returned to Farmington, he invited Lincoln to visit in 1841. Lincoln's six-week stay was intended as an antidote for depression following his break-up with Mary Todd, who became his wife in 1842.

During Lincoln's visit, Joshua's mother Lucy gave him an Oxford Bible. Lincoln later wrote to Joshua's half sister Mary, "Tell your mother that I have not got her 'present' with me; but that I intend to read it regularly when I return home. I doubt not that it is really, as she says, the best cure for the 'Blues' could one but take it according to the truth."

Patti's 1880s Restaurant: Grand Rivers, Kentucky

From the Maysville Ledger-Independent:

Grand Rivers is a small town with a population of a little over 400 and is located in the western part of the state of Kentucky.

The two rivers, the Cumberland and the Tennessee, join at Grand Rivers. At Grand Rivers you will find one of the best restaurants in Kentucky -- Patti's. Patti's restaurant is a popular stop for the locals and tourists. It has been the recipient of many awards throughout the years. I was most impressed with the establishment being voted number one restaurant for tourism by the state of Kentucky and number one Restaurant Association by Southern Living Magazine's Reader's Choice Award for Best Small Town Restaurant in Southeast United States.

Patti's opened as an ice cream shop in 1977 and it seated 20 people. It featured hamburgers, a variety of sandwiches and homemade ice cream. The most expensive item on the menu was $1.95. How times change! Now the restaurant Patti's 1880 Settlement Restaurant has expanded to include antiques, a gift shop, farm animals out back, stained glass, Indian Joe, shopping and gazebo. It is very family oriented and a great place for wonderful food. When we were there a few years ago, their pet pig out back was a favorite spot for the children to visit. Calvin was a miniature African pig who lived in total luxury. He had his own house, his own wardrobe, drank lemonade and sometimes took leisurely walks around town on a leash. He also walked in the town parades on holidays. He was truly spoiled.

In the restaurant specialties include 2-inch grilled pork chops, flower pot yeast bread with strawberry butter and pie piled a mile high with meringue. It is estimated that they prepare over 200,000 pounds of pork chops per year.

Newdigate Tavern/ Justice Stanley Reed Summer Home

The Old Newdigate Tavern was built in the late 1700s in Maysville,Mason County on what was once known as Zane's Trace and the Maysville-Lexington Turnpike, now old US 68.

The building was purchased by Stanley Reed in 1915 and was used as his summer residence when he served on the US Supreme Court.

1811 Augusta City Jail- Bracken County, Kentucky

Unlocking the past


Michael Moore paints the exterior of the historic Augusta jail Wednesday. -- Terry Prather/Staff


1811 jail's restoration nearing completion

By WENDY MITCHELL, Staff Writer
Published:
Friday, August 28, 2009 1:18 AM EDT
AUGUSTA -- A step into the lower portion of the 1811 Jail in Augusta takes a visitor back in time when getting into trouble meant meager accommodations and a cold cot.

Thanks to community support, the work of historians and the Augusta SHARE group, visitors can see what life behind bars meant for more than 150 years in Augusta.

Thick stone walls, complete with iron barred port-hole size windows and austere accommodations greeted wrong doers in the past. Within the walls is another log room, rebuilt representing a holding pen, which contains a chair, lamp and area for prisoners to be shackled.

Near the door hangs a shotgun, now locked in place, with Augusta City Jail carved in the stock.

Opposite the holding cell is another room with barred cells and metal cots.

Names, assumed to be created by former prisoners adorn the cell walls, which date from 1840 to the 1970s.

In a common area there is an ornate carving apparently done by a prisoner who was there from Dec. 17, 1974 - Feb. 25, 1975; and there is no visible heat source in the prisoner areas of the building.

A man known as "John Ike" was apparently jailed for a short time in the 1970s for streaking, and another time for 120 days according to the jail cell graffiti.

Comment: I was City Attorney for Augusta in the 1970's and remember this old stone jail very well!

William Whitley House- Lincoln County

The William Whitley House a/k/a Sportsman's Hill in Lincoln County is one of the first brick houses west of the Allegheny Mountains and the site of America's first circular racetrack with racing in a counter-clockwise direction was completed in 1794.

William Whitley (August 4, 1749 – October 5, 1813), was an early American pioneer born in what was then Augusta County, Virginia, the son of Solomon and Elizabeth Whitley. He was important to the early settlement of Kentucky and fought in both the Indian wars and the War of 1812.

In early 1775, he married Esther Fullen, and by the spring he set out on an expedition with his brother in law, George Clark, to explore what is now known as Kentucky. They chose a spot for a settlement near the Cedar Creek branch of the Dix River, and returned to Virginia to bring back settlers to establish a community. Returning in November of that year with his family and supplies, he planted 10 acres (40,000 m2) of corn and began to settle the area, but quickly moved to the newly built fort several miles away at St. Asaph's Creek, also known as Logan's Fort (now Stanford, Kentucky).


Referred to as the "Guardian of Wilderness Road", the Flemish bond pattern house was a gathering for early Kentuckians,including George Rogers Clark and Daniel Boone.

Lexington Cemetery Spring 2009

Bracken Baptist Church 1793 - Minerva,Kentucky

James Ellis Stone Tavern

The old stone inn was a stagecoach stop on the Maysville-Lexington Turnpike and was operated by Revolutionary War soldier,James Ellis. Located on US 68 in Ellisville in Nicholas County.

House built ca. 1807 by James Ellis, Revolutionary War soldier; it was well-known point on "Smith's Wagon Road" and Ohio-to-Alabama mail stagecoach line. Ellisville named county seat of Nicholas Co., 1805. Across road stood county's first courthouse, 1806-1816. Seat moved to Carlisle.

John Soper Home,Bourbon County

This home was built by John Soper circa 1803 after he migrated to Kentucky from Montgomery County,Maryland.

It is located on Soper Road in "The Pocket" area of Bourbon County between Jackstown and Little Rock, f/k/a Flat Rock.

Daniel Boone's Cabin,Nicholas County

Daniel Boone's cabin now stands on private property on Highway 68, three miles from the traffic island on Highways 68 and 36. A gravel road close to the historic marker sign leads to the cabin. Visitors are asked to park to the side of that road, in order not to block access.

He or his son Daniel Morgan Boone built this cabin in 1795 on Brushey Creek and lived there until they moved to Missouri in 1799. The site, Boone's last home in Kentucky, is now on Forest Retreat Farm.

Revolutionary War Hero Jack Jouett's Home

Located just off McCowan's Ferry Road in Woodford County

Elmwood Inn,Perryville,Kentucky

The Elmwood Inn was built in 1842 as the home of John Burton. It served as a field hospital during the 1862 Battle of Perryville, Kentucky's largest Civil War battle. The Greek Revival home became Elmwood Academy in 1896 and served as a prestigious boarding school until 1924.Guests of the Elmwood Inn have included Ronald Reagan, Colonel Harland Sanders, and Lynn Redgrave.

Elmwood was rescued by preservationists in 1974, placed on the National Register of Historic Places, and designated as a Kentucky landmark by Governor Wendell Ford.

It was christend Elmwood Inn in 1973 and became a regional restaurant. Shelley and Bruce Richardson purchased and restored the mansion in 1990. They began serving afternoon tea at Elmwood Inn in 1990 at a time when few Americans were drinking hot tea, and before the American tea renaissance began. People from across the country made their way to the historic village of Perryville, Kentucky as word spread through magazine stories and the three Elmwood Inn tea cookbooks. In 2000, the National Historic Landmark became the first North American tea room included in the British Tea Council’s Best Tea Places, a guide to a select 100 tea rooms throughout the world that “pass an exacting and incognito inspection by acknowledged tea tasters.” TeaTime magazine photographed their charter issue at Elmwood Inn in 2003.

After 14 years, the tea room closed to the public on July 31, 2004 to make way for the offices of the expanding tea importing business of Elmwood Inn Fine Teas. Benjamin Press, the publishing division of Elmwood Inn, is also housed in the historic building. All the Elmwood Inn tea books and magazine articles are photographed and edited there.

Governor William Owsley Home: Pleasant Retreat

Located on US 27 in Lancaster,Garrard County.


When William Owsley began building it in the early years of the 19th century, he was a young, up-and-coming lawyer. During the time he and his family lived in the home they called Pleasant Retreat, he was elected to two terms in the Kentucky House of Representatives; named to the state Court of Appeals, where he served for 15 years; and sent back to the House and then to the Senate. He and his wife, Elizabeth, also raised six children. And the house, a three-story brick structure in the Federal style, grew with the family and with its patriarch’s political ambitions.

Owsley moved his family to Frankfort around 1834, when Gov. James T. Morehead named him secretary of state. Soon Owsley himself was being talked about as a possible gubernatorial candidate. In 1843, he even had a new county named for him.

Nominated for governor by the Whigs in 1844, Owsley won a close election against a hero of the War of 1812. But the former occupant of Pleasant Retreat found life in the governor’s mansion not nearly as pleasant. Though he became known as a champion of public education (the one cause for which the fiscally conservative Owsley seemed willing to spend money), he drew controversy for the way he handled the selection and provisioning of volunteer companies for the Mexican War; for pardoning Delia Webster, who had been convicted of aiding and abetting runaway slaves; and for a bitter and very public dispute with his own secretary of state over political patronage. Leaving the governor’s office in 1848, he said, caused him “no emotions of regret.”

Gov. Owsley spent his retirement in Boyle County, where he died in 1862. Meanwhile, succeeding owners of Pleasant Retreat expanded it still further. Today it is open to the public for tours, and visitors can see portraits of the Owsley family as well as two other governors from Garrard County. Another outstanding feature is the dining-room wallpaper. Hand-painted in France, it depicts a large-scale stag hunt.

Source: Kentucky Life KET

Associate Justice Stanley F. Reed Of Maysville

Stanley F. Reed (1884 -1980), at the time of his death, was the longest lived Supreme Court Justice in American history. He lived in Maysville Kentucky before heading off to the University of Virginia to study law. He also studied law at Columbia University and later in France, but strangely he never actually obtained a law degree. In fact, he was the last person to serve as a Supreme Court Justice without possessing a law degree.

Duncan Tavern Paris,Kentucky

Duncan Tavern is a three-story stone tavern located in Paris that was built in 1788 by Major Joseph Duncan. In its early days it served as a gathering place for local citizens and early pioneers such as Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton.

It is the Kentucky Headquarters of the DAR.

Johnston Inn & Tavern Bourbon County

Johnston Inn is situated on US 460 in rural Bourbon County between Paris and Georgetown. In its heyday it was a busy tavern offering a respite for the weary traveller. It appeared on Filson's 1784 Map of Kentucky.


Robert Johnston, a Revolutionary War captain, was born in Virginia in 1749. He and his wife operated a tavern in their house here from 1796-1812. Located on what was the main road between Maysville and Lexington, this inn served stage and horseback passengers in its 30-foot tavern room with sleeping accommodations overhead.

Hopewell Presbyterian Church 1787

Old Hopewell church still holds Sunday services and is located on the Paris Pike (US 68) between Paris and Lexington in Bourbon County.


Hopewell, one of the oldest Presbyterian churches in Bourbon County, has held worship services since 1785. The first congregation included Dutch settlers. It was recognized by the Transylvania Presbytery in 1787. Original church was located near Grant's Fort, one mile from this site. After fort and church burned, the church was rebuilt here in 1823 and in 1904.

St. Hubert's Episcopal Church, Clark County

A picturesque stone church of simple design stands in the heart of the rolling hunt country in Clark County. It is named St. Hubert in honor of the patron saint of hunters

History Of Guyn's Mill- Woodford County

The old mill (Circa 1840-1870)and blacksmith shop and residence (across the road), is located on the banks of Clear Creek in southern Woodford County.

It is the only documented water powered sawmill which still survives in Kentucky.Guyn's Mill was strategically positioned along the early trade routes between Lexington,Mundy's Landing (On the Kentucky River)and Harrodsburg.

Guyn's Mill,Woodford County

Guyn’s Mill was built circa 1850-1870 by William Rankin Guyn (1839-1927), adding on to the existing businesses the family owned. He was the grandchild of Robert Guyn (1744-1818) who was one of the first to settle this portion of the county. Over time, he helped to develop a bustling community, starting with a sawmill. William Guyn built the gristmill and blacksmith shop, operating them with the help of his brother Moses. Eventually, his children took over the two businesses, as the sawmill and general store, all owned by the Guyn family.The mill operated until 1920.

The old mill is allegedly haunted and if you look real close at the left of the building in the photo showing the creek you can see an apparition of an old man and to the right some see a little girl on a swing.The first photo shows the wooden cog wheel,beveled gearing and massive timber support framing in the basement of the old mill.

The B/W photos were taken in 1980

Located on Mundy's Landing/Pauls Mill Road near Troy,Kentucky of of KY 33.

Colville Covered Bridge,Bourbon County

Historic Home In Ruddle's Mills

Circa 1780

Ruddles Mills is the third oldest settlement in Kentucky and the oldest continuously inhabited community in the state. In the late 1700's there were four working mills in the village. Ruddles Mills was once considered as the location of the county seat of Bourbon County.

Ruddle's Mills Bourbon County Kentucky

Isaac Ruddle (1732-1812)is buried in the Mouth of Stoner Presbyterian Cemetery in Ruddle's Mills.

Captain Isaac Ruddell was a 18th century American Virginia State Line officer during the American Revolutionary War and Kentucky frontiersman. He was an officer commanding a company under BGEN George Rogers Clark (1777-1782). He was the founder of Ruddell's Station, one of the earliest settlements in Bourbon County, Kentucky. During the American Revolutionary War, the settlement was destroyed by a joint Canadian and Shawnee party under British officer Captain Henry Byrd in 1780. He and his family were held prisoner in Detroit for over two years before their release.

He was also a brother-in-law to Kentucky pioneers Isaac, Joseph and John Jacob Bowman. His grandson, John M. Ruddell, was a prominent Kentucky statesman and landowner.

Isaac Ruddle returned to Kentucky after the Revolutionary War and established a mill town a few miles upstream from the station he lost to Captain Henry Byrd and the Shawnee. Nestled in a valley at the confluence of Stoner and Hinkston Creeks, Ruddles Mills is still going, though in reduced circumstances. Other settlers didn’t fare so well. Some 200 were held at Chilicothe for 15 years. Two of Ruddle’s sons were adopted by the Shawnee and took native wives.