Every historic building has a story to tell
Have you ever noticed two historic houses side-by-side and thought they looked identical? “Twin” dwellings are common in early 20th century residential development in many Kentucky towns – often an example of small scale speculative development. Pattern books and catalogs from titans of the “mail-order home” business like Sears, Roebuck and Montgomery Ward (among many others) (read more)
On June 10, 1886, a post office was established at a crossroads in northwestern Jackson County, Kentucky, and the community around it christened “Collinsworth.” This wasn’t the birth of the village, for it had been around well before the Civil War, but a post office marked the beginning of a modern community, one in touch (read more)
StoryCorps is coming back to town! The nonprofit organization that helps people record stories about their lives and “leave a legacy for the future” will return to Lexington, Kentucky on March 16, parking their MobileBooth — a sleek Airstream trailer converted to a recording studio — at Phoenix Park next to the downtown library. I visited the (read more)
Categories: Kentucky history, Oral History
Tags: NPR, oral history, StoryCorps, StoryCorps MobileBooth, WUKY
Monday morning deserves a dreamy Queen Anne-Romanesque Revival style house, I think… and the George W. Robson, Jr. house fits the bill! Cincinnati-based architect Samuel E. des Jardins designed this gorgeous dwelling for Robson, an affluent resident of Bellevue, in Campbell County, Kentucky. The 2.5 story brick house has massive stone arches over the second (read more)
The chain link fences have gone up, making visible the divide between what was and what shall be – from tired reminders of former neighborhoods to blank earth, littered by concrete and gravel. And with the demolition of these houses, one of the last vestiges of the Virginia Avenue neighborhood between South Limestone and South (read more)
Categories: Demolition, Fayette County, Historic architecture, Historic Preservation, Kentucky architecture, Lexington Kentucky History, Lexington neighborhoods, Vernacular architecture
Tags: Adamstown, demolition, Lottie Street, Lottie Street Presbyterian Church, Maxwell Street Presbyterian Church, Porter Memorial Baptist Church, University of Kentucky, Virginia Avenue, W.S. Griffing
My first trip through Union County, in Western Kentucky, occurred during a week of spring floods. Our plan to travel along small, meandering rural roads close to the river was often thwarted by standing water. Although our circuitous route missed the county seat of Morganfield, we did stop in the coal-mining town of Sturgis, established (read more)
I have a confession to make. Yesterday, I went to Lowe’s to see if they were stocking flats of pansies yet. I returned home with only furnace filters and light bulbs, shaking my head over my own foolishness – led astray by the erratic weather patterns in the Bluegrass. I know it’s too early – (read more)
Categories: Gardens, Historic architecture, Historic Preservation, Kentucky, Morgan County, Vernacular architecture
Tags: crepe myrtles, Gardens, pansies, Spring
I’ve never kept track of how many abandoned and moldering rural houses I’ve encountered over the years. But though I might not know the number, if you show me a photograph, I can almost always tell you exactly where the house was located. This dwelling, built sometime after the Civil War – probably the 1870s – was (read more)
Urban renewal was not kind to many areas of Louisville, Kentucky. The Brown Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church (built 1864-65) weathered the waves of demolition around it, and some 150 years after Gideon Shryock designed the building on West Chestnut Street, its exterior continues to impress. But the design of the church is only one (read more)
Categories: African American History, Churches, Greek Revival Style, Historic architecture, Historic Preservation, Jefferson County, Kentucky architecture, Kentucky churches, Louisville
Tags: Brown Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, Chestnut Street Methodist Church South, Gideon Shryock, Louisville KY churches, Reverend L.H. Brown, West Chestnut Street, William Strickland
I’ve always viewed intellectual curiosity in a positive light. My curiosity has propelled my career, and helped forge paths to interesting places populated by interesting people. But sometimes, one must temper curiosity in light of rotting wood – and accept that sunlight shining through a roof isn’t necessarily an invitation for forward movement. I learned (read more)
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