Ohio River, Left Bank, MP 606

MELANIE DENISE LEWIS (1972-2012)

We buried Melanie today.  She was 40.  Melanie was the mother of two of my three nieces and two of my three nephews.  She and my brother had an off-again, on-again relationship for nearly twenty years.  It wasn't all pretty and it wasn't all bad.  Melanie had demons like all of us and the cause of her death at such a young age may have been related to one of those demons.  Ultimately it was a stroke which ended her young life.

Over the years, Melanie was sometimes quiet around me but never rude.  I can attest that she was a good cook.  For a few years, she and my brother lived in my home - and I never went hungry.  Later, when they lived on Harlan Avenue, I was often treated to a plate of fried chicken, green beans, sweet potatoes, greens, and lots of other good cooking.  I never turned it down; it was always good.

But I know she caused problems for my brother over the years.  For most of the last ten years, he has raised the youngest three of their children on his own.  While she wasn't present in the house, she was never far off, never more than a few blocks away.  She saw her children on a regular basis, including the day before she fell ill with the stroke.

It is never good when a parent has to bury their child as Melanie's mother, Vera, did today.  Nor can it be good that my youngest nieces and nephews, ages 9, 11, 13, and 17 today laid their mother to rest.  It was very sad.  While there are lots of reasons to wish this day had never happened, she is now at peace.

May her soul and the souls of all the departed rest - rest in peace.

Section 73 of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Kentucky reads as follows:

The Governor and the Lieutenant Governor shall commence the execution of the duties of their offices on the fifth Tuesday succeeding their election, and shall continue in the execution thereof until a successor shall have qualified.

Today was the fifth Tuesday succeeding the recent election for governor and lieutenant governor wherein the slate of incumbent Governor Steve Beshear and the former mayor of both the City of Louisville and of its successor-in-law the Louisville-Jefferson County Metro Government Jerry E. Abramson defeated the slate of State Senate President David Williams and the now-former Commissioner of Agriculture Richie Farmer. As such, Beshear and Abramson today celebrated their inauguration by taking the celebrated Oath of Office, as prescribed in Section 228 of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, which reads, in part:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm, as the case may be) that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this Commonwealth, and be faithful and true to the Commonwealth of Kentucky so long as I continue a citizen thereof, and that I will faithfully execute, to the best of my ability, the office of [governor, lieutenant governor] according to the law, and I do further solemnly swear (or affirm) that since the adoption of the present Constitution, I, being a citizen of this State, have not fought a duel with deadly weapons within this State nor out of it nor have I sent or accepted a challenge to fight a duel with deadly weapons, nor have I acted as second in carrying a challenge, nor aided or assisted any person thus offending, so help me God.

Both gentlemen having sworn or affirmed that they were in the business of upholding constitutions and not in the business of duelling with deadly weapons, even as a second, even in another state, they were dutifully sworn into office by the Chief Justice of the Kentucky Supreme Court, the Hon. James Minton.

As I have done twelve previous times, I attended these ceremonies up and down Capital Avenue in Kentucky's very beautiful capital city of Frankfort. My first inauguration was for Governor Ned Breathitt as a three-year-old with my mother, Barbara Hockensmith, and her mother's aunt, Dorothy Borden Collins Austin Hedger, who, at the time, lived on Second Street just east of the VFW Post. The house is gone and the lot now serves as a parking lot for the VFW.

I participated in the inaugurals of three successive governors, Martha Layne collins (1983), Wallace Wilkinson (1987), and Brereton Jones (1991), although the latter was purely by accident, being invited at the last minute by a high-ranking official to whom I could not say no.

I was fortunate enough to have seats in the inauguration of Steve Beshear four years ago and even better seats for today's event, which I attended with my dear friend Michael (Eli) Garton, also of Louisville.

While there are at this hour festivities continuing, we have returned home, here along the Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606. We had viewed parts of the parade, which included marching bands from 54 high schools across the Commonwealth and a total of 4150 participants. We were treated to some food and drink in several places, among which were offices of the House Leadership including Speaker Greg Stumbo (of Prestonsburg) and Speaker Pro-Tem Larry Clark (of Okolona). We also spent some time at the public reception held in the Thomas Clark Kentucky History Center on Broadway in downtown Frankfort.

Before leaving town, we dropped in on my maternal grandmother's younger sister, Frances Moore, 91, of Choateville. She was taking a break from making candies and bourbon balls for the holidays and chatted for about a half hour. We looked through a picture album from her 90th birthday event last Summer at the Choateville Christian Church where she has been a lifelong member. (Although my grandmother, Frances' sister, was not a regular at church, she was also a member of Choateville, having been baptised there in 1930). We talked about family, friends, and politics, all common themes in Frankfort talk. Politics is a mainstay in my family. Aunt Frances reported having retired from "working the polls" - something she did for 53 consecutive years in the Choateville precinct of Franklin County.

We've returned home and the Commonwealth goes to work tomorrow under the continued guidance of Governor Steve Beshear and his second lieutenant governor, Jerry E. Abramson.

Incidentally, the best line of the day came from the governor's speech when he said, "We need leaders who will build bridges instead of dams." So true on so many levels.

God Bless the Commonwealth.

Below is a picture from Kentucky's leading newspaper, the Lexington Herald-Leader, from the parade review stand of Mrs. Abramson, Lt. Gov. Jerry Abramson, Gov. Beshear, a Beshear grandson, and Mrs. Beshear, who was also celebrating her birthday today. An unscheduled part of the governor's speech was to invite the crowd in attendance to join him in singing Happy Birthday to Mrs. Beshear.


Photo from www.kentucky.com, the Lexington Herald-Leader

The Confederacy is alive and well in Kentucky and many other states which have a powerful-enough Tea Party influence in their state's Republican Party, as we do in Kentucky.

I have members of the Confederate Army in my family's lineage and have visited their graves, not because I revere them for their politics, but because they are flesh of my flesh, blood of my blood. I do not know if they were racist in their time or if they were simply young men in need of a paycheck and their destiny threw them in with the CSA.

I do know that the modern day Tea Party and Republican Party is full of people with beliefs I find abhorrent and un-Christlike, beliefs which are antithetic to many of my friends who are either non-white, non-Christian, non-American, or any of the many of other non's that most of us have come to accept as simply friends.

The American dream was built upon a melting pot of cultures and creeds. Those who would deny those same opportunities to the next generation of newcomers are simply un-American. America, the USA, defeated and put an end to the CSA in 1865. Long live America. Don't let these modern day Confederists, people President Lincoln called "elements in rebellion," destroy what is left of the good and great America.

At some point I need to get back to writing real blog entries instead of these little games. But, I am enjoying them so that may not happen for a while. First, a new picture, Hidden Location #12, for Marty to locate. Wait, I meant for everyone to take a stab at locating before Marty figures it out. Go.



Marty's answer for Hidden Location #11 is correct. That is the 1200 block of Hull Street looking northeast. This is the Irish Hill neighborhood just off Baxter Avenue near what is now called Lexington Road. The subdivision known as Irish Hill was laid out in two parts, the earlier one closer to Lexington Road, then known as Hamilton Avenue, was the old Valentine Schneikert property and developed by Adolph Hull, who probably named Hull Street. The Schneikert mansion still exists up on a hill behind some condos which front at 1234 Lexington Road. Very few people ever see the Schneikert mansion, which now has been converted to apartments and has a Pine Street address. I cannot locate a good picture of that home. Schneikert was a Louisville brickmaker in the post-Civil War era. His home was built prior to 1884.

[WRITER/EDITOR'S NOTE: Before some more informed soul than I points it out to me, someone like Dr. Tom Owen, I must confess I've eliminated a reference in the last sentence of the above paragraph to Mr. Schneikert's home being built of wood, as opposed to brick. When I wrote that earlier - the reference is now gone - I felt I was wrong. So, as part of my evening drive I went and found the house and found (most of it) to be constructed of brick, as is befitting the home of a Louisville brick merchant. Thanks for allowing me to clear that up].

Two people mentioned the old brick mansion at 1212 Hull Street, pictured below, believed to have been built around 1868. That was the home of Nicholas Finzer, a Louisville tobacco merchant - The Five Brothers Tobacco Company - as well as a member of the old Louisville School Board. A school once stood on E. Broadway between Shelby and Clay streets on the south side named for Mr. Finzer and Finzer Street runs behind the old school proeprty over to Smoketown. I've put a picture of the school below that of his mansion. It is now a parking lot.

These two homes in Irish Hill aren't that far apart. I can't determine where the proeprty division may have been based on the current street grid. But the balance of the Schneikert property was re-subdivided by an Act of the General Assembly on March 24, 1884. This later section became the property of the Payne family and Payne Street obviously is named for them. This subdivision extended over to the now-abandoned Eastern Cemetery where my Schlenk relatives are buried, including my great-grandmother Loraine Augusta Schlenk Lee Hall, and her parents, Emil and Minnie Schlenk.

*****


Nicholas Finzer Mansion, 1212 Hull Street


Nicholas Finzer School, formerly at 740 E. Broadway

I haven't posted for two and a half weeks. Seems I left y'all down in the Kentucky Bend of the Mississippi River with a promise of stories about the return trip. My apologies. Interestingly, my readership hasn't suffered from the lack of posting - still the same seven faithful readers.

At this point I'm not going to give you a paragraph or two for each road and highway used to make the trip back home. Suffice it to say, at least while in Kentucky, they were mostly two lane state routes through stretches of largely unpopulated territory - what seemed to be some of western Kentucky's coal country - areas previously undiscovered in my trekking about the backroads of Kentucky.

From the Bend, I returned to Fulton County proper travelling to the county seat Hickman, and from there to Clinton, the county seat of Hickman County immediately north. Along the way, just west of the intersection of KY239 and KY123, I spied an old school building called Oakton or Oakdale or something. I wish I had taken the time to learn more about it while I was in the area but didn't. I've sent off an email to a Hickman County historian in the hopes of learning more.

I passed through Clinton to KY307, which runs in a nearly straight north-south line for almost 34 miles from Fulton to its intersection with US62 in northeastern Carlisle County, one of the longest straigh lines of pavement anywhere in the Commonwealth. I drove about 13 of those miles to that point, taking US62 eastward through a few miles of Ballard County and into western Kentucky's metropolis, Paducah, the seat of McCracken County. Here I visited the parents of a friend of mine, spending two hours gossiping about the County Judge and County Clerk's races, one of which includes the write-in candidacy of a Republican woman who is apparently running at te behest of the County Judge. The incumbent County Clerk, a Democrat, is otherwise running unopposed. From there I headed back to my motel room in beautiful Calvert City to prepare the next day's trip back toward the Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606.


Early the next morning, before leaving Calvert City, I drove to the northern dead-end of KY95 in Marshall County where the road becomes a boatramp into the Tennessee River. The picture here is looking eastward (or upriver). It was an inspiring sight - that's Livingston County across the river to the left.

I crossed back over the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers following the new US62 eastward up through Caldwell County and into Hopkins County and its intersection with KY109 northward. I'll have to admit I've never really been much off the main roads in Hopkins County. Back in 1995 I spent a lot of timing driving State Representative Jim Wayne around in his Primary race for State Auditor. One of those trips was to some kind of BBQ event sponsored by State Representative Eddie Ballard of Hopkins County. I'm not sure I could find it today, but until this recent venture, that was my only detour from the regularly scheduled roadways. I left Madisonville, the county seat, eastward on the four-lane Anton Road - KY 70. At the fork in the road just before the community of Anton and a crossing of the CSX Railroad, I went to the left as is my wont and ended up on KY85. For seven long and lonely miles, KY 85 traverses acres and acres (and acres and acres) of corn and soybeans. There were no mailboxes and no electric lines along this elevated section of highway along the bottomlands of eastern Hopkins County. The road eventually crosses the Pond River and into McLean County, just north of the Muhlenberg line. After a few miles, KY85 comes to an end and thus I turned northward onto KY181 and into the village of Sacramento.

Sacramento is a town I've been meaning to visit for some time. For several years now I've been trying to get my friend Preston Bates to join me on a May trip here for the annual reenactment of the Battle of Sacramento, a Civil War event cited by the locals as the first war victory attributed to Nathan Bedford Forrest, a lieutenant general of the Confederate States Army and hero to many in the Old South. Forrest was a self-educated military genius who prior to his service to the Lost Cause was an alderman and slave owner and trader in Memphis, Tennessee. For many, this alone should discredit him. But, let me offer a speech he delivered to his troops upon the end of the war which saw his side capitulate and surrender to the overwhelming forces of United States Army General Ulysses Grant. If more of today's self-proclaimed adherants to the Old South would heed the words of their military hero, General Forrest, a multitude of racial problems might just go away. Here is a part of what he said to his troops at his headquarters in Gainesville, Alabama on May 9, 1865:

Civil war, such as you have just passed through naturally engenders feelings of animosity, hatred, and revenge. It is our duty to divest ourselves of all such feelings; and as far as it is in our power to do so, to cultivate friendly feelings towards those with whom we have so long contended, and heretofore so widely, but honestly, differed. Neighborhood feuds, personal animosities, and private differences should be blotted out; and, when you return home, a manly, straightforward course of conduct will secure the respect of your enemies. Whatever your responsibilities may be to Government, to society, or to individuals meet them like men. The attempt made to establish a separate and independent Confederation has failed; but the consciousness of having done your duty faithfully, and to the end, will, in some measure, repay for the hardships you have undergone. In bidding you farewell, rest assured that you carry with you my best wishes for your future welfare and happiness. Without, in any way, referring to the merits of the Cause in which we have been engaged, your courage and determination, as exhibited on many hard-fought fields, has elicited the respect and admiration of friend and foe. And I now cheerfully and gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness to the officers and men of my command whose zeal, fidelity and unflinching bravery have been the great source of my past success in arms. I have never, on the field of battle, sent you where I was unwilling to go myself; nor would I now advise you to a course which I felt myself unwilling to pursue. You have been good soldiers, you can be good citizens. Obey the laws, preserve your honor, and the Government to which you have surrendered can afford to be, and will be, magnanimous.

This year's reenactment was held the weekend of May 21 (although the actual Battle was in late December). Preston and I had both just concluded our work in different Democratic primaries and neither of us was up to the trip. Perhaps next year. But, I digress.


I left Sacramento northward to the county seat at Calhoun where I picked up KY81. Coming down off the Veterans Memorial Bridge over the Green River into downtown Calhoun deposits you at a stop sign on Main Street just south of Second. The east side of Main north of Second is occupied by the McLean County Court House. Main Street runs on for about a mile north of town out to the Calhoun Cemetery where a fork in the road leads KY81 off to the right. As a side note, the fork to the left, KY815, leads to a town called West Louisville. I wonder if they cruise along Broadway in West Louisville on Derby Day? I wonder if they even celebrate Derby Day? Again, I digress.

A few miles north of Calhoun, I turned east onto KY140 which leads to one of my ancestral communities, Utica, in southern Daviess County. I've written about Utica before and my great-grandfather Robert Lewis' forefathers being from there. At KY140's intersection with US431, I turned northward through what appears to be another mining region in Browns Valley and into Owensboro, the Daviess County seat.

The Kentucky part of my trip home ends, at least for now, in Daviess County. I worked my way through downtown and eastward out of town along E. 4th Street, co-numbered as US60 and US231. There is a great deal of highway construction going on as the east side extension of the Wendell H. Ford By-Pass around the city is being reconstructed to connect to the recently rebuilt US60/231, which leads to the fairly new (opened in October 2002) and strikingly beautiful William Natcher Bridge, carrying US231 out of Kentucky and into southern Indiana. US231 is being completely reconstructed in Indiana as a four-lane divided highway - almost an interstate - all the way up to I-64 north of the town of Dale. Gone will be the days of travelling the narrow but terribly straight US231 which presently passes through the communities of Rockport, Chrisney, Gentryville (with its connection to all-things-Lincoln), and Dale on its route from Owensboro to I-64.



As with other journeys which eventually reach I-64 in this very Catholic area of Indiana, I tend to head straight on eastward into Louisville, about a 70 mile journey from this point. This trip was no exception. I'm sorry it has taken all these weeks to get you back home, but here we are.

Have a good weekend.

"It's been an interesting week in Lake Wobegon" - thus says a well known tag line from the long-running APM radio show A Prarie Home Companion - PHC. In case you are looking at those letters APM and thinking those aren't the letters you remember, you are right. APM, American Public Media, has been the distributor of PHC for the last few years. Before that, the show was distributed by PRI - Public Radio International. But, I digress.

We aren't in Lake Wobegon or Minnesota. Here along the Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606, we, too, have had an interesting week. Earlier in the week, we took a road trip. My friend Lisa Tanner, political field organiser extraordinairre, is handling that task for the congressional campaign of Democratic challenger John Waltz in Kentucky's Fourth Congressional District. Kentucky-4 is a "stringtown" of counties mostly bordering the Ohio River from Ashland in the east to Prospect in the west, just upriver from our place here on the waterway. The Fourth also includes some interior counties such as Henry, Robertson, Bath, and Carter. If you think of the v-shape that forms the top of a map of Kentucky, that gives you the Fourth Congressional District.

At one time the Fourth also included a band of precincts around the Jefferson County perimeter from Prospect southwest to Valley Station. With the exception of ten precincts in Okolona and two south of Valley Station, those precincts are now part of Kentucky-3, represented by my favorite congressman John Yarmuth. The twelve mentioned above, once in the Fourth, now in the Second, are represented by Congressman Bret Guthrie, a Republican from Bowling Green. The Fourth was for many years represented by Marion Gene Snyder, he for whom the Jefferson Freeway was appropriately renamed. The Federal Court House, downtown on Broadway, was also named for him, although I can't give you a good reason as to why. The Fourth is currently represented by Geoff Davis, a Republican from northern Kentucky about whom I know very little. My friend Lisa's candidate, Mr. Waltz, is seeking to unseat Mr. Davis.

She called Tuesday afternoon with a few questions and wanted more than a few answers. Rather than hang on the phone until the batteries went dead, something I have often done while listening to Lisa on the other end of the line, I instead looked at my calendar and realized my Tuesday night was unexpectedly free.

Road trip!

I told Lisa that I would head up to Mr. Waltz' campaign headquarters, officially located in the southern Boone County community of Walton. For many Kentuckians my age, Walton brings to mind one person, a jockey named Steve Cauthen. Cauthen, who is a few months older than me, gained a spot in Kentucky horse racing history (and thus Kentucky history) aboard one of the greatest horses of all time, Affirmed, the last horse to win the sport's covetted Triple Crown. Cauthen did that as an eighteen year old in 1978. He was pictured on the cover of Sports Illustrated a week after his Derby win, which was only a few days after his 18th birthday. As a side note to that most historic storied racing season, Affirmed, with Cauthen aboard, beat the same horse in each of the Triple Crown's three legs, a horse named Alydar. Alydar is the only horse which Placed in all three races. But, again, I digress.

John Waltz' campaign headquarters is located on Dixie Highway - the real Dixie Highway, not the imposter that runs through Louisville, which is signed as US25 in this southern part of Boone County, just west of the main CSX rail line to Lexington. While in the unincorporated commnuity of Richwood, the mailing address is in the Walton zip code. Walton city proper is a few miles to the south along US25. On the other side of Frogtown Road, to the north, is a tavern known as the Special K's Sports Bar. It reminds me of an old fashioned roadhouse, the kind you of place like where the Blues Brothers played in the classic movie Animal House. In Louisville, we used to have a type of roadhouse along Preston Highway, just north of the original alignment of the Watterson known as Coke (or Koch or even Cooke) Station. It was torn down in the 1980s.

Lisa and I ended up in the Special K's place for a sasparilla [thank you Jerry Kleier] and our discussion covered a multitude of questions and answers, amidst the usual crowd of bar patrons who had stopped in for a cold one after a day's work. There was a pool table, a juke box, cornhole and horsehoes out back, and three large screen TVs, all three of which were tuned to the same channel showing the same Cincinnati Reds baseball game against the Milwaukee Brewers. Tuesday's game was centerpiece of a three day homestand against the Brewers. They had lost the night before 3-2. Tuesday's game, as well as Wednesday's, went in the win column.

We eventually returned to the headquarters where I met the rest of the campaign staff as well as the candidate Mr. Waltz, an aggressive and progressive young man with a solid resume for the job he is seeking. Mr. Waltz served on board the USS George Washington from 2000 to 2004 and was deployed in support of Operation Noble Eagle, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and Operation Enduring Freedom. He and his wife, Janie, live in Florence (Mall Y'all) with their four daughters. The group of us ended up in the headquarters parking lot discussing the specific events of the day and the general events of the campaign. Mr. Waltz' campaign website is http://www.johnwaltz.com. Go visit.

That was my long road trip for the week. I've had a few shorter ones, including one last night out to the El Nopal restaurant east of Jeffersontown on the way to Fisherville. I met a group of friends who had been campaigning on behalf of Marty Meyer, the Democratic candidate for Kentucky's 38th Senate District. They had spent the evening at Saint Michael's Catholic Church picnic, about a mile away. We had a good time well into the evening afterwhich I took a short ride out into Spencer and Shelby counties before returning home.

As I said, it has been an interesting week.

Thus ends July. Happy Trails.

By the way, tomorrow, August 1, would have been my grandmother's 94th birthday were she living. Vivian Thomas "Tommie" Lewis Hockensmith, older sister to Frances Lewis Moore, mentioned a few entries back, was born August 1, 1916 in a house along the south side of Pea Ridge Road in western Franklin County, near the back of the property now occupied by the Game Farm on Louisville Road in Frankfort. She married Daniel Thomas Hockensmith on May 16, 1936 at a pastor's residence on Conway Street in Frankfort. The couple's only child, my mother Barbara Ellis Hockensmith, was born in the old Kings Daughters Hospital on Steele Street in South Frankfort, in 1940. During the war, while my grandfather was serving in the United States Navy, my mother and grandmother lived in Long Island, New York and Providence, Rhode Island. Other than those years, they made their home in Louisville. My grandmother died on February 18, 1976.

Tomorrow is also the birthday of two long time friends, folks I met when I was a young teenager in the Kentucky Young Democrats. Mary-John Celletti and Dale Emmons are both just a few years older than me, and both will get one year older tomorrow.

Time for August.

Went to Frankfort last night - actually to Choateville (named for my Great-Great-Grandfather's family) - to celebrate the birthday of my oldest living relative, Aunt Frances Katherine Lewis Moore, little sister to my late grandmother, Vivian Thomas Lewis Hockensmith. Aunt Frances' 90th birthday party was held at the Choateville Christian Church, where many generations of my mother's family have been baptised or are current members. Happy 90th Aunt Frances.

I cut class today - no, I played hookie from work today. I didn't call in sick - I actually told my boss I wouldn't be in and he said ok.

Part of my unscheduled holiday was spent in Louisville doing those things you can't always get done during the day because you are at work. But I had planned my afternoon around a trip to Frankfort. (I know what you are thinking - how many times is he going to write about a trip to Frankfort pretending such a trip isn't just another in a series of the mundane adventures of a political junkie?). Well, here is another in the series.

Today's trip had little to do with politics. I attended a ceremony at the Old State Capital on Broadway honoring the conclusion of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial and the beginning of the Civil War Sesquicentennial. Today, of course, marks the 16th president's 201st birthday. During the last few years the nation has been celebrating the bicentennial of his birth. Many of those events have taken place in Kentucky, in places like Springfield, the Lincoln Homestead State Park, Larue County, and in downtown Louisville on the waterfront where we have a new larger than life size statue of Lincoln, created by Louisville's famed sculptor Ed Hamilton. All of those celebrations, at least in Kentucky, officially came to an end today. But with that closing of one door, we open another, the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War, or as some call it the War Between the States, or the War of Northern Aggression. Through the Kentucky Historical Society, of which I am a member, Kentucky will be marking the Civil War for the next few years. That program will be ran by Donna M. Neary, the director of Kentucky's Civil War Sesquicentennial Initiatives.

After the official program this afternoon, I found a friend in the audience, former State Senator Lindy Casebier, and we discovered each other's interests in being present today. I told him I wanted to meet Ms. Neary as she and I had already been exchanging tweets on the Twitter. She came over to our conversation and he made the formal introductions and an expansive conversation ensued. The end result is that I am hoping to somehow get involved in this sesquicentennial celebration as the Civil War in general, and the Civil War in Kentucky in particular, is something which holds my interest. My backroads travel of the Commonwealth often - regularly - involve stopping to read historical markers scattered across the state, many of which concern the Civil War. I have "cousins" buried here and there in the state, some with graves marked by a cross and the letter USA for the United States Army, while others have the same cross, but the letters CSA, for Confederate States Army. Most any Kentuckian with roots in the state have relatives on both sides of the blue and gray line. Again, it is something which interests me.

During our conversation, we somehow got talking about the colorful new interior in the New State Capital, which itself is celebrating a milestone, its own centennial. And at some point in that conversation I heard a familiar name and responded, "Oh, he's my cousin." I didn't go on to explain just how we were cousins as I have never thought of this person as anyone other than my cousin. I see him pretty regularly, we are the same age, and fairly close. But then it occurred to me that here I was in the Old Capital, which in the past housed the Kentucky Historical Society, which is the repository of so many genealogical records and resources, that maybe my casual reference to this person as simply my cousin was an orthographic faux pas. After all, we aren't simply cousins.

I have no first cousins. My brother and me are the only grandchildren of both sets of our grandparents. Our cousin-counting technically starts with second cousins, or properly, in some instances if we had any, first cousins-once removed - we don't have any. There is a nomenclature amongst genealogists, some of whom follow it with zeal and precision while others are lazier in their observance of the proper rules and terms. The person I casually referred to as my cousin is technically my third cousin-once removed. I am his second cousin-twice removed. Some people might call us fourth cousins. We share a common ancestor - Annie Collins. Annie Choate Brawner Collins was his great-grandmother. She was my great-great-grandmother. She lived at the fork between E. Main and Broadway, just east and opposite the Capitol Avenue bridge in downtown Frankfort. I've written about her before here on the blog. Whatever the technical relationship, in my family we're simply called cousins. And I have a lot of them.

*****

Before I left Frankfort, I stopped in my favorite Frankfort coffee shop, the Kentucky Coffeetree Cafe, located across Broadway from the Old Capital Annex. It is a ritual of mine although I've never been in there this late on a Friday. The time was about 6:30 p.m. There was a band setting up while I was there which was to be performing tonight to a sold-out house. Now, to be honest, there probably aren't 30 seats in the house, so selling it out shouldn't be difficult. For Louisvillians, the best way to describe the Kentucky Coffeetree Cafe is that of a true combination Heine Bros. - Day's - Old Louisville - Sunergos coffeshop with a little Rudyard Kipling thrown in for music. It is quickly becoming a cultural center for downtown Frankfort.

Tonight's band is The Farewell Drifters, based in Nashville, Tennessee. With one exception, they all looked about 22 years old to me - with one older. The promo picture at right reminds me of a Procol Harem promo pic from the 1960s. They have a website - thefarewelldrifters.com. The warmup was a very mellow combination of folk music and bluegrass picking, played a little too loud but I am sure with a full house it won't be. I wish I could have stayed and the truth is I probably should have. As a Jackson Browne devotee, I am sure, based on the fifteen or so minutes I was listening, that I would have liked their performance. Here is some copy from their bio:

"Zach Bevill (guitar, lead vocals) and Joshua Britt (mandolin, vocals) write eclectic folk songs unbound by tradition, yet invariably influenced by it. Add the rest of the Drifters – Clayton Britt (lead guitar), Christian Sedelmyer (fiddle), and Dean Marold (upright bass) – and you have a delightful synthesis of folk pop and traditional string band music that appeals to a wide range of listeners."

The coffeehouse itself has a website - kentuckycoffeetree.com. Those of you into indi music should check out their show schedule. Just remember, the seating is very limited. Also, they have a varied food menu and their beverage list isn't limited to coffee. There is also beer and wine, and being Kentucky, Ale-8-One in a bottle.

Another reason Frankfort is my favorite little capital city.

I've not written for a while. Much has changed. I've gotten older this week. No, I didn't have a birthday - that is in September - September 23rd for those who have their calendars handy. It is on a Thursday this year and I will, in fact, be getting older then. It will be my 50th. Damn.

Earlier this week, my little brother turned 48. That made me old enough. Tomorrow my mother will be 70. Seventy. That makes both of us older. Double Damn. My mother, who is probably my best friend and has been for most of my life, was born in Frankfort at the old Kings Daughters Hospital downtown on Steele Street, on January 22, 1940. She is the only child of her late parents, Vivian "Tommie" Lewis and Daniel Thomas Hockensmith. She lives in the house her father built in 1957 off South Park Road in southern Jefferson County, along with my ailing (but doing better) father (whom she divorced in 1964 but takes good care of him nonetheless) as well as my niece Lindsey, who helps a lot, and Lindsey's boyfriend Matt. That home has always housed a variety of relatives and would-be relatives, and including Dad, once-were relatives (at least in her book). So, tommorrow we celebrate. Happy 70th Mom.

But it is perilous times in which we are celebrating. A year ago I was celebrating in grand fashion with friends the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president. We travelled to the Federal city to enjoy the festivities, and we did have a great time. But the year has not been good in as many respects as one would like. We're still at war, something a lot of us thought we'd be getting out of. Instead we're just shifting over, albeit to a more logical foe, the Afghans. We've started and not finished more than a few legislative battles including the elephant in the room, health care. It will likely go unfinished now that the voters of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have deprived the Democrats of a magical 60th vote in the United States Senate. And, proving they are the strongest arm of the Republic, today the Supreme Court, on a 5-4 vote (sound familiar), has decided that corporations have First Amendments rights, including those involving donations to political campaigns. (A note here - unlike most of my liberal brethren, I have always sided with Mitch McConnell on this matter, known in legal circles as Buckley v. Valeo, a 1976 case on the matter which was revisited in another case, McConnell v. FEC in 2003, and now this one, known as Citizens United v. FEC). With today's ruling, striking down parts of the McCain/Feingold law, we will return to the pre-Theodore Roosevelt/Bill Taft days of an America where unrestrained capitalism is king and absolute power will corrupt absolutely. It has not been a good week for the American Republic.

I had intended to go further here but I've just this moment received a text-message telling me of the passing of a family friend, "Aunt Rosie" Krill. Aunt Rosie wasn't my aunt - rather she was the aunt of my friend Sherry. My guess is Aunt Rosie is in her 90s. She was quite a character. Her brother, Pete Habeeb (also deceased), once operated the old Min's Cafe on Story Avenue. I worked for Pete as a night manager there in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Aunt Rosie worked many years at Min's. Her sons operate the Colonnade Restaurant here in town. I'll quit here. Rest In Peace Aunt Rosie. May your soul and the souls of all the departed Rest In Peace.

Thanks Be To God.

"Weekends were made for Michelob." That's an old advertising line. A nice cold Michelob might be good on a hot summer weekend night, but this weekend was not the time for imbibing a cold, brisk beer in a sleek, green bottle.

Rather, as is my wont, I spent the weekend on the road, visiting the living and the dead.

Saturday my mother and I travelled to Frankfort together where she dropped me off at the Wendell H. Ford Kentucky Democratic Party Headquarters where I was to attend the 4th Quarter meeting of the Kentucky Democratic Party State Central Executive Committee. My favorite cartoon character, Foghorn Leghorn, might make a funny here, implying that visiting the Democratic Party this weekend could be a stop one would make while visiting the dead. But then, that wouldn't necessarily be a funny - it is well close to the truth given the failures going on in Washington and our recent failures in Special Elections. So instead, I won't say anything about the meeting.

While I was cussing and discussing at the meeting, my mother crossed over US60 to the Sunset Memorial Gardens, where several generations of my people are buried. But, let me rephrase the beginning of the sentence. I did no cussing or discussing at the meeting. In fact, three different people commented on my lack of commenting. It was not for lack of trying. Despite sending the Chair a Christmas Card so as to get on his radar screen, and sitting directly in front of him during the meeting, and politely holding my left hand up for most of the meeting, I was, not surprisingly, never recognised for a comment.

Had the Chair called on me, in our discussion about how do we do this Special Election thing should there be a next time, I would have said that I've never understood why we go through a grand and monumental effort every four years during what is called the Reorganization, (allegedly) electing three people in each precinct in every precinct in the Commonwealth, and that group electing members to County Executive and State Central Executive committees, and then we do very little else with them. We are not even sure if the people we elected last year are still viable to the Party this year. Nor do we make any great effort to fill the vacancies in those precincts where no one was elected. (As a note, I've been told that Fayette and Franklin counties do endeavor to keep these slots filled). The truth is, if every precinct level opening was filled just in Jefferson County, we'd have a base-base of about 1545 troops-on-the-ground. Well, that's what I would have said if given the chance. I will add that several people who did get called on made impressive and passionate speeches - especially Marcus Woodward of Ashland, Charlotte Lundergan of Lexington, Lisa Tanner of Louisville, and Martha Jane King of Lewisburg. Mr. Woodward's discussion on healthcare was somber and sobering. Most everyone applauded. It was a great speech about a serious delinquency in our government. Let me move on.

My mother made her way to her cousin's house off Versailles Road opposite the road that leads back to the Frankfort Country Club. After the meeting, I hitched a ride over there. From that visit, we went to another cousin's house in Versailles, near the big Kroger off Lexington Road in Woodford County, east of town. Our final destination was back in Frankfort, but I very much dislike backtracking, so I coursed through downtown Versailles and headed west on US62, rather than physically north on West US60, the way we came into town.

This ride takes you past the High Bridge across the Kentucky River, just upriver from the old crossing of Shryock's Ferry opposite Tyrone in Anderson County, where perched up on the hill is a sign saying Welcome to Paradise, indicating the home of Wild Turkey Bourbon. We climbed up US62 into the east side of Lawrenceburg, and then northward out US127 toward Frankfort. Along the way, where KY151 (the old US127) leads off to the left is my cousin Loretta Sharp's restaurant called the Captain something. I've never been there. She operates another one by the same name down in Lee County, Florida. She is one of two cousins of mine operating restaurants in the area. The other one is Melanie Baker, who's Melanie's is at the corner of Saint Clair and West Main streets in downtown Frankfort. We didn't stop at the restaurant and instead stayed on US127 out of Anderson and into Franklin, crossing over both I-64 and US60, and leaving that road at KY1005, which takes one over to Choateville to the west. There we visited with my maternal grandmother's oldest sister, Frances Catherine Lewis Moore, who is 89. She had cooked up a pot of vegetable soup with a great deal of roast beef as flavoring. She also had freshly made jam cakes, and while we were there her great-granddaughter whipped up some oatmeal and peanut butter cookies. I had a little of everything.

Eventually, in a hard blowing snowstorm (which didn't stick) we made our way back to Mom's house.

Today was a different trip, one I had not planned until a few days ago. After church, I told a friend I wanted to go find the grave of Mrs. Sylvia Cross, the lady I mentioned in the previous entry who died last week. I knew from the obituary the name of the cemetery and I gathered from maps where the cemetery might be. I knew if I could find the cemetery, her grave would still be fresh and covered with flowers.

We started south on I-65 toward Greensburg, the county seat of Green County. Mrs. Cross was said to have been buried in the Green County Memory Gardens on KY61 south of Summersville. Not wanting to make the trip on the interstate system, I exitted at the Lebanon Junction/Boston exit, one of many along I-65 with KY61. We headed east toward Boston, a tiny community just out of Bullitt County and into Nelson. Turning south on West US62 for a brief period, we then turned east on KY52 which takes one along side the railroad spur from Lebanon Junction over to Lebanon itself, through the communities of Nelsonville and Lyons. The road ends at US31E in the community of New Haven, where we turned south on the Federal highway. I should have bought gas there in New Haven, as it was the cheapest I saw along the entire trip at $2.399 a gallon. But, I didn't. We followed US31E into Larue County, passing along the way the boyhood home of President Abraham Lincoln, the place at Knob Creek. At White City, I thought about turning onto KY470, but couldn't recall exactly where it came out, so instead I stayed on the road I knew, into Hodgenville, around the new roundabout - much better than Louisville's new roundabout at the Zoo, this one seems to have some purpose to it - and then south. We drove up into the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site, noticing the 56 steps representing the years of the president's life, and the granite edifice holding the little log cabin, dubiously yet traditionally held to be the birthplace of the 16th president. The entire facility is presently closed for renovations.

We crossed US31E onto KY61 towards Buffalo. Before US31E was completed sixty years ago between Lincoln's birthplace and Magnolia, this was the road over which is was routed. In Buffalo, I encountered KY470, now remembering where it led. KY470 south of Buffalo is the original alignment of US31E toward Magnolia. We contined on KY61 toward our destination. Along the way, I began noticing the names I read in Mrs. Cross's obituary - we passed a Despain Road (Despain was her maiden name), as well as several sites with the name Bloyd, which was her first husband's last name. We passed over the hill at Mount Sherman, out of Larue County and into Green County, down the hill into Taylor Chapel, through Allendale and Bloyds Crossing, past the old Skyline Drive-In Theater (will open May 1st), and into the crossroads village at Summersville.

At this point, we need only to look for the cemetery which quickly came into view less than a mile from the town on the east side of the road. The cemetery is about two acres and only about half developed. Nearly in the center, closer to the back side than the front, was the newly dug grave, covered over with flowers now a little over a week old. Although it was very muddy due to all the recent rain and snow, my friend and I crossed over to the grave. Her marker appears to have been in place for some time, noting her birth year of 1917, but much too soon for 2009 to mark her death. Next to her's is a gravesite for her son and daughter-in-law, people I've never met, but according to her obit, are still among the living. After a pause, a prayer, and some pictures on my cell phone, this pilgrimage was at an end. About 80 miles separate Mrs. Cross's final residence in Old Louisville and this site she had obviously chosen years ago as her final resting place. I was very sad.

We left the cemetery for the sojourn home. Again not wanting to backtrack, I headed south toward Greensburg, knowing KY88 a few miles ahead could take us over to both US31E at Hardyville or US31W and I-65 at the Hart County seat of Munfordville, usually pronounced with an "s" between the "d" and the "v." Twenty five miles separate KY61 in Green County and US31W in Hart County. Along the way I began to recognise the road, remembering a visit to another graveyard. We came upon the Gilead-Fairview Road, a name which stuck in my mind. I turned there and just a few hundred feet to the north was a fork with a lane called the Pleasant Grove Cemetery Road. Here in this cemetery is buried my cousin Scottie Ralston. I had brought my mother to her funeral in January 2004. The cemetery is quite small and full of stones bearing the name Ralston. Isabelle Scott "Scottie" Dean Ralston's mother and my grandmother were sisters - sisters also to the 89 year old Frances with whom we visited yesterday. I called my mother from the cemetery - Scottie was ten years older than me and ten years younger than my mother when she died.

This was our final stop, from there quickly making our way over to Munfordville and US31W's intersection with I-65. Headed north, crossing the Green River, the Nolin [No Lynn] River, and the Salt, we were safely back home about darktime here along the Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606.

So begins Christmas Week. Merry Christmas.

I was busy the entire weekend. Covered a lot of ground in many different places and a few different ways.

The busy weekend started with my friend Morgan Ransdell at Actors Theater on Main Street in downtown Louisville. It was a production of William Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. It was quite a production that, had it been a movie, might have been rated R or at least PG-13. The acting was interesting as the story was set somewhere in haze of the drug-infused 1960s, replete with a Volkswagen full of second-rate actors for the play-within-the-play, a Shakespeare staple. Older readers might recall sets from Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In or the old Dating Game.

As written by the Bard, the stars are Oberon, Titania, and Puck, respectively the King and Queen of the Faeries, and Oberon's special servant, Puck, sometimes known as Robin Goodfellow. As performed, the characters of Puck and Bottom (the Ass, from the Players Troupe) took the center stage of the viewers' attention. Eric Bondoc , my favorite for the night, played a very seductive and somewhat homoerotic Puck to his master King Oberon, played by Edward O'Blennis. Puck's unusual singing voice, a sultry lower-middle range, added to the intensity. O'Blennis' portrayal was a cross of Jimi Hendrix, Richard Pryor, the performer once and presently known as Prince, and a few others. He was great. Bottom was portrayed by Aaron Munoz who is transformed as an ass and plays lover to Queen Titania, which was played by Jessica Morris. Munoz as the Ass as well as his Bottom was over-the-top in so many ways. His ramblings around the stage interacting with nearly every other cast member at some point was excellent. We laughed through the entire production which was a litte long on time but never short on creativity and excitement. A great Friday night.

Saturday and Sunday were spent with Preston Bates touring the counties which comprise the 14th Kentucky Senate District, a district where it is anticipated a Special Election may be called for December 8. Preston was already in the area with his U of L History class on some sort of field trip to the Perryville Battlefield State Park in Boyle County, one of my favorite places in Kentucky and our stake in the tourist department for Civil War buffs. Waiting for Preston's class to end, I hiked one of the two loop trails, a distance of about 1.5 miles through Parson's Ridge, the Widow Gibson site, overlooking the Bottom House, up and down Loomis' Heights, along Doctor's Creek, and eventually returning to the Trailhead near the Confederate Cemetery and the Union Monument. I can use the exercise, and this little hike was probably the most I have had in years.

Eventually Preston and I joined up, leaving Perryville and headed to Harrodsburg. We viewed the site for the new Court House, going up on the same Civic Square where three previous courthouses have been erected. Harrodsburg is the county seat of Mercer County, one of the five counties in the 14th Senate District. We headed north out of town and out of the district into Anderson County toward the BG Parkway. As Preston's class had centered on the Civil War, I took him to the Salt River Baptist Church Cemetery in Lawrenceburg where, among many others, are buried distant cousins of mine, the Moore brothers, Samuel and James. Samuel and James were Confederate soldiers under the command of Louisville's Lt. Col. Bennett Young. Here is a trivia question for you. The Moore brothers of Lawrenceburg, Kentucky participated in the northernmost skirmish of the Civil War as privates in the 8th Kentucky Cavalry of the Confederate Army. The "raid" occurred fifteen miles from the Canadian border. Any takers on the name of the raid?

Also buried in the Salt River Cemetery is my 5-Greats Uncle and 6-Greats Grandfather, the same person, Johann Michael Hockersmith, a veteran of the Revolutionary War whose grave is marked by a Sons of the American Revolution plaque. He died around 1812. The cemetery and church date from 1798.

From there, as it was getting late, we took the Bluegrass Parkway over to the western side of the 14th District, to its most populous county, Nelson, and its county seat of Bardstown. However, again a detour. Preston has asked me in the past about the Catholic population of central Kentucky. Nelson County is the base of this popluation, and even before Bardstown was the community of Saint Thomas, home for Bishop Flaget's cabin, the Saint Thomas Church, and the original building which housed Nazareth College, the forerunner of my alma mater, Spalding University. The building dates from 1814. From there we went into Bardstown where we ate supper at a Mexican restaurant on Third Street. We called it a night and proceeded back to Louisville.

Sunday's trip covered the rest of the 14th District, beginning in far southern Taylor County at Tebbs Bend. This beginning again took us into Civil War territory. On July 4, 1863, while the rest of the country was focussed on battles at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and Vicksburg, Mississippi, another smaller battle was being fought over the Green River Bridge at Tebbs Bend in Taylor County. A confederate cemetery marks the spot and among its graves are those of James Hockensmith and Alexander Hockersmith, cousins of mine, both from the family of Johann Michael mentioned above. We left the cemetery driving into Campbellsville with its very non-descript courthouse built in the 1960s as well as Campbellsville University on the northwest side of town.

From there we headed north on US68 and the detoured onto KY208, an older path between Campbellsville and the Marion County seat of Lebanon. This road takes us through Calvary, a small town memorable for me as the place where my Ford Ranger PickUp crossed the 100,000 mile mark on the odometer a few years back. Ah, the memories. In Lebanon, we drove around several parts of town noting the statuary at the corner of Spalding Avenue and Walnut Street. Spalding heads out of Lebanon and Marion County and into Springfield and Washington County, following KY55. Nine miles of very good highway separate the two county seats.

In Washington County I am always interested in passing the Mordecai Lincoln House, once belonging to the president's uncle. I helped with its original fundraising drive for restoration back in 1979. Upon the death of Mordecai's father, Abraham, who was killed in a Native American raid in Jefferson County, Mordecai inherited his father's property in Washington County. The president's parents were married a little north of this site in 1806. Three years ago, a reenactment of that marriage was the official opening event of our country's celebration of President Lincoln's bicentennial. The marriage license marking this event can be found in Washington's 1816 courthouse, Kentucky's oldest still in daily use.

We ventured north out of Sprinfield past the Lincoln Homestead Park, using KY555, Kentucky's proposed Heartland Parkway. Although this is a very wide two-lane highway, you can see the even wider right-of-way marked by the fencelines, right-of-way which someday could allow for the construction of another two (or more) lanes. I've written before about this connecting road between Green River Lake and Taylorsville Lake, and it was on KY555 and its connecting KY248, that we returned home to Louisville, thus completing our tour of the 14th District's five counties, counties we will need to know all we can in a few weeks as we approach the Special Election.

I will add pictures later.

Today was supposed to be spent in southwestern Jefferson County at a community festival helping the candidate I am supporting for Mayor of Louisville-Jefferson County Metro in next year's Democratic Primary. But Mother Nature changed my plans, flooding the festival grounds with yesterday's rains causing the event organizers to cancel the festival.

As such, I got some free time out of it and took to the roads.

My first stop was Lakeview Park in Franklin County, east of the high school on US460. My maternal grandmother's remaining sisters and brothers and their families gathered for a reunion in the very brisk weather under the Hank Hancock Pavilion of the park. My grandmother was the first of her siblings to pass away back in 1976. Since then two more have crossed over. Today the rest were to be found, ranging in age from 69 to 89. My grandmother, were she alive, would be 93.

Everytime I go to one of these affairs I am reminded that like my grandmother's siblings, I too am aging. I joked with more than one of my cousins - actually all 2nd or 3rd cousins as my brother and I have have no true 1st cousins - that I didn't know anyone there under 40 - and I didn't. I had to ask whose kids are whose, and sometimes had to ask whose kids the parents of those kids were.

There was food and drink galore and someone brought an outdoor chimney which provided some much needed heat for the old and young alike. After a full meal and a half, along with a piece of pie, I departed northward out of Franklin County along US127, a very well built highway constructed in the 1970s with wide lanes and wider shoulders. Here and there remnants remain of the former road, especially where one can venture off to the small commnuities of Swallowfield in Frankin County and Monterey in Owen County, which I did. Monterey, by the way, was originally called Williamsburg and was renamed in 1847 in honor of the Mexican city of that name and its role in the Mexican War.

About 25 miles separate Frankfort from Owenton, the Owen County seat. You arrive in Owenton on the southeast side of town where US127 meets the multiplexed KY22/KY227. A note about KY227. When I was younger, it was numbered as US227. However that designation came to an end as the route both started and finished in one state, which sort of keeps it from being a federal highway. The southern part of US227, from Paris to north of Richmond was renumbered as KY627. The northern leg, from Georgetown to Carrollton retained the 227 number, but as a state highway.

The Owen County Court House, shown here in a photo taken by Dave Redden, is off to the west of US127/KY227 on Seminary Street. I stayed north on Main Street leaving the little town where Main Street forks off to the left avoiding the Adams Street Hill. At the community of Long Ridge, more or less an intersection, northbound US127/KY227 are joined by westbound KY36. KY36 is one of the longer state routes in Kentucky, crossing from Frenchburg in Menifee County, through eight more counties before coming to an end at the Milton-Madison Bridge in Trimble County.

About nine miles north of Owenton, KY227 departs the federal route and heads west to the tiny little community of New Liberty, one of the oldest communities in the Commonwealth, dating to sometime before 1800. New Liberty was incorporated in 1827, which is one year before Louisville received its charter from the General Assembly. The oldest church in the county was gathered there about 1806, and remains so, now called the New Liberty Baptist Church.

From New Liberty, KY227 courses westwardly along a ridge through the Dallasburg community which is (apparently) served by the Wheatley Post Office. The street map shows a community named Wheatley, but if one is there I didn't see it. Eventually the road heads toward the confluence of Eagle Creek and the Kentucky River, and the hardscrabble town of Worthville, which is located about four blocks off where KY227 presently runs. Originally the highway fed onto Kyle Street in this little burg, which seems to serve mostly as a staging area for the CSX railroad system. The town is about three blocks wide and maybe 3/4 of a mile long along both sides of the railroad, as shown in the picture. There remain the remnants of an old town - a line of two and three story brick buildings attesting to a once vibrant railroad town. Very little is left other than the railroad yard.

I followed KY227 to its western terminus at US42 in the Carroll County seat of Carrollton. Turning south I ventured one block over (northward) to Main Street which runs along the Ohio River. This street allows a view of the back side of the courthouse and its ample lawn. This is also the original "main" street of the town. A few blocks west is another confluence, that of the Kentucky and Ohio rivers. US42 crosses over the mouth of the Kentucky on a blue two lane bridge built in 1952 into the town of Prestonville.

Someday I will write about the Preston family of Kentucky. This Prestonville and our Preston Highway, along with Prestonsburg in eastern Kentucky and Preston's Landing in Trimble County, are all related. William Preston and his family have roots all up and down the Ohio River and he was from the family of one of Louisville's founders, a family which orginated in Virginia and before that in Ireland. But, I digress.

From Prestonville, I followed the Left Bank of the Kentucky River for a few miles upriver along KY55 and KY389, the latter of which intersects with Interstate 71 at Milemarker 43. From this point I returned home, completing the inside circle of the golden triangle, going "not quite" to Lexington, thence northward "not quite" to northern Kentucky, and returning thence to Louisville.

Sometime last week my friend Keith requested a free trip to Lexington for he and his friend, something he knows I am usually up for most anytime. They didn't say exactly when it was they wanted to go, so I suggested they could travel with me to Frankfort today, attend with me the State Democratic Committee meeting, then we'd all head to Lexington where most everyone was concerned about THE FOOTBALL GAME but they were only going to see his friend's sister. In fact, they weren't even aware THE FOOTBALL GAME was being played until I explained why all the Jefferson County plates were zooming past us as I leisurely made the drive from Louisville to Frankfort.

So the three of us set out for the Kentucky Democratic Party Headquarters, located on the east side of Frankfort off US60 just south of Interstate 64's Exit #58. They sat through about the first third of the meeting before escaping to the outdoors while I sat through the rest of the meeting. While we aren't supposed to divulge what happens for fear of ouster from the Party, I can tell you without divulging any secrets that we didn't do much of anything today. There was quite a spread for breakfast of some very good food and I ate my share and perhaps that of two others. There was also a few times that I wanted to speak, or vote NO on a matter, but I didn't; I was quiet for the most part. I did speak up when there was an attempt to make an appointment to fill a vacancy on the Committee without a vote, something the By-Laws do not allow. I would have thought that the Party's legal counsel would have caught that - or maybe one of the newly appointed members of the By-Laws Committee, but no one spoke up so I did. Thus a motion was properly made and seconded, and the motion carried filling the vacancy. We are whole once again.

Eventually the meeting came to an end and I rejoined my friends for the twenty-two mile trip over to the Hamburg Place area of Fayette County where I dispatched them at an Aeropostale store in one of Hamburg Place's myriad of shopping centers. I explained to them some of the history of the once-sprawling horse farm, much of which is now developed into way-too-many shopping and office centers. It is frankly abhorrent in my opinion.

Given that I had no where to be for several hours, I thought it would be a good time to make a short drive south to some places I hadn't been in a while, checking to see what has changed and what has not. So from Lexington, I headed south on I-75 across the Kentucky River at Clay's Ferry into Madison County. Avoiding Richmond, I continued south exiting the highway at Berea and found my way into the Kentucky Artisan Center, just north of the collegiate community. This is a combination Rest Area, Restaurant, and Educational Exhibit, with students and other craftsmen and women demonstrating various things, all amidst a commercial venture where lots of Kentucky related stuff can be had for a mere buck or two - or twenty - or a hundred. I was intrigued by some hardwood tree Christmas trees which ran from about $20.00 up to about $70.00. I might go back and get one of these. They are said to be made in Elliott County which, unrelated, is one of eastern Kentucky's reliably Democratic counties, and one of only eight in the Commonwealth which carried for Barack Obama in 2008. Good for Elliott County.

From the Kentucky Artisan Center I ventured south along KY595 into Berea, home to one of Kentucky's college treasures, Berea College, whose history is worth writing about and maybe I will some other day. I got caught up in the traffic related to the Spoon Bread Festival parade, which managed to tie up all three of Berea's main streets. The festival is named for one of the signature dishes at Berea College's Boone Tavern Hotel. It is a corn meal type bread made with butter, milk, eggs, and meal with addition now and then of baking soda and/or sugar. However it is made, the festival in its honor is now in its 13th year. I headed west out of Berea along Chestnut Street, turning south onto US25 down the hill toward Mount Vernon.

Along this two-lane highway, which is a branch of Kentucky's famous Wilderness Road, one finds themself situated between two other forms of transportation. The CSX (formerly L&N) Railroad runs along the east side of the road while I-75 is about a good city block to the west. Leaving Madison County, one enters Rockcastle along the twenty or so mile drive between Berea and Mount Vernon. I followed US25 all the way into the Rockcastle County seat, passing through the Country Music mecca of Renfro Valley along the way.

At the end of US25, one can turn left and go a block and a half to the Courthouse, pictured here, or right onto US150, which is another branch of the Wilderness Road, and is, in fact, here in Mount Vernon, as elsewhere, called Wilderness Road.

Many years ago - it was 1990 - with my late friend Rob, one day we set out to drive the entire length of the eastern branch of US150, which begins over in Martin County, Indiana, follows eastwardly to Paoli and New Albany, then crosses the Ohio River into Louisville, from which it follows generally southeast through Bardstown, Springfield, Danville, Stanford, and Crab Orchard, ending in Mount Vernon. Although I wasn't going back to Louisville right away, I would be making part of that route today, but in reverse. But the route Rob and I travelled then has been greatly changed, and is presently being changed even more. Much of it has been straightened and widened, and even more is being corrected now, a part of President Obama's highway building stimulus fund package to get the economy moving again.

Thus I left Mount Vernon, then passing through the old town of Brodhead, making a left turn to stay on US150 which would in about three miles leave Rockacastle County and enter Lincoln County. The first town in Lincoln is Crab Orchard, which is one of Kentucky's oldest known places, predating the creation of the state by many years. The orchard full of crabapple trees was a meeting place for man and animal alike as it boasted several springs in the area, making it a place of hospitality in the old wilderness of what was home to Native Americans during the exploration of what would become Kentucky. Its post office was founded in 1815.

Staying on US150 requires another left turn, this one in Crab Orchard, which leads into the Lincoln County seat of Stanford. Just east of town, the highway becomes widens and becomes a by-pass. To go through Stanford, one must turn left on the "old road" which is now signed as KY78, but was still US150 when Rob and I made our journey. I believe my Young Democrats friend from back-in-the-day is still the PVA in Lincoln County. David Gambrell is a far more conservative Democrat than me, one more suitable to the voters of Lincoln County. I followed the old route of US150 through town past the courthouse, and then northward along Danville Street which leads, naturally, to Danville.

The road between Stanford and Danville, and in fact from here to my destination of Frankfort, is a wide four lane highway with medians and shoulders, a pleasant drive where one must watch one's speed between one courthouse town and the next. Danville and Stanford make up two-thirds of a trio of courthouse towns which are the closest together of any three courthouse towns anywhere in the Commonwealth. If one were to drive the triangle of US150 from Stanford to Danville, then KY52 over to Lancaster, then US27 back to Stanford, you would drive fewer miles than an entire trip between downtown Louisville and downtown Shelbyville. From this point back to Frankfort, I mostly followed the four lanes, which meant I followed around the towns of Danville in Boyle County, Harrodsburg in Mercer County, and would have driven around Lawrenceburg in Anderson County, except that I like to take the old road south of town, pausing at the Sand Spring Baptist Church Cemetery where my great-grandmother's little sister Vivian Antoinette Brawner Wheat is buried, along with other members of her family.

I followed the old US127 through town which eventually returns you to the four lane, which itself returns you to Frankfort, the place I was headed for a birthday celebration. That was all of my adventure tourism for the day. I will say the birthday party was a grand affair, with plenty of very good food and drink, copious amounts of roasted pork, homemade barbecue sauce, potato salad, and more than a few sasparillas. We were celebrating the 55th birthday of a friend, Phinis Hundley, who is the Larue County Democratic Party chair.

So I started the day in Frankfort with some delicious food at Democratic Headquarters and ended the day in Frankfort with some delicious food at the home of a friend on Watkins Court in downtown old Frankfort. That is until I returned to Louisville, the county seat of Jefferson County.

Here is a trivia question for you. How does the entry title relate to the contents of the entry?

*****

Tomorrow is the 29th birthday of a dear friend, and one well known to many Louisville and Kentucky politicians. Will Carle, who is an employee of the governor's office, is twenty years less three days younger than me. Happy Birthday Will.

In the tradition of the late Colonel R. K. Walker, who at the beginning of each new season would pen a Letter to the Editor of the Courier-Journal, I offer the following:

Today begins the season of Summer in the northern hemisphere for 2009. It began about 1:45 am. Today will technically be the longest day of the year as we crossed a cardinal point in the Earth's annual rotation around our own personal star, which we call the Sun.

Summer runs from now until late September. We'll have another celebration then as that date will coincide with my last birthday before, in one year, I cross my own cardinal point, out of the first half-century of my life.

Today, in the United States, we are also celebrating Father's Day. I will be visiting my father here shortly. I will also see my brother, who is the father of six. To all of you, Happy Father's Day.

While seeing my father and brother today, my family will also be celebrating the birthday of my oldest niece, Lindsey, who arrived as a Father's Day gift to my brother 22 years ago. She actually arrived on a Wednesday if I remember correctly.

Enjoy the long day.

I know earlier today I said the blog would be on break for a week and that was my plan, but then I wanted to write some more, and, as it is my blog, I am thus writing some more.

First, in an entry on Saturday I mentioned stopping by Bethlehem, Indiana, where my grandfather's stepmother once lived and where his youngest siblings, the children of his father and stepmother were raised. While standing in the Bethlehem Cemetery I called my grandfather's youngest sister, Aunt Mildred, to report to her my presence there in her hometown. She wasn't in when I called so I left a message. Later that night she called her niece, my mother, to report my call and let her know that the other of my grandfather's youngest siblings, his brother Lee Roy, would be visiting her today from Paducah, where he is living in retirement. How odd that within three days of my visiting their ancestral home, they were getting together to do so themselves. I spent this afternoon visiting with that side of my family and, as has always been the case when visiting there, had a big plate of food - lasagna, salad, and pie with whipped cream, along with very sweet tea to drink. While many of the people who have always been a part of such reunions have long since passed on, it is always good to see those remaining of my grandfather's family.

Second, on reading my emails just a few minutes ago, one was from my friend Olivia Fuchs, who is an attorney here in town. She forwarded to me some words of wisdom sent to her in one of those emails where the sender asks you to pass it along. I don't ever do that. But I did like the philosophy of the original writer of this email, said to be 90 years old in the article. She writes the 45 Lessons of Life. I find them true at least in my life so far at 48 years of age. They remind me of the much longer poem called My Philosophy, written by James Whitcomb Riley, the one-time Poet Laureate of the State of Indiana (in honor of my grandfather's Indiana siblings mentioned above).

Below is the email. I've tried to find Riley's poem on the internet, but can't. Maybe someone else can locate it. There is another of these philosophical soliloquys by Ralph Waldo Emerson, but I couldn't find it either.


*****

Written by Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, Ohio.
"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written."

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first pay cheque.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.

12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets and wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion, today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words 'In five years, will this matter?'

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift."

*****

My favorites are #2, #16, #23, #28, #34, #39, and especially #44.

Now, we'll go on break. Hopefully I will see some of you at the Metro Club tomorrow night.