Log House

Patrons at the opening of "Forever Free: Abraham Lincoln's Journey to Emancipation" Friday at the Boyle County Public Library will have an opportunity to explore "Kentucky's Abraham Lincoln," an exhibit on wheels. An experience provided by the Kentucky Historical Society, the HistoryMobile will be available from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in front of the library's temporary location in the old ATR building on the Danville bypass. A mobile museum housed in a 45-foot tractor-trailer, the HistoryMobile features exhibits on Kentucky history.

It's understandable that the administration of Gov. Ernie Fletcher should view with some skepticism a passel of state grants approved in the last days of the Patton administration. Like pardons granted by outgoing governors and presidents, government grants also may be handed out as paybacks to old political friends. Yet without some proof that rules were bent and projects that received grants were unworthy, the Fletcher administration should honor the grants given "preliminary approval" by the previous administration.

Dedication ceremonies this Sunday for a Main Street building have been in the making since the late 1700's. That's when many believe an old two-story log meeting house was erected at the site, the first part of a building that has had many uses over its rich history - including private home to the McRoberts and Helm families, a library, a museum and, many believe, one of the earliest places where Presbyterians met in the region. "It's a great old place built in three major stages.

One recent day when we were having a slow falling rain, I stood on the front porch and let my mind drift back to my childhood. Immediately I remembered the rain falling on the tin roof over the bedrooms at my Grandmother Reynold's home in Nicholas County. That was a very peaceful sound. Today when my friends and family get together our conversation eventually gets around to the importance of rain water in our early lives. In my family's early days of living on the farm, rain water was a necessity not only for our household needs but for the stock as well.

Union Meetinghouse was located in the bend of Wades Mill Road (Ky. 1961) about 1.5 miles from the intersection with US 60. This was the fourth Presbyterian church formed in Clark County; it followed Salem, Sugar Ridge and Winchester. It is shown on the 1861 Clark County map as "Presb. Ch. " and on the 1877 map as "Union Ch. "Union Church was organized in 1837 with five founding members: Cornelius and Jane Skinner, Daniel and Isabel Sphar, and George Anderson. George Crawford was the first minister.

Joseph McCormack (1762-1852) left his father’s home at an early age and never looked back. By the time Joseph died, his children’s families did not even claim kinship to their cousins over on Hanging Fork Creek. One wonders today what brought about this division in the McCormack family, but the most likely reason was the passage of time and distance between the family members. The father of Joseph McCormack was Daniel McCormack Sr. (1724-1810). Daniel is best remembered for having donated the land in 1785 for the erection of a meetinghouse which became known as McCormack’s Meetinghouse.

John Haggin arrived in the wilderness of Kentucky when Harrodsburg and Boonesborough had few white inhabitants and many Indians, who used the grounds for hunting.  Haggin wanted to begin cultivating the fertile land in this region and purchase several tracts of land from the government that included a tract where Harrison, Bourbon and Fayette counties came together. He began removing trees, erected a small log house and brought to his new home some furniture and iron kettles for making sugar.

When the crowds come to Canaan Land Saturday for the 13th annual Harrodsburg Historical Society's Homes Tour, Mark and Ann Fryer will take it all in stride. The Fryers, who bought the bed and breakfast a year and a half ago, are used to hosting many overnight guests and some people who just drop by to tour the farm and feed the many animals there. "We have school groups that come out and we have four guest rooms in the house and three in the cabin," Mark Fryer says. The 80-acre farm boasts one of the earliest brick homes in Kentucky.

This is the last of three articles describing the John Holder Trail at the Lower Howard's Creek Nature and Heritage Preserve. As before, we will focus on the people who lived or owned land along the trail and the events that occurred there. The land referred to as the Benjamin Hieronymus place is located on a rise above the Kentucky River cliffs just west of and above Hall's Restaurant. It is bound on the south and west by Athens-Boonesboro Road, on the north by the Bush Mill Road (the Preserve entrance road)

Special to The Sun From simple to ornate, a variety of housing styles were in the spotlight at Thursday night's monthly Second Thursday program at the Bluegrass Heritage Museum. Chuck Witt, a retired architect and a Winchester native, styled his remarks "Domestic Architecture, 1800 to the Present. " Housing styles covered Colonial Revival, Queen Ann, bungalow, shingle and international. Witt began with drawings illustrating floor plans of early homes, starting with a single pen log house not more than 16 square feet that could be erected by just a few people.