Chapter G of the Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky

The Enquirer/Patrick Reddy

Introduction Index

_ A _ B _ C _ D _ E _ F _ G _ H _ I _ J _ K _ L _ M _ N _ O _ P _ Q _ R _ S _ T _ U _ V _ W _ Y _ Z _

G

GREEN DERBY RESTAURANT. The Green Derby Restaurant has long been a fixture at thbe northwest corner of Night and York Sts...

(cont’d on pg. 421)

The Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky Contents Introduction, Foreword, Acknowledgments and Guide for Readers Chapters: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, Y, Z Index, Bibliography, Illustration Credits

Edited by Paul A. Tenkotte and James C. Claypool THE UNIVERSITY PRESS OF KENTUCKY Republished for the World Wide Web by NKY.com and Enquirer Media

A Project of the Thomas D. Clark Foundation, Inc. Mark A. Neikirk, President Sherry Jelsma, Vice President

Dave Adkisson, Treasurer Melanie J. Kilpatrick, Secretary

Thomas R. Brumley, Immediate Past President Michael J. Hammons, Past President

Dave Adkisson, Frankfort Jane Beshear, Frankfort Thomas R. Brumley, Lexington John S. Carroll, Lexington Sara W. Combs, Stanton

Board of Directors Michael J. Hammons, Park Hills Sherry Jelsma, Shelbyville Martha C. Johnson, Melbourne Mark A. Neikirk, Highland Heights Alice Stevens Sparks, Crescent Springs

Robert Ted Steinbock, Louisville Mrya Leigh Tobin, New York City James M. Wiseman, Erlanger

Editorial Staff Editors in Chief: Paul A. Tenkotte and James C. Claypool Associate Editors: David Hatter, John Schlipp, David E. Schroeder, Robert Stevie, Michael R. Sweeney, John W. Thieret (deceased), Thomas S. Ward, Jack Wessling Topical Editors: Agriculture: Lynn David & James Wallace; Art: Rebecca Bilbo; Biography: Michael R. Sweeney; Business & Commerce: John Boh; Counties & Towns: David E. Schroeder; Ethnology: Theodore H. H. Harris; Government, Law, & Politics: John Schlipp; Literature: Danny Miller (Deceased); Medicine: Dennis B. Worthen; Military: James A. Ramage; Music, Media, & Entertainment: John Schlipp; Religion: Thomas S. Ward & Alex Hyrcza; Sports & Recreation: James C. Claypool; Transportation Joseph F. Gastright (Deceased); Women: Karen Mcdaniel.

Maps: Jeff Levy at the Gyula Pauer Center for Cartography & GIS, University of Kentucky.

Copyright © 2009 by The University Press of Kentucky, 663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, KY 40508-4008 www.kentuckypress.com.

Print editions: Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The Encyclopedia of northern Kentucky / edited by Paul A. Tenkotte and James C. Claypool. p. cm.

ISBN 978-0-8131-2565-7 (hardcover : acid-free paper) ISBN 978-0-8131-2585-5 (limited leather edition) 1. Kentucky, Northern— Encyclopedias. 2. Kentucky— Encyclopedias. I. Tenkotte, Paul A. II. Claypool, James C. F451.E55 2009 976.9'3003—dc22 2009027969

Reis, Jim “A Killer Named Cholera Stalked Victims Rich, Poor,” KP, October 4, 1999, 4K.

GAINES, JOHN P., MAJOR (b. September 22, 1795, Augusta Co., Va.; d. December 9, 1857, Quartsburg, Ore.). John Pollard Gaines, a U.S. military officer and governor of the Oregon Territory, was the son of Abner and Elizabeth Matthews Gaines, who moved from Virginia to Boone Co. in 1800. He was educated in local schools. When the War of 1812 erupted, he enlisted as a private in a regiment of the Kentucky Volunteers. Afterward, he speculated in land locally. He married Elizabeth Kinkead of Versailles, Ky., in 1819.

Gaines entered Boone Co. politics in 1825 and was elected to the first of his several terms in the Kentucky legislature. During the Mexican War, he enlisted in a Kentucky cavalry brigade, where he held the rank of major. In January 1847 Gaines and 80 of his fellow soldiers were captured at Incarnacion, Mexico, and held prisoner in Mexico City until August of that year. While a prisoner, Gaines was elected to the 30th U.S. Congress as a Whig candidate from Kentucky’s 10th District, a position he held for two years. When he ran for reelection, he lost to the Democratic candidate, Joseph Lane.

Gaines was an ardent supporter of Zachary Taylor during the 1848 presidential election campaign, and subsequently the party rewarded his loyalty by appointing him governor of the Oregon Territory in 1849. He and his family traveled by ship around Cape Horn on a nine-month voyage to his new assignment. The trip was a disaster for the family, because two of his daughters, Harriet and Florella, died of yellow fever during a stop in Brazil. Shortly after the family arrived in the Oregon Territory, Gaines’s wife, Elizabeth, was killed in a fall from a horse, and one of his sons died soon afterward. To protect his remaining children, he sent them back to live with relatives in the East.

Gaines’s tenure as a Whig governor was marked by fierce partisanship on the part of the territorial legislature, controlled by the Democrats. One of the major controversies he faced in Oregon was whether the state capitol should be located in Oregon City or in Salem. When Gaines’s four-year term ended, he did not seek reelection. After leaving office, he remained in Oregon, where he remarried and settled on a farm at Quartsburg, near Salem. He lived there until his death from typhoid fever in 1857, at age 62. Gaines was buried in the Old Pioneer Cemetery at Salem, Ore. Biographical Encyclopedia of Kentucky. Cincinnati: J. M. Armstrong, 1878.

Pioneer Cemetery Records, Pioneer Cemetery, Salem, Ore. The Political Graveyard. “Gaines, John Pollard.” www .politicalgraveyard.com (accessed December 28, 2006).

GAINES, WALLACE ARKANSAS (b. April 15, 1865, Dayton, Ohio; d. August 1940, Evansville, Ind.). African American businessman and civic leader Wallace Gaines came to Covington with his parents about 1875. He began working for his uncle in Ottoway Burton’s barbershop, at 706 Washington St., shining shoes; he continued as a bootblack until he found other employment in the handling of furniture and feathers.

By 1880, Gaines was serving as president of the “colored” Garfield First Voters Club, which supported James Garfield of Ohio for president (1881).

He rose quickly within the Republican Party and received an appointment in 1881 as a storekeeper in the Federal Revenue collection department. During the administration of President Benjamin Harrison (1889–1893), he was appointed a U.S. gauger; the duties of a gauger included inspecting scales and other measuring devices used to determine the official weight of grains and other supplies. When the Republican Party was out of power, Gaines became a hauling contractor, handling grain and whiskey for distilleries. During this period he joined the United Brothers of Friendship, which by the late 1890s had become the largest African American civic association in the country. Gaines rose through that organization’s ranks and by 1897 was the Grand Supreme Master. It placed him at the head of an estimated 300,000 African American voters nationwide. With such backing and political connections, Gaines was mentioned as a candidate for the post of U.S. Registrar of the Treasury. He traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby for the job but did not receive it; instead he returned home to resume his job as a federal gauger, which he kept only briefly. In May 1898 he was appointed a federal court bailiff but resigned the same day, after it was determined that the job would interfere with his support of the renomination of his personal friend Walter Evans, a Republican congressman.

In 1904, while doing his job as a special revenue agent for the U.S. Treasury Department, Gaines discovered that the wholesale whiskey house of Crigler & Crigler, located on Pike St. in Covington, was moving untaxed whiskey barrels. His report to the tax collector and revenue agent led to action in the U.S. District Court.

Gaines was a founding member, president, and director of the Progressive Building and Loan Association, which was created for the African American community of Covington. The association, which operated from 1906 to 1910, was located at the corner of Seventh and Scott Sts. adjacent to the W. A. Gaines funeral home.

For a number of years Gaines owned the W. A. Gaines Funeral Home at 633 Scott St. He was the first African American funeral director in Covington. In 1908 he started a funeral home in Evansville, Ind. In 1912 he expanded his funeral home businesses to include Henderson, Ky., then in 1913 sold his Covington business to Charles E. Jones. In July 1913, Gaines married Tillie Young, a teacher at

Lincoln Grant School and a former treasurer of the Progressive Building and Loan Association, and the couple moved to Evansville, Ind. He died in Evansville and was buried in Highland Cemetery, Fort Mitchell. At the time of his death, he was a 33rd Degree Mason.

“Building Association Will Be Organized,” KP, May 31, 1906, 2.

“The Colored Garfield First Voters’ Club,” DC, October 25, 1880, 1.

“Colored Man, Who Is Said to be Booked for High Position,” KP, July 24, 1897, 8.

Reis, Jim. “Blacks at Turn of Century Persevered to Improve Lives,” KP, January 17, 2000, 4K. ———. “Wallace Gaines Achieved Success in a Difficult Era for African-Americans,” KP, February 2, 2004, 4K. ———. “When History Is Overlooked,” KP, February 8, 1999, 4K.

Theodore H. H. Harris

GAINES TAVERN. The Gaines Tavern in Walton in Boone Co. has been used as a stagecoach stop, a tavern, and an antique shop. On early-19thcentury maps of Kentucky (such as H. S. Tanner’s 1839 A New Map of Kentucky) it is referred to as Gaines Crossing, where the road from Covington divided into a route to Lexington (see Covington and Lexington Turnpike) and a road to Warsaw.

Abner Gaines, born October 8, 1766, in Orange Co., Va., was the first member of his family to arrive in Kentucky. He married Elizabeth Matthews on December 8, 1792, in Virginia. The exact date when the Gaines family arrived in the state is unknown, but the 1800 census shows Abner living in Woodford Co., Ky. He first appears in the Boone Co. records in 1804.

Estimates for the year the present building was constructed range from the 1790s to 1814. Gaines received clear title to the property in December 1813. As early as 1795 but at least by 1803, Archibald Reid was operating a tavern on the property.

Archaeological evidence suggests that an earlier building existed just south of the existing brick structure and may have stood until the 1890s.

Gaines appears to have taken over the tavern in 1808, when he was approved for a tavern license.

The license allowed him “to keep a tavern at his dwelling house in the county of Boone . . . and provide in his said tavern good wholesome cleanly lodging and diet for travellers and stablage provender or pasturage for horses.” According to the license, Gaines was not to “suffer or permit any unlawful gaming in his house nor suffer any person to tipple or drink more than is necessary or at any time suffer any disorderly or scandalous behavior to be practised in his house.” The tavern license was renewed by Gaines every year or two through December 1818. The list of rumored guests at the tavern includes Henry Clay, Vice President Richard Mentor Johnson, and Gen. Marquis de Lafayette.

Although Gaines was running a tavern in 1808, it appears that he did not own the property until 1809. He lived at his home in Walton until his death on October 30, 1839. Gaines willed the tavern to his unmarried daughter Mildred. After Mildred married Anthony Davies, the couple sold the

GALLATIN ACADEMY

land to Mildred’s brother Archibald in 1850. In 1869 Archibald sold it to Harvey Hicks.

The road to Lexington had existed for many years before Abner Gaines opened his stagecoach line on May 6, 1818. An advertisement in the May 16, 1818, Western Monitor in Lexington states that the cost of passage from Cincinnati to Lexington on Gaines’s stagecoach was 10 cents per mile, which included 14 pounds of baggage. For 100 pounds or more of baggage, one paid the same rate as for a person. Several of Gaines’s sons served as postmasters for the Walton area and used the stagecoach line as a postal connection to Lexington. During winters, the stagecoach line was often closed owing to bad road conditions.

There are several documented stories of suicides occurring at the tavern. The Cincinnati Daily Enquirer on April 18, 1867, reported that Maj. John A. Goodson had shot himself at Glen’s (Gaines’s) Tavern one mile north of Walton. Goodson had been a state representative and served as mayor of Covington from 1860 through 1864. The next day, the newspaper reported that Goodson’s funeral would be held at J. G. Carlisle’s house in Covington. John G. Carlisle was Goodson’s son-in-law.

Robert F. and Attila Cleek bought the tavern property in 1873. On September 3, 1883, another suicide occurred. Covington’s Daily Commonwealth reported that Hugh Ingram had hanged himself on the tavern’s property from the beam of a bridge that crossed the Cincinnati Southern Railroad. The suicide of Ingram was blamed on a mad dog that had bitten him several years before. The bridge was torn down several years ago, but its stone supports remain on each side of the tracks.

Yet another bizarre incident took place in May 1892 when Cleek’s sister-in-law Lizzie Rice was visiting. The Boone County Recorder related that while Rice was in the orchard, she poured coal oil on herself and then set fire to it.

John Gault operated the Haunted House Antique Shop in the former tavern for most of the 20th century. In 1989 Alan and Stephanie Gjerde purchased the house and began an extensive restoration of the property. In 2006 the city of Walton received a $300,000 federal grant to purchase the home, continue restoration, and convert it into a transportation museum.

Becher, Matt, to Paul A. Tenkotte, e-mail, July 11, 2008.

Boone County Recorder, May 11, 1892, 2.

Coleman, J. Winston, Jr. Stage- Coach Days in the Bluegrass. Louisville, Ky.: Standard, 1933.

“Died,” CDE, April 19, 1867, 2.

“Suicide of Ex-Mayor Goodson,” CDE, April 18, 1867, 1.

“Suicide of Hugh Ingram,” DC, September 3, 1883, 1.

Worrel, Stephen W., and Anne W. Fitzgerald. Boone County Kentucky Court Orders, 1799–1815.

Falls Church, Va.: S. W. Worrel, 1994.

Elizabeth Comer Williams

GAINESVILLE. See Idlewild.

GAITHER, THOMAS (b. 1943, Cincinnati, Ohio). Tom Gaither is best known for his keen

understanding of the character of Northern Kentucky, as expressed in his paintings and writings.

He is the son of Rudy C. and Bertie M. Gaither and the brother of wildlife artist Bill Gaither.

Tom Gaither grew up in Ludlow and currently resides with his wife Gee in Fort Mitchell. His fi rst job in art was as a traveling salesman, selling fi ne art prints to galleries. He later became a manager at Echo Publications in Amelia, Ohio. Having gained experience in the world of published art, in 1970 he began preparing pen-and-ink illustrations for the Kentucky Post. His friendship with artists Tom Bluemlein, Don Dennis, and Jack Meanwell influenced him to take up watercolor painting. Then in 1974 he opened a frame and print shop in Ludlow, selling only his own works at fi rst. Because he was familiar with the print business, he made prints of his most popular subjects, and he found that scenes of Northern Kentucky and the Cincinnati area were the most often ordered. In 1990 Gaither was asked to be a contributing writer for the Kenton Co. Recorder.

His weekly column included stories and recollections from Northern Kentuckians, in addition to his own musings about happenings in his hometown. Many of his sketches of buildings and locations around Northern Kentucky have been reproduced in the Kentucky Post, the Kenton Co. Recorder, and other publications. Many private collections in the region include his work; his commissioned works may be found at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, Miami University of Ohio, and Auburn University in Alabama.

The paintings and prints he contributed to the Tall Stacks celebrations in Cincinnati have a wide distribution.

“Frame Maker Also Can Fill Them,” KE, April 30, 2006, B5.

Gaither, Thomas. Interview by Rebecca Bilbo, fall 2006, Fort Mitchell, Ky. “Print Sale to Benefit Museum,” KP, September 18, 1985, 8K. “Renaissance ’78 Will Bring Arts to Plaza,” Colonel Covington’s Chronicles, April 1, 1978, 8.

Rebecca Bilbo

GALLATIN, ALBERT (b. January 29, 1761, Geneva, Switzerland; d. August 12, 1849, Astoria, N.Y). Albert Gallatin, the namesake of Gallatin Co., was the son of Jean and Sophia Gallatin, who were members of a noble family but not wealthy; both died before Albert was nine years old. He arrived in America in 1780, settling in Boston, Mass.

Gallatin Co. was named after him in 1799. Gallatin was U.S. secretary of the treasury from 1801 to 1814 under Presidents Thomas Jefferson (1801– 1809) and James Madison (1809–1817) and a lead negotiator on the Treaty of Ghent which ended the War of 1812. Gallatin was noted primarily for his steadfast defense of the Constitution’s allocation of powers and duties among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government. He also antagonized and questioned Federalist politicians regarding their monetary policies: Gallatin believed that the Federalists did not give the young nation’s debt sufficient consideration. Gallatin

379

died in 1849 at age 88 and was interred in a vault at the Trinity Churchyard in New York City.

Kuppenheimer, L. B. Albert Gallatin’s Vision of Democratic Stability: An Interpretive Profile.

Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1996.

United States Department of the Treasury. www.us treas.gov/education.

Bernie Spencer

GALLATIN ACADEMY (Carroll Co. Academy).

One of the earliest schools in Kentucky, the Gallatin Academy was chartered in 1813 by an act of the Kentucky legislature. A state law passed in 1798 allowed for seminaries to be established, funded in large part by donations or sale of public lands. In 1813, while serving a second term as the Kentucky governor, Isaac Shelby (1792–1796 and 1812–1816) signed the charter creating Gallatin Academy. The land donated to support the new academy in Gallatin Co. was a 6,000-acre tract located near Hopkinsville in Christian Co., part of the Cumberland River land tract.

The name seminary or academy did not refer to a theological seminary; nor were such institutions free schools, but rather private schools offering elementary and secondary education. A board of trustees, often tied to a religious group, oversaw a seminary or an academy and hired teachers, charging students tuition to cover expenses.

The first trustees of Gallatin Academy were John Barner, Garland Bullock, Robert Plummer, Carter Tarrant, and William Winslow. Meeting for the first time on May 13, 1813, the trustees selected Port William, today Carrollton in Carroll Co., as the permanent site for the Gallatin Academy. Although it was originally in Gallatin Co., Gallatin Academy became a part of Carroll Co. with the formation of that county in 1838. The school was on land that Benjamin Craig had donated, designated in the original plat of Port William as the “old public ground.” The trustees were advocates of quality education. Carter Tarrant was well educated, a leading, though controversial, Baptist and a major antislavery spokesman. Robert Plummer was Port William’s first postmaster, and William Winslow, from Spottsylvania, Va., was the father of Dr. Henry Winslow, a graduate of the School of Medicine in Philadelphia.

These early academies functioned as the private schools in Virginia and Maryland did, teaching composition and writing, English literature, Latin and Greek classics, mathematics, physical geography, and rhetoric. The leading families in Carroll, Gallatin, and northern Trimble counties supported the local academy for some years.

It appears that the Gallatin Academy evolved into the Carroll Co. Academy. In 1859 the trustees of the Gallatin Academy included many of Carrollton’s town fathers: George W. Boorom, William Cox, Henry Crittenden, William H. Harrison, Richard W. Masterson, and John W. Root. On September 10, 1859, the trustees of Gallatin Academy transferred four to five acres, designated as the Old Public Ground on the Port William plat, to the shareholders of what became the Carroll Co. Academy. This property was the site of the Carroll

380 GALLATIN CO. Co. Academy, then the Carrollton High School, and currently the Carrollton Middle School.

In 1860 incorporation papers by 45 stockholders of the Carroll Co. Academy were fi led at Carrollton; the curriculum and selection of teachers were modeled on the best classical education of the times. The Carroll Co. Academy was operating at the time of the 1892 annual report to the Kentucky superintendent of instruction, but it had closed by the time the 1899 report was submitted.

Bevarly, R. W. “History of Education in Carroll County,” Master’s thesis, Univ. of Kentucky, 1936.

Campbell, Justine Tandy. “History of the Carroll County Schools,” 1976, Carroll Co. Public Library, Carrollton, Ky. Carroll Co. Deed Book, book 7, pp. 251, 258, Carrollton, Ky. Carrollton Democrat, June 12, 1868.

Hamlett, Barksdale. History of Education in Kentucky. Frankfort: Kentucky Department of Education, 1914.

Parker, Anna V. “A Short History of Carroll County,” 1958, Carroll Co. Public Library, Carrollton, Ky. Peters, H. W. A Study of Local School Units in Kentucky. Frankfort, Ky.: Superintendent of Public Instruction, 1937.

Tarrants, Charles. “Carter Tarrant (1765–1816): Baptist and Emancipationist,” RKHS 88, no. 2 (Spring 1990): 121–48.

Diane Perrine Coon

GALLATIN CO. Located on the western side of the Northern Kentucky region along the Ohio River, Gallatin Co., established in 1798, was the 31st of the Kentucky counties in order of formation. The county was named for Albert Gallatin, an early U.S. secretary of the treasury. Several of the county’s earliest settlers were enlisted soldiers during the Revolutionary War and arrived with land grants issued for their military ser vices. Gallatin Co. covers an area of roughly 99 square miles, mostly wide and fertile floodplains, and the county’s economy is mainly agricultural. Gallatin Co. is bounded by the counties of Boone, Carroll, Grant, and Owen. Warsaw, the county seat, was once an important center of river trade; abundant deposits of natural materials such as sand and gravel are surface-mined there, and tobacco and corn were once cash crops. Small industry such as furniture manufacturing (see Warsaw Furniture Factory) was also once part of the local economy.

A portion of Gallatin Co. was taken to form Carroll Co. in 1838, the year Warsaw became the county seat. The Civil War was a difficult time for the county. It was highly Confederate in sympathies, and many Southern recruits came out of Gallatin Co. Several minor skirmishes took place within the county. One of the worst steamboat disasters in U.S. history occurred on the Ohio River near Warsaw on December 4, 1868, when the America and the United States collided, killing 74 people. In the early 20th century, river trade gave way to travel via highways and interstates, such as U.S. 42, U.S. 127, and I-71. The Ohio River navigation lock and dam at Markland, Ind. (see Markland Dam), was completed in 1964; a hydroelectric power plant (see Power Plants) was

Gallatin Co. Courthouse, Warsaw, built in 1837; the addition dates from 1868.

added there in 1967; and a vehicular bridge across the top of the dam came in 1978. In the late 1990s, the Kentucky Speedway began operations near Sparta, changing the face of the county, as have the gambling casinos opened close by in Indiana.

In the 1820s abolitionist Alexander Sebastian proclaimed his antislave stance throughout the county; Gallatin Co. was the home of Dr. Lucy Ann Dupuy Montz, Kentucky’s first woman dentist, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; country music star Skeeter Davis was born in Gallatin Co. at Glencoe in 1931; Alvin Kidwell, a local nurseryman, served in the Kentucky State Senate from 1941 to 1967; and Dr. Carl Bogardus, a medical doctor and a respected local historian who was a native of the county, helped to chronicle much of the area’s history until his death in 1992.

Education in the county greatly improved with the opening of the new Gallatin Co. High School in 1993 and again in recent years with the additions made to the Gallatin Co. Free Public Library at Warsaw.

Incorporated towns within the county are Glencoe, Sparta, and Warsaw. In 1990 the county’s population was 5,393, and in 2000 it was 7,870; Warsaw had 1,811 residents at the time. Positioned between the major markets of Louisville and Northern Kentucky, Gallatin Co. today faces pressure from both of those highly populated areas as they expand and develop, spreading into the county.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia.

Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1992.

U.S. Census Bureau. “American Fact Finder. Data Set. Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF1) 100-Percent

Data. Custom Table.” www.census.gov (accessed March 8, 2007).

GALLATIN CO. FREE PUBLIC LIBRARY. During the late 1970s, the dream of a library in Gallatin Co. became a reality through the work of the original Library Board chairman, Charles G. Warnick, and library committee members Mary Evelyn Beverly, William Coates, Doris Combs, Barbara Liggett, and Richard Rider. Appointed by Judge Executive Clarence Davis and the Gallatin Co. Fiscal Court, this committee acquired financial help from the state: a $60,000 library demonstration grant from the Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives (KDLA), which was used, along with help from the Gallatin Co. Fiscal Court, to support the library for more than two years. The small population of the county (5,367) would have to approve a property tax in order to continue library ser vices once the grant moneys were expended. But the future struggle of getting this tax passed did not dim the enthusiasm of library supporters; dreams and plans were formulated, and a site for the library was selected.

Keith Collins, a graduate of Northern Kentucky University (NKU) and a resident of Glencoe, well known for his civic activities, was employed in June 1978 as the first library director. Brenda Hawkins of Warsaw became the first library assistant. Establishment of the library for Gallatin Co. was under the direction of Philip Carrico, director of the Northern Kentucky Library Development District. Carrico’s expert advice and leadership helped Gallatin Co. open its first library in a remodeled laundromat on W. Pearl St. in Warsaw, in September 1978.

Shelves were built by the agriculture class at the local high school and were fi lled with books, some

382 GALLATIN CO. HIGH SCHOOL donated by other libraries in Kentucky. Curtains made from bedsheets graced the two large windows; volunteers worked diligently to make this first library charming and inviting to the public.

Books were hand-stamped for checkout, and office space was one long table equipped with a used manual typewriter. In December 1978 Janet Jackson, a graduate of Ball State University at Muncie, Ind., succeeded Collins as library director. Jackson and her family had moved to Glencoe after her husband, Steve, accepted a teaching position at the Gallatin Co. High School.

The future of the first library was uncertain and depended totally on whether the voters of Gallatin Co. passed the proposed property tax to support the library. In November 1980 the property tax passed by 65 votes, making the library a permanent fi xture in the county.

The need for a library building larger than the remodeled laundromat was soon evident, and plans for building a new library were finalized in 1982. The cost of the new construction was supported in part by a matching grant of $250,250 from the KDLA; the remaining costs were covered by a bank loan. The new library, at the corner of 209 W. Market St., directly in front of the existing library, was of Federal design, with white pillars at the entrance, a clock tower, a colonial garden, a brass weathervane, and brick sidewalks. This new structure provided 5,000 square feet of space, four times that of the former quarters. Architect Robert Ehmet Hayes was hired for the project; his blueprints included provisions for an expansion, in case it was ever needed. The new library facility opened its doors in 1984 and has become a model for other libraries built in the smaller counties of Kentucky. The original library building now houses Senior Citizens of Northern Kentucky Inc., but it is still known as the “old library.” Brenda Hawkins, employed by the Gallatin Co. Free Public Library since its inception in 1978, became the library’s director in September 1986. In July 1991 the library’s Kentucky Room was formally dedicated to the memory of the late Charles G. Warnick. More than 200 guests attended the dedication, demonstrating that the community had suffered a profound loss with Charles Warnick’s death.

In June 2000 a new library addition of 1,800 square feet was dedicated to the youth of Gallatin Co., to provide modern technology for them, to meet the diverse educational needs of today, and to enhance youthful imagination. The addition was financed by generous donations from businesses and private citizens and by a new grant from KDLA. A plaque recognizing these donors and listing board members hangs in the Children’s Room.

The library has served as an example for libraries in other small counties in Kentucky in regard to technology as well as structure, receiving one of the first Empower Kentucky grants for Internet ser vice. The Gallatin Co. Free Public Library has been featured in articles in two issues of Kentucky Living magazine.

Although the library is automated with the latest technology and offers a collection of more than

28,000 books, it retains its country charm. An always popu lar display of Denny French’s model trains has been a Christmas staple at the library for 26 years. And hot coffee is provided free to patrons daily, along with warm conversations and friendly directions from members of the library’s staff. Library director Brenda Hawkins retired April 1, 2005, after 27 years of ser vice, and Shirley French, a graduate of NKU, became the fourth library director. The Gallatin Co. Free Public Library is a permanent reminder of the generosity and forwardthinking nature of Gallatin Co.’s citizens.

“Gallatin Library Approved,” KP, August 19, 1977, 11K. “Gallatin Library Gets $60,000,” KP, June 20, 1978, 5K.

Brenda Hawkins

GALLATIN CO. HIGH SCHOOL. The Gallatin Co. High School, located on U.S. 42 in Warsaw, the county seat, is the only secondary education institution in Gallatin Co. It opened in 1936 as the consolidated public county high school, accepting students from the former Warsaw High School, Sparta High School, and Glencoe High School. The original building was that of the Warsaw High School, which had been built in 1913. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) constructed a new building in 1937, adjacent to the older 1913 structure, which then became an elementary school. In the school year 1959–1960, a new addition opened, and the elementary and high schools shared some rooms and a cafeteria. Damaged in a 1959 explosion of the Warsaw Pepsi-Cola plant, the 1913 building was demolished several years later when a new addition was constructed in the growing educational complex; further expansions occurred during the 1970s. In 1995 a new high school campus was opened, and the old building was turned into a middle school. When a new upper elementary-middle school was completed in 2008, the old WPA building with its 1959–1960 and subsequent additions was demolished.

The school is under the daily supervision of a resident principal and the school’s site-based council. The school system’s overall operation is directed by a four-member county board of education, whose members are elected from their respective districts for four-year terms, and a county school superintendent hired by the county’s school board.

The Gallatin Co. High School is a member of the Kentucky High School Athletic Association, and its sports teams, called the Wildcats, compete under the colors of blue and white. The athletic program offers a variety of interscholastic sports for men and women, including basketball, baseball, football, golf, tennis, cross-country track, volleyball, and softball. In accordance with its relatively small student population, the school is a Class A school for athletic purposes. In addition to its core curriculum, Gallatin Co. High School offers courses in art, music, band, shop, and foreign languages, and students can participate in a variety of extracurricular activities, including the school’s interscholastic academic team. Full racial integration of the school system was achieved in 1964

without notable incident. In 2008 the high school had 409 students enrolled.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

Steve Huddleston

GALLATIN CO. NEWS. The first issue of the Gallatin Co. (Ky.) News made its appearance on September 1, 1926; it was edited by Edgar Lamkin and printed at the Boone Co. Recorder’s plant in Burlington. The publisher of Gallatin Co.’s new newspaper was R. E. Berkshire. Unfortunately, bound volumes of early editions of the newspaper did not survive; however, from January 1, 1935, on, bound copies of each year’s newspapers are fi led at the office of the Gallatin Co. News in Warsaw.

In 1934 Warren P. and Bess Boulton purchased the Gallatin Co. News. Printing equipment was acquired, and the newspaper began to be printed at Warsaw. In 1937 Mark Meadows purchased the newspaper from the Boultons and continued printing it in Warsaw. In 1941 he also purchased the Walton (Ky.) Advertiser. The Gallatin Co. News was next sold to Charles E. Adams, a native of Morehead who came to Warsaw with his wife Frances and his stepson Phil Bradley, who was from Shelbyville, Ky. While working at Morehead, Adams had been employed by that town’s newspaper, the Sentinel-News. He was an experienced printer, able to operate the complicated Linotype machine of the day, and proved to be an excellent writer-editor. He issued the first number of his paper on August 7, 1941.

Weathering the dark days of World War II, with its paper shortages and slow advertising growth, Adams continued printing the Gallatin Co. News without interruption. He built a fine new brick building on the courthouse square in Warsaw to house the newspaper’s business office and printing facility. An indication that he was active in journalism outside his own venture was that he was elected president of the Kentucky Press Association in 1956. Adams’s stepson Phil Bradley joined the Gallatin Co. News, serving as editor.

But after Bradley’s untimely death in 1974, Adams sold the newspaper. Charles and Denny Warnick purchased it on February 1, 1975.

Reflecting the many changes that have occurred with the modernization of newspaper production, the paper is now printed at the Landmark Press in Shelbyville, Ky. The days of hot metal, the flat-bed press, and the Linotype are gone from the newspaper business. Computers are used to write stories and to compose pages, which can be sent electronically to the printing plant. Subscribers’ mailing labels for the Gallatin Co. News are also computer-generated.

However, the editorial offices of the newspaper, located in a restored 1860 house one block from the Gallatin Co. Courthouse, remain the same. At the death of Charles Warnick in 1984, Denny Warnick became the paper’s publisher. The couple’s older son, Kelley Warnick, is editor. He is also the newspaper’s award-winning photographer and a

GALLATIN CO. PUBLIC SCHOOLS

longtime Kentucky Press Association board member. Younger son Clay Warnick is the newspaper’s associate editor and advertising director. Terry Combs-Caldwell is production head and is assisted

by Bobbie Hendrix.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

Cutshaw, Paul, former hot-type printer of the Gallatin Co. News. Interview by Denny Kelley-Warnick, March 30, 2006, Warsaw, Ky. Gallatin Co. News, various back issues.

Gray, Gypsy M. History of Gallatin County, Kentucky. Covington, Ky.: Self-published, 1968.

Denny Kelley-Warnick

GALLATIN CO. PLANT NURSERIES. Along each of the three highways leading to Warsaw, the county seat of Gallatin Co., there is a plant nursery.

These businesses represent an industry that thrived throughout the 20th century, causing Gallatin Co. to be nicknamed “the nursery county.”

The father of these wholesale plant nurseries was John F. Donaldson, a native of England, who began his first nursery on rented land in Warsaw.

Later he bought 70 acres in Sparta, along the Louisville and Nashville Railroad tracks, over which his plants were shipped to the Midwest and the South. He was well known throughout those regions and hailed as a pioneer whose techniques and supply of offshoot plants gave birth to many others. People who worked for and learned from him began by leasing, then buying land around Warsaw.

William Hill began planting offshoots he had obtained from Donaldson on the eastern and southern edges of Warsaw. He built a greenhouse to grow plants for sale and then established Hill’s Nursery, encompassing more than 125 acres along U.S. 42 to the east of Donaldson’s Nursery. There he grew bare root stock, from shrubs to trees, until he died in 1963. His son-in-law Harry Roberts continued the operation until 1990.

Chester “Shug” O’Connor went from water boy to foreman at Donaldson’s Nursery, learned landscaping while stationed at Norfolk, Va., during World War II, and returned to Warsaw to operate a greenhouse. Because his knowledge of grafting and propagating were in high demand, he leased, then later bought, tracts of land in several locations in the county, expanding to more than 167 acres in nursery stock. He owned and operated his business as Arrowwood Nurseries for 35 years, and his son, Terry continued the business for 15 years as O’Connor Nursery.

Raising nursery stock was a year-round occupation. The busy seasons were spring and fall, when the plants were dug from the ground, either barerooted or swathed in burlap for transplanting. The plants were hand dug by a mostly local workforce that was expanded during the busy seasons. In winter, since few used a mechanical spade, they could dig only as long as the crust of frosted earth was no deeper than four inches. When winter conditions prevented outdoor work, plants were grafted in clay pots by a smaller, skilled group of

workers, so that they would be ready for sale in the spring. It was during this dormant season that owners could research new methods and new plant varieties and prepare pocket-sized price lists. Summers were spent mowing and weeding to control rampant growth.

More nurseries opened west of Warsaw as Harry Hopperton, who had for years bought trees from O’Connor for his garden center in Illinois, purchased a farm on the west edge of town in 1957, converting former corn and tobacco fields to plant stock. When Hopperton retired, he leased his operation to Rick Flynn, who continued the business until 2005.

In 1961, Eddie Mylor transformed 150 acres of his family farm to a balled and burlapped stock of tree liners, which were small plants field grown in rows. Mules, as well as tractors, were used to plow and drag the largest plants from their holes. Former farmhands loaded plants onto flatbed trucks for transport as far away as New York and Wisconsin. Seasonally hired teenagers would accompany the loads to provide labor.

The building of the local interstate highways helped the industry in two ways: the highways provided a faster route to other nurseries and garden centers, which were existing markets; and the roads enhanced the nursery market, since nursery products were needed to landscape and beautify the federal highways.

The American Nurserymen’s Association, in which some owners were active, helped promote these mostly family-run businesses. In 1966 R. Waldron Haymond bought Donaldson’s original Sparta land, named Willadean Nursery, which had been operated for more than 40 years by Kentucky state senator Alvin Kidwell. Haymond renamed it Willadean-Donaldson Nursery, and he, a licensed landscape architect, designed the grounds of many private homes and public projects, such as the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.

Plants from Gallatin Co. nurseries were used to landscape a variety of sites, from Bernheim Forest south of Louisville to Kings Island in Mason, Ohio.

The industry was affected by events such as the blizzard of 1978, which necessitated a long recovery period, and by market trends that included the sale of imported nursery stock by big-box retailers.

In 1991 another family farm was transformed into a plant nursery when Zack Bledsoe started Cloverfarm Nursery with container-grown stock in over-winter-protection poly houses, actually large cold frames. These 14-by-96-foot structures shelter the plants from winter dry-out, before their tops are removed in the spring. The plants, both deciduous and evergreen, ground covers to shade trees, are propagated in a nonsoil medium and are spaced throughout the poly house in order to grow into a pleasing shape. Cloverfarm Nursery supplies Gallatin Co.’s first garden center, Country Blooms, operated by Bledsoe’s wife, Janet. In 1992, Jeff Wallace started Rolling Ridge Nursery on his family farm in western Gallatin Co., growing container trees. His operation today includes balled and burlapped trees on five acres of land. Such operations

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supply a new demand for diverse landscaping plants that container nurseries make possible.

“Former Senator Alvin Kidwell Dies at Age 80,” Gallatin County News, April 18, 1974, 1.

“Local Nurseryman, J.F. Donaldson Passes Sunday,” Gallatin County News, March 30, 1950, 1

Jacquelene P. Mylor

GALLATIN CO. PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Education has had high priority for Gallatin Co. residents from the very beginning of the county in 1798.

Many log schools existed in the county in early days, such as the Gridley School at Ethridge, the Gullion School between Sparta and Glencoe, and the Orr School in the Drury community. These schoolhouses were one-room structures with splitlog seats and served students of all ages. There were a number of private schools and academies before the establishment of the public school system.

Gallatin Co. established a public school in Warsaw in 1885; it built a new building in 1888 and closed in 1913. The city of Warsaw established its own school system in 1904; in 1913 it created Warsaw High School.

During the early 1900s, there were still several one-room schools in Gallatin Co. Some of these were the Carlisle School located on Montgomery Rd., the Clay Lick School just outside Glencoe, and others named Concord, Cow Branch, Drury Chapel, Eagle Tunnel, Ethridge, Gex, Hamilton, Hixon’s, Hogan, Hoggins, Hughes, Jackson, Lick Creek, Lowe, Montgomery, Napoleon, Oakland, Paint Lick, Sleet, South Fork, Steeles Creek, Stone Lick, Sugar Creek, Ten Mile, Union, and Walnut Valley. In addition, African American schools existed at Warsaw and Park Ridge.

Sparta established its school district during the early 1870s on land donated by A. D. Mason that was partly in Gallatin Co. and partly in Owen Co. This facility was in use as late as 1936–1937 and was known as the Old Red Brick School.

A school established by Glencoe in 1871 held classes in the Christian Church until 1872, when the townspeople, with the help of the Masonic Lodge in town (see Masons), built a two-story frame building for the school. In 1910 this school became a grade school, and a new building was built for it in 1914. During the 1936–1937 school year, when the schools in the county were consolidated, this school became the Glencoe Elementary School. The building burned in 1956 and a new building was built in 1957. This school operated until the 1970s; when it closed, all of its classes moved to Warsaw.

The 1935–1936 consolidation of Gallatin Co. schools resulted in the closing of the one-room schools in the county as well as Sparta’s school. The two initial county schools were Gallatin Co. High School (formerly Warsaw High School) and the Glencoe Elementary School. Today, the Gallatin Co. School District operates four schools: a lower elementary, an upper elementary, a middle school, and Gallatin Co. High School, all located in Warsaw.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

384 GALLOWAY, DONALD P. “DON” Gallatin Co. School District. www.gallatin.k12.ky.us/ (accessed June 9, 2008).

Ohio Death Certificate No. 50253, for the year 1940.

“Program in Tribute to Memory of Maurice L. Galvin,” WCKY radio, script from broadcast, Tuesday, August 27, 1940.

Reis, Jim. “Past VIP’s: Diverse Group of Politicians, Military Men, and Scientists Made a Difference,” KP, October 20, 1986, 4K.

Darrell Maines

GALLOWAY, DONALD P. “DON” (b. July 27, 1937, Mason Co., Ky.; d. January 8, 2009, Reno, Nev.). Don Galloway, an actor, a producer, and a director, is the son of Paul Smith and Callie “Malee” Poe Galloway. He grew up just outside Brooksville, graduating from Bracken Co. High School in 1955. Galloway graduated from the University of Kentucky in Lexington in 1959 and then went to New York City to study acting. From 1963 to 1964, he played Mitchell Harris, a character in the ABC television network’s drama Arrest and Trial, the series that inspired the popu lar NBC program Law & Order. Galloway is retired from a television and movie career that totaled about 60 credits as an actor, a director, or a producer. He is best known for his supporting role as Detective Sgt. Ed Brown alongside lead actor Raymond Burr in the popu lar NBC television program Ironsides, 1967–1975.

Galloway resided in Valencia, Calif., with his wife, a former actress, until his death in 2009. They had two daughters. Galloway was cremated.

Bracken Co. Extension Homemakers. History of Bracken County. Bicentennial ed. Brooksville, Ky.: Bracken Co. Extension Homemakers, 2002.

“Malee Poe Galloway,” KP, December 27, 1991, 6A. McNeil, Alex. Total Television. New York: Penguin Books, 1996.

Reis, Jim. “Joy, Sorrow Marked Holidays Past,” KP, December 21, 1991, 4K.

James C. Claypool

GALVIN, MAURICE L. (b. July 10, 1872, Covington, Ky.; d. August 25, 1940, Cincinnati, Ohio).

Attorney Maurice Lee Galvin Jr. worked compulsively, took few vacations, and became one of the most powerful Kentucky Republican “political bosses” and powerbrokers of the 20th century.

“His word was his bond and his iron was in his hand,” said two-term Kentucky governor Albert B. “Happy” Chandler (1935–1939, 1955–1959) in a letter to Galvin’s family. “Even vacations he took when we were young were shortened so he could get back to work,” commented his daughter Grace Galvin Nelson, of Covington.

Maurice Galvin Jr. was one of 10 children born to Covington blacksmith Maurice Galvin Sr. and Ellen Cronin Galvin. The Galvin family lived near Fourth and Garrard Sts., and Maurice attended Covington public schools. He graduated from the Covington High School and from Xavier University in Cincinnati. After earning a law degree from the Cincinnati Law School in 1893, he went into practice with his brother John, who later became mayor of Cincinnati. Galvin was the brother-inlaw of Earl Wilson, the Kenton Co. native who died in 1910 as a result of injury while playing football for the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, and also of radio station owner L. B. Wilson, one of Greater Cincinnati’s broadcasting pioneers.

Galvin was involved in the management of Latonia Racecourse, which operated on the grounds where the Latonia Shopping Center cur-

Roger Auge II

GAMBLING. Gambling and associated vice in-

Maurice Galvin, July 1921.

rently stands. In 1939, when the racing industry fell on hard times, Galvin guided the sale of the racing property in Latonia to Standard Oil. He became secretary-treasurer of the Kentucky Jockey Club, an organization headed by Col. Matt Wynn, the man who built Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby in Louisville into internationally famous institutions.

Galvin served Kentucky governors from about 1900 through the end of Happy Chandler’s first term in 1939. Friends said Galvin worked for the man he thought could do more for Kentucky, whether Democrat or Republican. In 1907 the U.S. Senate approved his appointment as internal revenue collector for the congressional district then centered in Covington, and he took office in February 1908. Several years later, Happy Chandler, in a letter to Galvin, complimented this Northern Kentuckian as “one of my longest and strongest supporters.”

A director and cofounder of radio station WCKY, Galvin also was attorney for the Stewart Iron Works; the Union Light, Heat, and Power Company; the Greene Line Steamers; and the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad. He was director and attorney for the Deering Publishing Company and attorney for the Kentucky Post when it was an independent newspaper. His law partner for many years was Frank M. Tracy.

Galvin died in 1940 of a cerebral hemorrhage; he was age 68. A tribute on WCKY radio quoted Kentucky Post editor Carl Saunders: “Mr. Galvin was honest and sincere, modest, and unostentatious. He never forgot his friends.” Maurice Galvin was buried at St. Mary Cemetery in Fort Mitchell.

“Death Ends Colorful Career of Leader M.L. Galvin at 68,” KP, August 26, 1940, 1.

dustries played an important part in Northern Kentucky’s economy from the first decade of the 1800s until the early 1960s. It was during this period that Northern Kentucky gained a national reputation as being a center for vice, especially gambling. In addition, the gambling and entertainment innovations instituted at the Beverly Hills Supper Club, one of the region’s gamblingentertainment centers, represented an important turning point in the history of casino gambling.

For years in Cincinnati it was commonly said that “things were a bit looser on the other side of the river.” Simply put, in the smaller municipalities on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River, it was easier for vice interests to buy off local city officials, thus avoiding the constant threat that laws against vice and gambling in these cities would be enforced. The reputation of Newport for being weak in enforcement of vice and gambling laws began with the arrival of the Newport Barracks in 1809 when troopers stationed there began visiting adjacent houses of ill repute.

Until the 1960s, people profiting from the illegal vice activities in Northern Kentucky had been able to weather the reforming impulses of the region’s rising middle class. Since vice interests represented a large portion of the economy in Northern Kentucky, many local citizens were hesitant to help clean up the affected cities. The region’s proximity to Cincinnati and its distance from state government and state law enforcement officials in Frankfort also helped to promote and perpetuate a sense of regional autonomy that allowed illegal activities to continue to grow and prosper. The situation was magnified during Prohibition, when bootlegging allowed criminals who previously might have been small-time outlaws to reap enormous profits through the production, transportation, and distribution of illegal alcohol. Many of America’s greatest fortunes, criminal and otherwise, were made during Prohibition. It was the hotbed from which most of the country’s major organized crime figures emerged. After the federal government made the manufacture and distribution of alcoholic products legal again in 1933, these nouveau riche bootleggers had to look for other investments. Cincinnatian Peter Schmidt, who fell into this category, was about to make his mark.

Soon Schmidt began to act on a vision that, though not necessarily unique, turned out to be one of the models for the modern-day casino. He had in mind a gambling hall that offered a variety of ser vices, including fine dining and a full bar, in addition to gambling. The idea was to offer to the masses the same gambling amenities usually afforded only to the rich in private clubs. To achieve

GAMBLING

his dream, Schmidt built the Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate. Its success prompted envy from the region’s largest criminal organization, the Cleveland Syndicate (a.k.a. the Mayfield Road Gang). In the late 1930s, the crime syndicate attempted to buy Schmidt out on numerous occasions. Stubborn, Schmidt refused, and the Cleveland Syndicate, through local agents, blew up the Beverly Hills Supper Club in 1937. Schmidt rebuilt the club but eventually, in 1940, agreed to give up his piece of the local gambling turf, and the syndicate from Cleveland arrived.

Although it is easy to view the Cleveland Syndicate as a ruthless criminal organization, much like the Corleone family in The Godfather, it is best understood as well-financed businessmen, whose business was largely illegal gambling. This is not to discount their capacity to resort to violence.

Their local enforcer was Red Masterson, who oversaw the Cleveland Syndicate’s local operations.

Like most enforcers, he usually dealt with problems through persuasion and cash payments but sometimes used violent means.

With the coming of organized crime in the early 1940s, Northern Kentucky’s gambling industry took on the structure that it retained until most of the casinos in the region were shut down in the early 1960s. It was essentially a two-tiered affair, in which larger, better-financed and sometimes glitzy “carpet joints” competed with more rough-and-tumble “bust-out joints.” Most of the carpet joints were run by the mobsters and local henchmen associated with the Mayfield Road Gang, but Peter Schmidt’s Playtorium and Glenn Rendezvous were also included. They made their money the same way today’s casinos in Las Vegas and in Atlantic City, N.J., do—the odds were with the house, which meant that as long as people lost more than they won, profits were made. The take could be enormous, but achieving it required patience and startup capital. To draw in players, the carpet joints were well appointed (hence the name) and usually had nice restaurants and showrooms attached. The Playtorium had a bowling alley, and the Beverly Hills Supper Club booked national entertainment acts.

The bust-out joints operated on a different business model. Smaller, with less capital, most of them were located in downtown Newport. They were often just bars with some gambling in the back. These joints generally played on the naïveté of tourists and other out-of-towners, rigging the games so customers always lost or drugging customers to steal their winnings. Thus, individuals who entered and gambled could not get “out” until they were “busted.” Since the cops were on the payroll, these suckers had no recompense, and they would often be blackmailed into keeping quiet by means of pictures that had been taken showing them in a compromising position with a showgirl or prostitute.

The most famous episode in Newport’s history was a classic example of bust-out-joint trickery.

The reform candidate for Campbell Co. sheriff, George W. Ratterman, was hoping to play upon his celebrity as a former professional football player

to gain election. Thus, when Peter Tito Carinci, another former football player and the manager of the Glenn Hotel–Tropicana Club, told Ratterman he wanted to get out of the gambling business and could provide important information about corruption in Newport, Ratterman agreed to meet with him. What Ratterman did not know was that he was being set up by Carinci, who was acting on orders from his mobster associates to frame Ratterman. Carinci drugged Ratterman and another man, who had come along with Ratterman to observe, before dinner in Cincinnati and then took them both back to the Glenn Hotel in Newport.

Carinci’s attempt to have Ratterman photographed with semiclad showgirl-prostitute April Flowers (Juanita Hodges) backfired (the photographer never arrived), but Ratterman was still arrested for soliciting prostitution by corrupt Newport police officers who had been paid off and were part of the frame.

The charges against Ratterman quickly proved to be a farce, and the episode destroyed whatever credibility the gambling interests retained in Northern Kentucky. But the incident reveals a lot about the styles of the carpet joints versus the bustout joints. Once the heat was on in Northern Kentucky, the Cleveland Syndicate’s operations shut down, or else the restaurants stayed open and the casino operations closed. But the small-time operators like Carinci had a lot more to lose, and so they attempted to frame Ratterman, using the same techniques that had succeeded in framing thousands of out-of-towners for years. The Cleveland Syndicate preferred to try to buy Ratterman off, but he rebuffed them every time.

Casinos were Northern Kentucky’s primary form of gambling during the 1940s and 1950s.

Many of them contained the table games— blackjack, craps, and roulette—that today’s avid gambler would find familiar. Slot machines were popu lar, but most serious gamblers stuck to the tables. Slots were more of a diversion than serious gambling, and most of these “one-arm bandits” were found in small bars and cafés in Newport.

Another type of gambling was layoff betting, and much of the money that went through Newport was in this form. As the national center for the horse-racing industry, Kentucky is one of the few states where gambling on horse racing has been never been outlawed. Thus, much of the infrastructure for betting on horses was in place in Kentucky, especially in Newport. Small-time bookies could be found throughout the county. Using the various wire ser vices, the bookies could get up-to-date information on horse races being run anywhere in the country. Most of these handbooks, as they were called, were essentially illegal versions of today’s offtrack betting houses. Patrons would put money on horse races and, increasingly after World War II, would bet on sports such as football and basketball.

Bookmakers adjusted the betting lines on a contest in order to attract an even amount of betting for each participant. Thus, in order to attract betting for an underdog, a bookmaker offered better odds. Bookmakers wanted an even amount of money on each side because they made their prof-

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its from the vigorish, or commission charged to the losing bettor (10%). But sometimes, no matter what the line, there might be uneven betting. So the bookmaker called in a “lay-off ” bet to another, usually larger, gambling operation to cover his risk.

Many of these lay-off operations were in Northern Kentucky. Often no more than a phone bank, the lay-off house was a key part of the region’s gambling business.

Gambling was the core of Northern Kentucky’s illicit economy. It is what brought the locals as well as out-of-towners to Newport, the “Sin City on the Ohio River.” But there were plenty of secondary businesses that fed off gambling and Newport’s economy of crime. The most prominent of these was prostitution. Newport was notorious for its various brothels, which were divided between day and night houses. Day houses ser viced customers from the morning until the early evening; evening houses were open until the sun rose the next day. A house would have a light (usually red) turned on if it was open for business. Prostitution, despite its notoriety, is one of the least understood aspects of the region’s larger gambling economy.

Other businesses that benefited from gambling included the numerous food, beverage, and linen purveyors that served the restaurants and casinos, as well as the hundreds of people who worked as bartenders, cabdrivers, dealers, and waitresses. All of these people had businesses and jobs that were dependent on the gambling industry, a fact that explains the lack of support reform efforts received in the municipal areas of Newport and Covington.

The least discussed aspect of Newport’s gambling business is the economy of corruption, which was one of its most lucrative aspects. In addition to providing jobs for ser vice employees, gambling also provided generous payouts to law enforcement officials in the form of regular payoffs and bribes.

The amount of money that was circulated into the economy in this manner should not be overlooked.

Officials from the lowest beat cop all the way up to the county judge and solicitor received weekly and monthly payoffs to persuade them to allow casinos and brothels to run without interference. These payments not only provided a powerful roadblock to reform but also were a key part of the gambling economy. Much of the profits from syndicate-run casinos left town, lining the pockets of Moe Dalitz and others, who then invested them in their Las Vegas ventures. But the bribes and payoffs stayed in the region, supplementing the incomes of lowpaid civil servants.

Gambling was a large part of the Northern Kentucky economy until the Committee of 500’s successful cleanup campaign of 1961. But this cleanup committee’s success portended the future of the casino industry in the United States. Committee of 500 members such as Ratterman admitted that they were not really opposed to gambling on moral grounds. They just saw the rampant corruption associated with illegal gambling as a barrier to the region’s long-term economic growth.

This was part of the gradual change in American attitudes toward casino gambling after World War II. Despite the success of cleanup efforts in

386 GANO, JOHN STITES, MAJOR GENERAL Newport and other regional gambling centers, Americans came to believe that casino gambling should be legalized, as long as it was run in a fair and legitimate manner. First in Las Vegas and later in Atlantic City, and now across the country on American Indian reservations and on riverboats, Americans have embraced casino gambling as an acceptable pastime.

Gioielli, Robert. “Suburbs v. Slot Machines: The Committee of 500 and the Battle over Gambling in Northern Kentucky,” Ohio Valley History 5, no. 2 (Summer 2005): 61–84.

Williams, Michael L. “Sin City Kentucky: Newport, Kentucky’s Vice Heritage, and Its Legal Extinction, 1920–1991,” master’s thesis, University of Louisville, 2008.

Robert Gioielli

GANO, JOHN STITES, MAJOR GENERAL (b. July 14, 1766, New York City; d. January 1, 1822, Covington, Ky.). An early settler instrumental in the founding of Covington, John Stites Gano was the son of John Gano, pastor of the First Baptist Church in New York City, and Sarah Stites Gano.

John Stites Gano was given the same name as the oldest child in the family, who had died in 1765 at the age of 11. In 1788 the family, along with other relatives, settled at Columbia, then part of the Northwest Territory. (Columbia was on the east side of modern-day Cincinnati, near where the Lunken Airport is now.) In 1790 Stephen, another son of the family, who was a physician and a Baptist minister, helped a group of settlers establish the Columbia Baptist Church, which was the first church of any kind in the Northwest Territory.

John Stites Gano married Mary Goforth of New York and they had seven children, two of whom died at a young age. Gano was appointed justice of the peace in Hamilton Co., Ohio. He was in the Ohio Militia for many years and fought on the frontier against Indians under the command of Gen. Arthur St. Clair, the territorial governor of Ohio. Gano attained the rank of major general. For a time, he was the commander of Fort Hamilton and Fort Washington in the Ohio Territory; the latter fort was on the banks of the Ohio River in Cincinnati. He also fought in the War of 1812.

In 1814, along with his brother Richard and Thomas D. Carneal, Gano purchased from Thomas Kennedy 200 acres at the Point in Kentucky, where the Licking River enters the Ohio River. At the time, there were only farms and farmlands west of the Licking River in Kentucky. On February 8, 1815, the Kentucky legislature passed “An Act establishing the town of Covington, at the mouth of the Licking,” thereby approving 150 acres of the 200 acres purchased by the Gano brothers and Carneal as constituting the Covington Company; later this land, which was then a part of Campbell Co., became the basis for the city of Covington. The Western Spy, a newspaper in Cincinnati, described the property: “This commanding & beautiful situation is generally known throughout the Western country. . . . This situation presents a prospect equal if not superior to any on the Ohio River.” The first lots were sold in March

1815. Later that year, Thomas Carneal sold his part of the property to the Gano brothers. Richard, John’s brother, died in October 1815 at age 41, and John S. Gano became the company’s sole proprietor.

In early 1816 Gano and Carneal received licenses to operate ferries across the Ohio and the Licking rivers. By 1817 Gano began listing lots for sale in Covington. He served as clerk of the Common Pleas Court and the Supreme Court of Hamilton Co., Ohio, until he moved to a nine-and-onehalf-acre Covington estate in 1818. Gano died on January 1, 1822. Originally buried at the First Baptist Grounds on Court St. in Cincinnati, his remains were transferred in 1866 to Spring Grove Cemetery, also in Cincinnati.

Cist, Charles. The Cincinnati Miscellany; or, Antiquities of the West. 2 vols. Cincinnati, 1846.

Smith, Allen Webb. Beginning at “the Point”: A Documented History of Northern Kentucky and Environs, the Town of Covington in Par tic ular, 1751–1834. Park Hills, Ky.: Self-published, 1977.

Spring Grove Cemetery Records, Cincinnati.

James R. Duvall

GANO-SOUTHGATE HOUSE. Located in Covington at 405 E. Second St., this historic mansion is officially named the Gano-Southgate House, but it has been mistakenly called the Carneal House for many years (see Licking-Riverside, Riverside Drive, and Ohio Riverside National Historic Districts). In 1820 Aaron Gano, son of John Stites Gano, one of the founders of Covington, purchased the land on which the house rests, originally lot number 69. Thomas Carneal may have designed and built this house sometime between 1820 and 1822 for Aaron Gano. The design is basically Federal (Adamesque), with obvious influences by the renowned Italian architect Andrea Palladio. The two-story recessed portico features slender columns, surmounted by Ionic capitals on the first floor and Corinthian capitals on the second floor. The recessed windows have arched lintels and Georgian tracery. The bricks are a rich rose.

In 1825 William Wright Southgate, who later served as a Kentucky state representative and as Covington mayor, acquired the mansion. He was the son of Richard Southgate, a Campbell Co. lawyer and businessman and one of the wealthiest men in Kentucky. In 1835 William Wright Southgate built an addition in Greek Revival style onto the back of the mansion. Over the years, the interior of the house was extensively remodeled, and the building was used for a time as an apartment house.

It has beautiful woodwork and impressive fireplace mantels. Most of the interior hardware is silver plated, and there are also several silver-plated metallic stars, which are said to be Masonic emblems. Lately, efforts have been made to determine the original wall locations and woodwork style, so that a total restoration can eventually be made.

An arched tunnel leading to the Licking River was initially built as a ser vice entrance through which supplies could be quietly brought into the house from the riverbank. Some believe that the tunnel and the house were used as part of the Underground Railroad escape network (see Under-

ground Railroad, Campbell and Kenton Counties). It is said that many notables have been guests in the Gano-Southgate house, including Henry Clay, Andrew Jackson, and Daniel Webster.

Bricking, Chuck. Covington’s Heritage: A Compilation of the City’s Historical Houses and a Short Biography of the Inhabitants. Covington, Ky.: Privately published, 1980.

Langsam, Walter E. Great Houses of the Queen City.

Cincinnati: Cincinnati Historical Society, 1997.

Jack Wessling

GARDEN OF HOPE. On three-fourths of an acre of land atop a peaceful hill overlooking I-75 to the west and Covington to the east, lies the Garden of Hope. In the garden is a statue of Jesus Christ, a 25-foot wooden cross, a re-creation of a carpenter’s shop, and a rock from the Jordan River, where Jesus was baptized. In the garden’s Chapel of Dreams is a piece of marble from the mountain where Jesus delivered his Sermon on the Mount. But the garden’s main attraction is an ivy-covered re-creation of the tomb in Jerusalem where it is believed Jesus was buried. Morris Coers, pastor of the Immanuel Baptist Church at 20th and Greenup Sts. in Covington, built the garden in 1958. At the time, it was said to be the only replica of the tomb in the United States. Solomon Mattar, the warden of the Jerusalem tomb, sent the exact measurements to Coers, and Mattar’s son Samuel helped build the replica of the tomb. Indeed, visitors who have previously been to Jerusalem have agreed that the tomb strongly resembles the original one. In its early years, the Garden of Hope was always open, and on a typical Sunday, 2,000 people would visit. By 1960 attendance had risen to 150,000 annually. When erosion threatened the hillside, a man wearing bib overalls “came out of nowhere and told Coers what to do,” according to legend. No one knew the man or where he had come from, but his advice, to build a retaining wall, solved the problem. In 2000 the Garden of Hope of Immanuel was incorporated.

The garden remains a popu lar spot for weddings and Easter ser vices.

DeVroomen, Sacha. “Obscure Garden, Replica Tomb Inspire Kindness of Strangers,” KP, April 10, 1992, 1K. Eigelbach, Kevin. “Hope for the Garden,” KP, April 10, 2004, 1K. Hicks, Jack. “Garden of Hope Brings Spirit of Easter Sunday into Visitors,” KP, April 5, 1999, 1K. Reis, Jim. “The Garden of Hope: Elusive Dream,” KP, January 11, 1993, 4K.

Ann Hicks

GARDNERSVILLE. Gardnersville, a small village in northwestern Pendleton Co., is located on Ky. Rt. 491, the Knoxville-Gardnersville Rd. Gardnersville was a booming village in the late 1800s and early 1900s. At its stores, customers could purchase anything from fiddle strings to a buggy or a jolt wagon. There were also a millinery shop, a sewing machine dealer, a post office, two barbershops, and a community hall where the Odd Fellows and the Junior Lodge met. Three blacksmith shops,

GASDORF MUSIC PUBLISHING COMPANY

which later gave way to the largest farm machinery dealership in Pendleton Co., were also operating in Gardnersville. In the late 1800s the town had a saloon where customers could bring their own bottles and have them fi lled with whiskey directly from the house barrel. The buggy shop manufactured and sold buggies and also did repairs. In the early 1900s, this shop became an automobile garage and upholstering shop where Model T Fords were fitted with new tops, curtains, and glass windows.

Gardnersville once had two doctors, an undertaker, a cemetery, two church houses, and three tobacco warehouses. The largest of the warehouses was a two-story building, built during the period when the nightriders roved through Pendleton Co. burning tobacco.

In 1911 the old Simpson School on Center Ridge Rd. was replaced by a new school building, which eventually included a two-year high school program. This school was replaced by the Portland School, built in the mid-1930s, which burned in the 1960s. Several wool buyers were located in Gardnersville, as were two automobile garages and, at various times, four gasoline dealers.

Modern times have changed the little village.

At present there are two churches, a cemetery, one store, and a farm machinery dealership.

Belew, Mildred Boden. The First 200 Years of Pendleton County. Falmouth, Ky.: M. B. Belew, n.d. [ca.

1994].

GARNER, JOHN “MACK” (b. December 23, 1898, Centerville, Iowa; d. Oct. 28, 1936, Covington, Ky.). Jockey Mack Garner, a 1969 inductee into the Racing Hall of Fame, was the son of T. F. “Dode” and Sarah Clements Garner. Mack’s greatgrandfather, grandfather, father, and five brothers were also jockeys. In 1915, at age 17 (not 15, as is often mistakenly asserted), Garner led the nation’s jockeys in wins, by achieving 151 wins, and in money won. He also was top money winner in 1929, winning $314,975, a record at the time. Garner won the 1929 Belmont Stakes aboard Blue Larkspur, the Belmont again in 1933 aboard Hurry Off, and the Kentucky Derby in 1934 riding Cavalcade. A regular rider at Covington’s old Latonia Racecourse, Garner’s greatest triumph there occurred in November 1923 when he guided Carl Wiedemann’s horse In Memoriam to victory over that year’s Derby champion, Zev. Garner married Willis M. Leslie of Covington in 1920, and the couple eventually moved into a home in Covington that belonged to his father-in-law. On October 28, 1936, after riding four races (one of which he won) at River Downs in Cincinnati, Garner had two heart attacks at his home. He died during a third attack at Covington’s St. Elizabeth Hospital (see St. Elizabeth Medical Center) and was buried in Covington’s Linden Grove Cemetery. He was survived by his wife and four children. In a 21year career, Garner rode 1,346 winners and 2,358 other mounts that finished in the money.

Claypool, James C. The Tradition Continues: The Story of Old Latonia, Latonia, and Turfway Racecourses. Fort Mitchell, Ky.: T. I. Hayes, 1997.

“Veteran Saddle Artist Dies of Heart Attack,” CP, October 29, 1936, 20.

James C. Claypool

GARNER, MARGARET (b. 1833, Boone Co., Ky.; d. 1858, Mississippi). Margaret Garner and her children were slaves owned by the Gaines family on Maplewood Farm near Richwood, Boone Co. Her husband, Robert, and his parents were owned by the Marshall family on an adjoining farm. On the cold, wintry night of January 28, 1856, with the temperature hovering around 10 degrees Fahrenheit, the Garner family (as well as 9 other Northern Kentucky slaves, a total of 17) escaped on a large sled, which they abandoned along Pike Street in Covington, and crossed the frozen Ohio River on foot into Cincinnati. The Garners fled to the Mill Creek home of Elijah Kite, a former slave and a cousin of Margaret’s. The 9 other fugitive slaves were successful in their escape to Canada via the Underground Railroad. The slave owners and a posse soon found the Garners at the Kite home.

Rather than allow her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Mary to be returned to slavery, Margaret killed her with a butcher knife and attempted to kill the other children. The Garners were overpowered and taken into custody.

The Garners stood trial as fugitive slaves in a Cincinnati federal courtroom. The trial provoked near-riots on the streets of Cincinnati and captured national attention. The fugitive Slave Law was upheld and the Garners were returned to their owners. Governor Salmon P. Chase of Ohio sent a requisition to Governor Charles Morehead (1855–1859) of Kentucky for the return of Margaret to Ohio to stand trial for murder, but it arrived after the Garners had been sent down the river to other Gaines brothers. No requisition was ever sent to any other Southern state. The Garners were forgotten and peace was restored to the streets of Cincinnati.

For abolitionists, the Garner case illuminated all that was wrong with slavery. It was also a states’ jurisdiction issue. The case juxtaposed federal law (the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850) and states’ rights (Ohio law for murder). Federal law took precedence over state law. Chase, the Ohio governor and an abolitionist, was personally torn because he was entrusted with enforcement of federal law and had to return the Garners to Kentucky.

This incident was one of several during the 1850s that, along with Harriet Beecher Stowe’s 1852 publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, popu larized the plight of African American slaves. For Margaret the death of her children was preferable to slavery. Although the Garners failed in their quest for freedom, it was Northern Kentucky’s best-known slave escape. Hundreds of abolitionists could not do as much for the antislavery cause as the Garners did, fanning the flames that eventually erupted into the Civil War. Toni Morrison was awarded the 1993 Nobel Prize in literature for Beloved, a novel based on this event, and the Cincinnati Opera Company was commissioned to produce Margaret Garner: A New American Opera, which debuted in three cities in 2005.

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“Boone Farm Confirmed as Slave Home,” KE, October 9, 1958, B3.

Brunings, Ruth Wade Cox. “Slavery and the Tragic Story of Two Families—Gaines and Garner,” NKH 12, no. 1 (Fall–Winter 2004): 37–45.

“Escape of Slaves,” CJ, February 2, 1856, 2.

Margaret Garner. “Margaret Garner: A New American Opera.” www.margaretgarner.org (accessed September 20, 2006).

Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Knopf, 1987.

“New Opera Will Tell Ky. Slave’s Tragic Story,” KP, February 20, 2003, 14A. Weisenburger, Steven. Modern Medea: A Family Story of Slavery and Child Murder from the Old South. New York: Hill and Wang, 1995.

Yanuck, Julius. “The Garner Fugitive Slave Case,” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 40, no. 1 (June 1953): 47– 61.

GASDORF MUSIC PUBLISHING COMPANY. This Newport-based fi rm was owned by Alfred Gasdorf, who was born October 30, 1883, in Newport to Conrad and Elizabeth Machinot Gasdorf. By the fi rst decade of the 20th century, Alfred Gasdorf was composing and publishing ragtime music for the company. He became one of several Northern Kentuckians involved with ragtime music, which flourished from 1897 to 1920. Alfred’s father and brothers also played and performed music locally, when they were not working in their whitewash business. Alfred performed on the stately Island Queen steamboat, which sailed out of Cincinnati to Coney Island Amusement Park, and he was known to manipulate its famous calliope. He also played in theater orchestras in Cincinnati and other cities. His ragtime compositions include “Sic’ ’Em Prinz: March & Two-Step” (1905), “Coney Island Tickle” (1906), “Mississippi Rag” (1913), and “The Queen of Coney Island: March and Two Step” (1904). By 1910 Gasdorf was living in Denver, Colo.; in about 1918 he began touring the United States with a concert group. In 1920 he had a San Francisco address, but later he settled in Los Angeles, where he died on December 6, 1957. The family’s musical tradition continued well into the 1950s, when Newport’s Merle Gasdorf, apparently a relative of Alfred, as a young boy played the drums on the old Ted Mack Amateur Hour television show around 1955.

There were at least three other notable contributors to the ragtime era who resided in Northern Kentucky. In 1905 Louis H. Mentel, who lived in Covington, wrote and published “A Daisy Girl,” one of the 10 rags he composed; in 1910 Covington’s William M. Hickman wrote “Diplomat Rag”; and the most famous of this region’s songwriters, Haven Gillespie, crossed over to collaborate with Lloyd Kidwell and Louis R. Strong in “Kyra: An Oriental One-Step,” in 1918. Northern Kentucky, Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Indianapolis were centers of ragtime, as this musical art form (one of the few meldings of German American and African American cultures) was performed on the vessels that traveled up and down the Ohio River and in so many of the communities on or near the river’s banks.

388 GAS LIGHTING AND GASWORKS Hasse, John Edward. Cincinnati Ragtime: A List of Composers and Their Works. Cincinnati: John Edward Hasse, 1983.

“Musician Dies on West Coast: Albert Gasdorf,” CE, December 8, 1957, 95.

RootsWeb.com. “California Death Index.” www .rootsweb.com (accessed December 27, 2005).

Michael R. Sweeney

GAS LIGHTING AND GASWORKS. The City Council of Covington on October 28, 1852, approved a contract with James Southgate and his associates to supply the city with gas. It was a 50year franchise allowing the city to purchase gas at half price for public streetlamps. The gas was generated by the burning of coal (coke). Besides allowing the city government to set the gas rates for users, the city held the right to purchase the Covington Gas Light Company on or after January 1, 1869, or at five-year intervals thereafter. Amos Shinkle became the president of that company. Its gasworks, completed by early 1854, was located along the Licking River, at the east end of Saratoga St., and soon five miles of main lines ran beneath Covington streets.

On June 11, 1857, an arrangement was made with the City of Newport for the Covington works to send gas to that Campbell Co. city via lines across the Newport and Covington Suspension Bridge. In October 1864, Newport had public gas streetlights and 2.5 miles of mains. In November 1868, the citizens of Covington voted to purchase the Covington Gas Light Company, but the City Council balked at paying the estimated price of $500,000. By 1880 Newport had 227 gas streetlights, and gas was being supplied by the Cincinnati Gas and Electric Company via a 25-year contract.

Later, a small gasworks operated in Newport for a short time as part of the Dueber Watch Case Company.

In 1872 the Kentucky legislature chartered the Newport Light and Fuel Company. Future Bellevue mayor Gus Harms became an officer of that concern. Another company, the Newport and Bellevue Gas, Light, and Coke Company, was formed about the same time with the intention of building a plant to manufacture gas from coal for customers in Newport, Bellevue, and Dayton, Ky. In Maysville, the first gas charter was granted in 1854 to the Maysville Gas Company to install gaslights in that city. That act was amended in 1865 for Solomon Salomon and associates to do the same while building a $32,000 gasworks. In 1886 the charter was revised to allow that company to furnish electric lights and power along with gas within Maysville. That same year, the Citizens Gas Light Company was incorporated to erect a local gasworks and to furnish gas and gaslights to both Maysville and the adjacent city of Chester. In 1903 electric lights were installed in the city of Maysville, but coal gas continued to be available.

Eventually, street lighting became electric with few exceptions, and gas from coal was replaced by natural gas piped into the area from the gas fields in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Soon, natural gas transmission lines owned by the Columbia Gas

Transmission Company, and later Williams Brothers, were crisscrossing Northern Kentucky, and gasworks were no longer needed.

Maysville Centennial Exposition Commission. As We Look Back: Maysville, 1833–1933. Maysville, Ky.: Daily Independent, 1933.

Reis, Jim. “Former Bellevue Mayor Found Riches in Mexico,” KP, July 31, 2000, 4K. Tenkotte, Paul A. “Rival Cities to Suburbs: Covington and Newport, Kentucky, 1790–1890,” PhD diss., Univ. of Cincinnati, 1989.

GASTRIGHT, HANK (b. March 29, 1865, Covington, Ky.; d. October 9, 1937, Dayton, Ky.). Hank Gastright, a professional baseball player, was born Heinrich Carl Gastreich. He was the son of Fredrick and Catherine Borgman Gastreich, immigrants from Sauerland in Northern Westphalia, Germany, who arrived in the eastern United States in 1846.

They moved west to Covington, Ky., to join a colony of neighbors who had followed their parish priest there. The entire family had anglicized their name to either Gastrich or Gastright by 1918.

Baseball was quite popu lar in Covington and Newport before the Civil War (see Kenton Base Ball Association). In this atmosphere, Hank Gastright was encouraged to develop his baseball skills. He was a six-foot-two-inch, 190-pound pitcher, who both batted and threw right-handed.

His first year as a professional was with the Toledo Mudhens in 1888. The Mudhens were in the International Association and were a feeder team for the Columbus (Ohio) Colts (American Association). Gastright’s statistics with the Mudhens are unknown, but he was promoted to the major league Colts in 1889.

He made his first major league debut for the Colts on April 19, 1889. He pitched in 32 games that season, compiling a record of 10 wins and 16 losses with an earned run average (ERA) of 4.57.

He ranked high in strikeouts, complete games, and wild pitches. His 1890 season with the Colts was outstanding in every way. He appeared in 48 games, winning 30 and losing only 3. His ERA was 2.94, and he struck out 199 batters in 401 innings.

In the 1891 season with the Colts, he completed only 28 of the 35 games he started, but his ERA rose to 3.78 with a record of 12 wins and 19 losses.

Gastright was traded to the Washington Senators (National League) for the 1892 season. He appeared in 79 innings in 11 games with the Senators and achieved a record of 3 wins and 3 losses with an ERA of 5.08. A move to the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1893 brought 59 innings pitched with 3 wins and 1 loss, but in midyear he was traded to the Boston Beaneaters (N.L.), where he pitched in 19 games and won 12 and lost 4, the best percentage in the National League. Gastright’s combined pitching record for the 1893 season was quite good, and the Boston team finished in first place.

During his last three years, 1894–1896, Gastright played for the Brooklyn Bridegrooms and then played briefly for the Cincinnati Reds. He played in 16 games for the Bridegrooms for a total of 93 innings, his ERA soaring to 6.39. He sat out the 1895 season. For the Reds on June 5, 1896, he

appeared in 6 innings in a single game. He gave up 6 runs but did not figure in the decision. For his major league career, he won 72 games and lost 63.

In retirement he was honored as a local hero for decades. He worked as a Newport policeman. Gastright was a resident of the Campbell Co. Infirmary in Cold Spring when he died at Speers Hospital in Dayton in 1937. He was buried at St. Joseph Cemetery in Johns Hill.

Ellard, Harry. Baseball in Cincinnati. Reprint, Cincinnati: Ohio Book Store, 1987.

James, Bill, John Dewan, Neil Munro, and Don Zminda, eds. Bill James Presents STATS AllTime Major League Handbook. Skokie, Ill.: STATS, 1998.

Kentucky Death Certificate No. 27530, for the year 1937.

Joseph F. Gastright

GATEWAY COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE. Opened in 1998 as Northern Kentucky Community and Technical College District and renamed Gateway Community and Technical College in 2002, this educational institution operates multiple campuses. The main campus, at 500 Technology Way in Boone Co., was dedicated in December 2005. This 30,000-square-foot concrete and glass facility features four two-story laboratories designed to accommodate large industrial equipment, associated observation areas, a computer-aided draft ing lab, a library, classrooms, and offices. Other campuses are located at Covington–Park Hills (the former Northern Kentucky State Vocational and Technical School) and at Edgewood (the former Northern Kentucky Health Occupations Center). Gateway offers a variety of programs and degrees, including Associate of Art and Associate of Science degrees, a nursing program, and a computer-aided design program.

In 1940 the Kenton Co. Board of Education began a vocational program at the Park Hills School that included courses in sales and technical fields.

By 1941 the school was relocated to the old Federal Building and Post Office, located at Scott and Third Sts. in Covington. Three years later, in 1944, the state board of education assumed control of the Kenton Co. Vocational School, which then became known as Northern Kentucky State Vocational School and operated under that name until the late 1990s. In 1997 the Kentucky General Assembly passed the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act, which included the establishment of the Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS). This law created a system of 16 districts throughout the state that operate together to better serve their communities.

The newly created Northern Kentucky Community and Technical College District (NKCTCD) combined three independent existing campuses in Northern Kentucky, which were operated by the Kentucky Department of Education, into one college with multiple campuses. These were the Northern Kentucky State Vocational and Technical School, which became known as the Covington campus; the Northern Kentucky Health Occupations Center, which became known as the Edge-

GAUNT, WHEELING

wood campus; and the Northern Campbell Vocational Technical School, which became known as the Highland Heights campus. Michael McCall, the president of KCTCS, announced in September 2001 that the main campus of the yet-unnamed community college would be on 41 acres of newly acquired land in Boone Co., just off the Mount Zion exit of I-75–I-71.

In November 2001, Dr. G. Edward Hughes was named the founding president and chief executive officer of the NKCTCD. Since 1985, Hughes had been president of the Hazard Community College in Hazard and had helped that school become a multicampus district serving about 3,800 students.

In March 2003 the Toebben Companies announced a donation of $650,000 worth of land and improvements to the Mount Zion project. This included the main drive into the new campus, Technology Way, plus all of the water, sewer, gas, and electric line hookups the campus would require.

This gift was accompanied by a $500,000 grant from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, used to pave the road. The groundbreaking for the new building was held on June 11, 2003.

In 2004 Gateway began a nursing program, in support of which the St. Elizabeth Medical Center, located near the Edgewood campus, offered $1.25 million over five years. Classes for this degree started in fall 2004 with 40 students. In July 2004 the Health Resources and Ser vices Administration, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Ser vices, granted the program $739,589 to recruit and train minority nursing students.

In September 2004 the U.S. Department of Education awarded $1.6 million in a five-year “strengthening institutions grant” to improve programs and provide training for professors.

Gateway Community and Technical College was ranked as the seventh-fastest-growing public two-year college in the nation between 2004 and 2005. Gateway’s vision for the future includes offering new degrees for the community. The college has articulation agreements with area institutions such as Northern Kentucky University and Thomas More College, enabling its graduates to pursue four-year degrees at the university level.

Gateway earned accreditation by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools in 2008.

“Evening Classes in Vocational Education to Be Started in Kenton,” KP, February 7, 1940, 1.

“Feds Provide $1.6 M Grant,” KP, September 1, 2004, 2K. Gateway Community and Technical College. www .gateway.kctcs.edu (accessed June 16, 2005).

“State Votes to Take Over Kenton Vocational School,” KP, December 16, 1944, 1.

“24-Hour Schedule Is Inaugurated at Vocational School in Covington: Students Urged to Register,” KP, April 29, 1941, 1.

Elizabeth Comer Williams

GATEWAY REHABILITATION HOSPITAL. This hospital, located on Merchants St. in Florence, Ky., received its first patient in December 2000.

The 40-bed, two-story, 66,000-square-foot facility cost nearly $10 million. It is licensed by the State of Kentucky as a Specialty–Acute Care Hospital. The physical plant was originally designed with the potential to easily add a third floor, should more rehabilitation beds later be needed. Physical therapy, speech therapy, and occupational therapy are offered at Gateway, along with aquatic therapy.

Stroke, spinal-cord injury, amputation, trauma, and hip fracture are just a few of the many conditions treated. In its short history, Gateway has become a welcome addition to the region’s health care continuum, helping to contain spiraling health care costs as it serves a specific clientele. According to Gateway’s brochure, its goal is to be “a hospital that doesn’t feel like a hospital.”

Burcham, James A., CEO and administrator of Gateway Rehabilitation Hospital. Personal communication, November 2004.

GAUNT, WHEELING (b. 1812–1815, Carrollton, Ky.; d. May 10, 1894, Yellow Springs, Ohio).

Wheeling Gaunt, described as a mulatto, was born into abject poverty as a slave, but over his lifetime he amassed a large fortune and gave most of it away in philanthropic projects. To this day, the poor families of Yellow Springs, Ohio, receive a Christmas gift of 25 pounds of flour and 10 pounds of sugar from the foundation Gaunt established. The funds for these donations came from a gift to the community of nine acres (now Gaunt Park) that the former slave owned next to Antioch College.

And in 1884 Wheeling Gaunt gave a $5,000 financial contribution to enable Wilberforce College (today Wilberforce University) at Wilberforce, Ohio, to become one of the leading traditional black colleges in the United States. Gaunt was a friend and benefactor of Daniel A. Payne, the presiding bishop and an evangelist for the African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) Church and the first president of Wilberforce College.

Wheeling Gaunt’s slave owner during the 1840s was John R. Gaunt, an attorney at Carrollton. Wheeling’s father was a white man, a leading merchant, who sold Wheeling’s mother to a slave trader when Wheeling was very young. In later years, Wheeling claimed that he inherited his knowledge of how to make and save money from that first slave owner–father. Wheeling married his first wife, Amanda, also a mulatto slave, in 1838 in a typical slave wedding.

John R. Gaunt permitted Wheeling to earn his freedom, as a few other Carroll Co. slave owners did for their slaves. The money for Wheeling Gaunt’s emancipation was earned by picking apples and shining shoes over and above his regular chores.

When John Gaunt died in 1841, his inventory of properties listed “One Negro Man, Wheeling,” worth $600. Wheeling and another slave, Louisa, were willed to John’s wife Nancy and their children.

The emancipation bond of $500, dated May 5, 1845, at the Carroll Co. Court house, between Nancy, Alfred R. and John E. Gaunt; William Root; and George Hinkley, witnessed by several justices of the peace of Carroll Co., stated that on that day they emancipated their slave, Wheeling.

389

Two years later, Wheeling Gaunt, a free person of color, purchased a house and two lots in Carrollton. He then purchased for $200 Nick, a slave owned by M. D. Smith; the contract stated that Nick was to be free on reaching the age of 21. Speculation is that this boy, born in 1841, was Wheeling’s son. In 1849 Wheeling purchased in-lots 138 and 139 at the corner of Fourth and High Sts. in Carrollton.

Wheeling purchased Amanda, his wife, for $500 and then emancipated her sometime before the 1850 federal census, which listed the family together as free people of color living in Carrollton.

Wheeling Gaunt, then 35, had $1,000 of real estate and was listed as a farmer. His wife, Amanda, was age 29, and Nicholas Gaunt was 9 years old. In 1858 and 1859, Wheeling purchased in-lots 189 at Fift h and Sycamore Sts.; 287 on Seventh St.; 135 at Fourth and Main Sts., a large lot along the Ohio River; and 136 on the southeast corner of Fourth and Main Sts. in Carrollton.

Ten years later, Wheeling Gaunt, age 45, remained in Carrollton, and his occupation was listed as teamster. He had $1,500 in real estate and $3,000 in personal property. His wife was 38 years old, and their son Nicholas was no longer living with them.

In 1860 Wheeling cashed out his Carrollton properties for $2,800 and headed for Yellow Springs, Ohio. Greene Co. historians in Ohio speculate that he may have heard about Moncure Conway’s emancipated slave colony at Yellow Springs, founded in 1862, or he may have followed Bishop Daniel A. Payne to Wilberforce College. There may be an even better link from Kentucky. The most famous Underground Railroad conductor between Louisville and Cincinnati, Elijah Anderson, would have known Wheeling Gaunt very well, since it was Anderson who established the Carrollton and Kentucky River route for escaping slaves. Anderson often took groups of runaway slaves up from Kentucky through northwestern Ohio to Sandusky, and he would have known about the abolitionists, black and white, at Yellow Springs.

Although the 1870 census of Greene Co., Ohio, listed Wheeling Gaunt, worth $4,000 in real estate and $6,000 personal property, as just a day laborer, he proved to be an excellent real estate speculator, buying and selling town lots near Antioch College between 1864 and 1890. For his residence, Gaunt built a substantial two-story Greek Revival building near the corner of N. Walnut and Dayton Sts. and four small cottages he called “Gaunt cottages.”

In 1887, the first year of racial integration at Yellow Springs, Gaunt ran for the city school board.

Although Gaunt never received any formal education, he was very interested in Bishop Daniel A. Payne’s concepts of education for black citizens.

Gaunt’s gifts to Wilberforce College began with his donation of a sizable brick house and property that Gaunt owned at 131 N. Walnut St., on the north side of Yellow Springs. It was, at the time, valued at $1,650. Then in 1884 he gave $5,000 in endowment funds to support Wilberforce College and the Payne Theological Seminary at Wilberforce.

The Gaunt holdings on the south side of Yellow Springs, originally nine acres, became a gift to the

390 GAYLE, JUNE WARD community of Yellow Springs and the financial source for the Christmas gifts to the poor. Named in his honor, Gaunt Park now contains Gaunt Pool, baseball fields, and a sledding hill. Wheeling Gaunt was also a major contributor to his church, the Central Chapel, an A.M.E. church at the corner of High and Davis Sts. in Yellow Springs. He donated a bell, the vestibule, and the belfry.

When his wife Amanda died in 1889, Wheeling erected a large, ornate marble tombstone in the Glen Forest Cemetery at Yellow Springs. He married a second time, to Mrs. Elizabeth Nichols of Xenia, Ohio, on July 2, 1890. Elizabeth received a bequest of $7,000 when Wheeling died of Bright’s Disease in 1894, and she was asked to care for Wheeling’s sister, Louise Chandler, during her lifetime. The remainder of his property Gaunt willed to Wilberforce College and the Payne Theological Seminary. The Yellow Springs Weekly Citizen asserted that Wheeling Gaunt was the “richest colored man in Ohio” and stated that he was “known to every distinguished man of his race, from Fred Douglass to Bishop Payne.” On May 18, 1894, both blacks and whites from Wilberforce, Springfield, Xenia, and Yellow Springs, Ohio, packed the church and lined the funeral procession for Wheeling Gaunt, the former Carroll Co., Ky., slave. He was buried next to his first wife, Amanda, in the Glen Forest Cemetery.

In addition to more than 15 Virginia black families whom Moncure Conway led to Yellow Springs in 1862, a number of families from Northern Kentucky resettled at Yellow Springs. The 1870 U.S. Census lists the following resettled Kentucky families as residents of Yellow Springs: Tolbert Baker, Alfred Benning, Andrew Benning, Francis Botts, John Cloak, Jackson Coffee, Henry Ford, Mack Ford, Peter Ford, Alfred Henry, Benjamin Grimes, Allen Jones, Eliza Lee, Charles Morgan, Anderson Ramsey, Vincent Smith, William Talber, Charles Webster, Charles Willis, and Harrison Wilson.

Claiborne, Karen. “Emancipated Gaunt Slave Prospered as a Free Man,” Carrollton News Democrat, February 2, 2004, 4.

Deal, Steve. “Wheeling Gaunt: Our Remarkable Patron: What We Know. What We Think.” www .yshistory.org/Gaunt.pdf (accessed July 25, 2006).

Emancipation Papers, Carroll Co. Court house, May 5, 1845, Carrollton, Ky. Freedom from Religion Foundation. “Moncure Conway House Designated Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Sites.” www.ff rf.org (accessed July 25, 2006).

Karen Claiborne and Diane Perrine Coon

GAYLE, JUNE WARD (b. February 22, 1865, New Liberty, Ky.; d. August 5, 1942, Owenton, Ky.).

June W. Gayle, a legislator, was born in Owen Co. to James and Sallie Green Gayle. He was educated in New Liberty schools, including Concord College, and also attended Georgetown College, Georgetown, Ky., for a short time. By age 16 he had become an Owen Co. deputy sheriff, and between 1892 and 1896 he served as the county’s high sheriff. A Democrat, Gayle was a member of the state

Democratic central committee. When his good friend James W. Cammack Sr., who later served as a judge, was married in Lexington in 1898, Gayle was an attendant. He was an unsuccessful candidate for state auditor in 1899. As a result of the death of Evan Settle, he was elected as a Democrat to the 56th U.S. Congress and served a little over one year, from January 15, 1900, to March 3, 1901, before returning to his previous business interests, banking and tobacco. He died in 1942 and was buried at the New Liberty Cemetery.

Biographical Cyclopedia of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Chicago: John M. Gresham, 1896.

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.

“June Ward Gayle.” http://bioguide.congress.gov (accessed June 20, 2007).

Kentucky Death Certificate No. 19042, for the year 1942.

GAYS AND GAY RIGHTS. Before the 1960s, the gay and lesbian community was largely invisible. Legal and societal pressures kept most homosexuals out of the mainstream and out of the press.

Kentucky laws against sodomy were used to criminalize and isolate homosexual behavior. Municipal laws against cross-dressing, sometimes referred to as “Halloween ordinances,” as in Covington, forbade dressing “with intent to counterfeit the opposite sex.” In June 1978 this law was tested before Kenton Co. District Court judge Joseph Condit when four African American men were arrested for cross-dressing and their attorney argued that the law forbidding it was unconstitutional. Condit upheld the ordinance’s constitutionality but dismissed the case on a technicality, namely that the court could not determine the sex of the accused individuals with certainty except by a medical examination. The ordinance was rescinded in 1990 when Condit was Covington city attorney.

Cross-dressing and female impersonation had long been a part of the gay subculture. Locally, the first documented reference to the topic involved a man named Peaches, who performed as a “female illusionist” from 1947 until 1949 at the Varga Club at Sixth and York Streets in Newport. Gays and lesbians could gather as a community in places like bars, health clubs, and public parks; evidence of their doing so is derived from police reports. From about 1966 until 1974, the Downstairs Club on Madison Pk. in Kenton Co. was recognized as a gay bar by homosexuals and heterosexuals alike.

In November 1968, a health club at 219 E. Second St. in Covington, in the old Gateway Motel, was raided for sodomy. In 1971 the Newport City Commission characterized the Riviera Club at Second and York Sts. in Newport as a gay bar.

Within a week, the club was raided for liquor violations. Numerous other gay bars existed throughout the Northern Kentucky region.

A slow change in legal and societal perceptions began to take place by the 1980s. In 1968 a series of articles appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer dealing negatively with gays and lesbians and noting that a Mattachine Society based in Cincinnati was working for civil rights for homosexuals. Part of the national and local change in attitudes derived

from the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City.

During the early and mid-1970s in Cincinnati, a gay church was organized and a pride festival began. By May 1984, Bertram A. Workum, a reporter for the Kentucky Post, outed himself as a gay male in an article written for that newspaper. The public announcement of his sexuality was in response to an article by fellow reporter David Wecker, who warned parents and their children not to wear red, the identifying color for gays, at a gay and lesbian day held at the Kings Island Amusement Park in suburban Cincinnati. In July 1986 Sandy Cohen, a well-respected Covington businessman and former two-term city commissioner, mysteriously disappeared. He had not publicly been known to be gay, but Cohen’s sexuality was revealed during the days after his disappearance. His badly beaten body was found in Cincinnati days later, and two 22-year-old male hustlers were found guilty of his murder. In 1989 Storer Cable of Northern Kentucky aired a series of programs on gays. In 1994 a Northern Kentucky University student group called the Alliance of Gays, Lesbians, Bisexuals, and Friends held a “coming out” event, in conjunction with National Coming Out Day, giving gays and lesbians the opportunity to announce their sexuality. In 2002 Northern Kentucky University’s Common Ground Gay-Straight Alliance held a national day of silence to underscore the silence caused by harassment and discrimination.

In January 1999 Kentucky representative Kathy Stein of Lexington first proposed adding sexual orientation to the mandate of Kentucky’s Human Rights Commission. The proposal has not yet been enacted. In July 1999 a survey of Northern Kentucky political leaders showed no inclination to favor such an ordinance. In 2000 the Cincinnati chapter of PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays) moved its annual banquet to Covington to protest Cincinnati’s adoption of antigay language in the city charter. In October 2001 the 11th Annual National Out and Equal Workplace Summit was held in Erlanger, also to protest Cincinnati’s discriminatory legislation. In May 2001 the Northern Kentucky Fairness Alliance (NKFA) Chapter of the Kentucky Fairness Alliance was officially formed. The Fairness Alliance objectives are to educate the public about the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered) community. It also works with local and state government to promote legislation supportive of gay rights and to stop discriminatory legislation. In 2002 NKFA featured a talk by Kentucky state senator Ernesto Scorsone of Lexington, who later “came out” as a gay man. On April 30, 2003, the City of Covington, with broad support throughout the community, unanimously passed an expanded Human Rights Ordinance that added protection for sexual orientation and gender identity. Later that year, NKFA celebrated with a fund raiser featuring speaker Judy Shepard, mother of the nationally known slain gay Matthew Shepard. At the same time, Northern Kentucky University studied the possibility of introducing same-sex-partner health benefits for its employees. In December 2003, Greater Cincinnati Community Shares honored Marian

GENERAL BUTLER STATE RESORT PARK

Weage of Fort Thomas with the McCrackin Peace and Justice Award for her advocacy on behalf of homosexuals.

In 1985 the city of Florence, concerned about homosexual activity taking place at the Florence Mall restrooms and I-75 rest areas, toughened its law against sodomy. In November a man challenged the ordinance and was convicted in February 1988. In November 1988 three men were charged with sodomy in Carroll Co. In 1992 the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled that the Kentucky state sodomy law was unconstitutional.

In 2003 Kentucky governor Paul Patton (1995– 2003) signed an executive decree providing for protection of executive department employees based upon sexual orientation. In April 2006 Kentucky governor Ernie Fletcher (2004–2008) repealed this order. In 2004 the Kentucky General Assembly proposed a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, which passed in the November election. The amendment followed both state and national Defense of Marriage acts.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) crisis was gaining recognition. The earliest newspaperrecorded AIDS death of a Northern Kentuckian was June 1983. From 1985 on, the local newspapers covered the AIDS crisis with growing concern and diligence. In May 1987 Northern Kentuckian Gary Bauer expressed the views of some conservatives who espoused abstinence versus condom use (see Birth Control) as a check on AIDS and blamed the spread of AIDS on the erosion of moral values. Church leaders did not necessarily agree.

For example, William Hughes, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Covington, was part of a panel of the United States Catholic Conference that sought tolerance for educational programs that described how condoms may prevent the spread of AIDS. Throughout his episcopacy, Hughes continued to seek tolerance for gays and lesbians. He officiated at a mass at a gay symposium in 1992 in Chicago and established an Inclusive Church Commission in the diocese to study and recommend proposals for gays, lesbians, and the handicapped. In 1988 the first Northern Kentucky group to help persons who lost family and friends to AIDS was founded. This organization was followed by others, such as AIDS Volunteers Serving Together (1991), the predecessor of the current AIDS Volunteers of Northern Kentucky. By the 1990s, despite increasing awareness that AIDS affected the homosexual and heterosexual communities alike, a constitutional amendment was proposed in December 1993 in the Kentucky General Assembly against anal sex (sodomy) so as to prevent the spread of AIDS. It subsequently failed. The first acknowledged Northern Kentucky contribution to the national AIDS Memorial Quilt was in November 1992 by Larry Barr.

One of the nationally known activists on behalf of U.S. congressional funding for AIDS research was Bill Kraus. Born in Fort Mitchell in 1947, Kraus attended Blessed Sacrament School.

When he was 13 years old, his family moved to Cincinnati, where he attended St. Xavier High

School. Graduating from Ohio State University with a BA and an MA in history, he moved to San Francisco, enrolled in a doctoral program at the University of California—Berkeley, and became a gay rights activist, serving as campaign manager for Harvey Milk, a San Francisco city supervisor who was assassinated. In the early 1980s, Kraus became a staff member for U.S. representative Phillip Burton of California. Author Randy Shilts, in his best-selling book And the Band Played On (1987), detailed Kraus’s work on behalf of people suffering from AIDS. The book appeared one year after Kraus’s own death from AIDS in 1986, at age 38. In 1993 the book was made into an HBO movie, and actor Ian McKellen played the role of Kraus. In 2008 Northern Kentucky University expanded employee health care benefits to include coverage for domestic partners.

Biesk, Joe. “Kentucky Overwhelmingly Says Yes to No-Gay-Marriage,” KE, November 3, 2004, A11.

“Bishops Soften Stance: Condoms Accepted in AIDS Education,” KP, December 11, 1987, 1K. Bliss, Betsy. “ ‘Homos’ Fighting Legal Bias,” CE, November 11, 1968, 1.

Fogarty, Bob. “Four Win Dismissal of Dress Code Charges,” KE, June 21, 1978, A2.

Houck, Jeanne. “Florence Toughens Gay Law,” KP, September 6, 1985, 1K. Kreimer, Peggy. “New Group Sustains Families through Loss to AIDS,” KP, November 8, 1988, 1K. Long, Paul A. “Bishop Said Mass at Gay Symposium: Bishop Hughes Criticized,” KP, June 16, 1992, 1K. Rutledge, Mike. “Gay Rights Law OK’d,” KP, April 30, 2003, 1K. “Sodomy Law Illegal: Justices Uphold Right of Privacy,” KP, September 25, 1992, 1K. Speers, William J. “Living the Gay Life,” CE, November 4, 1971, Magazine section, 30.

Wecker, David. “Drawing the Line at Kings Island,” KP, May 4, 1984, 1K. Whitehead, Shelly. “Hero to Thousands, Unknown at Home: Ft. Mitchell Native Joined AIDS Fight Early,” KP, September 10, 1993, 1K. Workum, Bertram A. “Cohen Found Brutally Murdered,” KP, July 11, 1986, 1K.

Charles King

GEASLEN, CHESTER F. (b. February 21, 1896, Cincinnati, Ohio; d. January 6, 1986, Villa Hills, Ky.). Chester F. Geaslen, athlete, railroad engineer, reporter, and historian, was the oldest of the three children born to Joseph and Clara Geaslen. When Chester was six, the Geaslens moved to 1614 Banklick St. in Covington, to be closer to his father’s employer, the Stewart Iron Works, which had just relocated to 17th and Madison. In 1917 Chester Geaslen, along with some friends, joined the U.S. Marine Corps. They were sent to Parris Island, S.C., for basic training, then to France to fight in World War I. In 1918 Geaslen was wounded in the hand during combat at Verdun, France. When the war was over, he returned to Covington and tried several occupations. A fine athlete, he enrolled at Xavier University in Cincinnati, simply for the chance to play on the school football team.

He also tried professional baseball and pitched batting practice for the Cincinnati Reds. When his career with the Reds did not advance, Geaslen

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signed to play center field in the Blue Grass League for the Paris, Ky., team. Baseball was not very lucrative, so in 1922 Geaslen applied, successfully, for a position with the Louisville and Nashville Railroad (L&N). During the Great Depression, Geaslen was laid off by the railroad. He then went to work for the Kentucky Post in Central Kentucky, managing circulation. To help boost the paper’s circulation, he carried a notebook and a camera and wrote human-interest stories about people he met along his route. His tactic paid off, with locals subscribing to see whom he had included in his column. When World War II began, Geaslen was called back by the L&N Railroad. Although he engineered by day, the writing bug had bitten.

He contributed a weekly column, Strolling along Memory Lane, for the Kentucky Post and wrote historical articles for the Kentucky Times-Star and the Cincinnati Enquirer. Following his retirement from the railroad in 1966 at age 70, he continued to write and to carry out research on Northern Kentucky history. He was the author of three books, which were compilations of his columns. They were titled Strolling along Memory Lane, volumes 1, 2, and 3. He also wrote a book called Our Moment of Glory in the Civil War, which was reprinted in 2007. Geaslen married Lucille Huber in 1928, and they had four children, Sue, John, Margaret, and Kathy. He died at the Madonna Manor Nursing Home in 1986 and was buried at St. Mary’s Cemetery in Fort Mitchell.

“Chester Geaslen, 89, Local Historian, Writer,” KP, January 7, 1986, 3B. Geaslen, Chester F. Strolling along Memory Lane. 3 vols. Newport, Ky.: Otto, 1971–1974.

Deborah Kohl Kremer

GENERAL BUTLER STATE RESORT PARK. The General Butler State Resort Park in Carroll Co. was formally presented to the Kentucky State Park Commission at the park dedication ceremony on August 12, 1931, as Butler Memorial State Park. The park was named for the illustrious Butler family, known for their military and political contributions from Colonial times through the Civil War. Oscar W. Geier of Carrollton, who sponsored the local citizen movement along with the Carrollton Tobacco Board, presented the deed of the old Butler Homestead, known today as the Butler-Turpin State Historic House, along with 300 acres, to create the park.

The acreage had been acquired with the help of the Tobacco Board. Since Carrollton was a tobacco market, the Tobacco Board of Trade had formed a plan whereby a small amount of tobacco was contributed by each member of this organization for some years, then sold. In a few years, a sum amounting to $22,000 had accumulated to be used for community benefit. These funds purchased the initial land for the Butler Memorial State Park. The site was developed by the state and federal governments through the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), the National Youth Administration, and the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The workers who built the park had little more than a

392 GENE SNYDER AIRPORT view to begin with; however, the hand-cut stone walls, pavilions, and an overlook that they fashioned still remain as testimonies to their expert stonemasonry.

The National Park Ser vice contributed $155,408 through December 1935 to the building of Butler Memorial State Park. Improvements made with these funds included a bathhouse, shelter houses, a lookout tower, a parking area, a water system, trails, bridges, picnic grounds, trail-side seats, public camp grounds, a custodian lodge, an incinerator, ser vice buildings, latrines, landscaping, guardrails, drinking fountains, picnic tables, camp stoves, park roads, and a lake about one mile long. Through 1941 the federal government continued to fund improvements, including a boathouse, a diving tower, and a ser vice building. With the beginning of World War II, further development was delayed.

The next major development occurred during the period 1948 through 1955. Approximately a half million dollars were applied to new construction and renovation. Land acquisitions increased the size of the park to around 800 acres, 10 new cottages were added, the old cottages built by the CCC were renovated, the trading post was renovated and expanded, the bath house was rebuilt and the bathing beach was enlarged, the Butler Home was restored and furnished, a complete new group camp was constructed, the picnic facilities were expanded, a new ser vice building was built, a new riding stable and trails were completed, and a new recreation area was developed. Final plans were completed and a contract was let during the latter part of 1955 for a new lodge, but construction was stopped at the foundation stage and the present lodge was not built until the early 1960s.

From 1960 through 1968, approximately $1.7 million was applied to additional development. The largest new facility was the present lodge, completed and placed in operation on October 31, 1962. The setting and architectural character of this lodge make it one of the most spectacular in the Kentucky park system. The lodge was designed

by Braun and Ryan, architects and engineers of Louisville. The initial construction included 24 rooms, and 8 additional rooms were financed from a $43 million revenue bond issue in 1965, to bring the total to 32 rooms. Other major developments have included a new nine-hole golf course located near the lodge, a new miniature golf course in the day-use area, a new expanded camping area, renovation or reconstruction of every building in the park, a complete new water and sewerage system, and new roads and parking.

The park retains many of the original elements from the early years. The beautiful stonemasonry construction can still be seen laced throughout the landscape. The manmade lake built more than 75 years ago now looks like a natural lake. It is difficult to believe that the preserved woodland areas, akin to the landscape in Kentucky at the early, unsettled stage, were once barren farmland. The homestead, known today as the Butler-Turpin State Historic House, stands as stately as it did

when first built in 1859. The Butler family cemetery is restored and protected. The original log house of the Butler family who settled at the mouth of the Kentucky River in 1796 is now a place where students of archaeology can explore the past.

Brooks, James W. “American History by Motor,” Washington (D.C.) Sunday Star, January 18, 1931.

“Butler Memorial State Park,” Kentucky Progress 3, no. 12 (August 1931).

Evelyn Welch

GENE SNYDER AIRPORT. The Gene Snyder Airport, located off Ky. Rt. 22 West, at 400 Gene Snyder Airport Dr., just four miles northwest of Falmouth, was built on the former farm of Henry Auchter and portions of surrounding farms. It was the fift h airport established in Pendleton Co. The first known airport was a grass strip located on the county’s old poor farm, on the Licking River bottoms of Hayes Station Rd., just north of Falmouth.

The second known airport was also a grass strip, located on the site of the current Pendleton Co. Athletic Park on U.S. 27 North in Falmouth. The next one was a grass strip at Shannings, just south of Falmouth, during the 1950s. The last grass airstrip to serve Pendleton Co. was located along the Licking River bottoms on Licking Valley Rd., in the vicinity of Kincaid Lake State Park, and included five hangars.

The paved Gene Snyder Airport, after being approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Kentucky Aeronautical Association, was dedicated on August 11, 1984. The founding members of the airport board were Robert Bay, Hildreth Kidd, Dr. Robert McKinney, Lloyd Spaulding, and Paul Tuemler. The first board’s attorney was Robert Bathalter. U.S. congressman Gene Snyder of Kentucky and U.S. secretary of transportation Elizabeth Dole were instrumental in obtaining the new airport for Pendleton Co. The Gene Snyder Airport, whose FAA identifier is K62, sits at an estimated elevation of 898 feet above mean sea level. There is no control tower at the airport. The airframe and power-plant ser vices are classified as major. However, there is no bottled or bulk oxygen available. The 4,000-by-75-foot asphalt northeast-southwest runway is considered to be in good condition. It has a single-wheel weightbearing capacity of 12,500 pounds, with mediumintensity edge lights on the runway.

Unlike many public landing facilities of its size, the airport offers pi lots the ability to refuel on an around-the-clock basis, using a credit card system.

Pi lots also have access to an outside telephone line and a small terminal. The airport has four small and two large paved hangars, in addition to tiedowns. There are typically five planes in one of the large hangars and as many as nine in the other. The airport is used quite often for refueling and emergency landings.

In April 2006, there were 23 airplanes based at the field, including 22 single-engine aircraft. At that time, the Gene Snyder Airport was averaging 96 aircraft operations per week. There is currently a waiting list to use the airport’s hangars. The volunteer airport board is working with the FAA and

the Kentucky Aeronautical Association to expand the operation to include taxiways and additional hangars.

AirNov.com. “K62 Gene Snyder Airport, Falmouth, Kentucky, USA.” www.airnav.com/airport/K62 (accessed June 5, 2006).

Lovelace, Donnie. Interview by Aprile Conrad Redden, September 29, 2006, Falmouth, Ky.

Michael D. Redden and Aprile Conrad Redden

GEOGRAPHY. See Dry Ridge Trace; Geology; Glaciers; Licking River; Ohio River; Weather and Climate.

GEOLOGY. Northern Kentucky stretches for more than 110 miles (176 km) along the Ohio River from Mason Co. in the east to Carroll Co. in the west. The northern boundary of seven counties within this area (Boone, Bracken, Campbell, Carroll, Gallatin, Kenton, and Mason) is the Ohio River. The Licking River divides Campbell and Kenton counties, flows through Pendleton Co., and forms the southwestern boundary of Robertson Co. The Kentucky River bisects Carroll Co. and forms the western boundary of Owen Co. Grant Co.’s Dry Ridge is a dividing point between tributaries flowing into the Kentucky River to the west and into the Licking River to the east.

The physiographic regions of Kentucky are defi ned by the surface topography. Northern Kentucky sits in the northern part of the Interior Low Plateaus Region, in the Outer Bluegrass subsection. Th is unglaciated area of gently dipping Paleozoic-age sedimentary rocks has relatively moderate topographic relief. The modern surface topography resulted from the entrenchment of the drainage systems that occurred before, during, and after the Pleistocene glacial advances.

The Outer Bluegrass subsection is more highly dissected than the rolling Central Bluegrass. The Northern Kentucky region is characterized by deeper valleys than the other subsections, both because of the nearness of the entrenched valley of the Ohio River and because the bedrock in this area is mostly composed of interbedded Ordovician limestone and shale. These rocks are more easily eroded than other sedimentary formations.

The surface topography is influenced by the kinds of rock that lie underneath. Although sandstone and shale occur throughout the region, much of the area is underlain by limestone. Karst topography, defined by limestone formations that are easily eroded to form sinkholes and underground streams, is well developed where these formations are near the surface.

The Outer Bluegrass overlays the Cincinnati Arch, a positive geologic feature composed of a thick sequence of Paleozoic-era sedimentary rocks.

These layers date to between 570 and 285 million years ago, although the oldest rocks exposed on the surface in Kentucky belong to the Ordovician period (505–438 million years ago).

The Precambrian rocks are ancient sedimentary layers that cover much of the Midwest. They

GEOLOGY

are part of the deeply buried Laurentia craton (the large nucleus of the continent) and are buried at least several thousand feet deep. The Laurentia craton is part of the larger North American Plate.

How these deeply buried layers were formed is not known. The passive behavior of the Laurentia craton is characterized by subdued subsidence and gentle uplift. These stable layers are called basement features. This long, inactive basement underlies the Paleozoic sedimentary layers.

The Paleozoic era includes seven geological periods dating from 570 to 285 million years ago. These successive layers of sedimentary rock formed in alternating shallow saline seas, swamps, and dry land.

Weathering and erosion marked the dry periods, often allowing for little or no soil formation during those periods. Even the rock layers were eroded away. Fossils are found in many of these layers.

The oldest rocks exposed on the surface in Northern Kentucky belong to the Ordovician period (505–438 million years ago), except in eastern Mason Co., where the more recent Silurian-period rocks are the oldest. Ordovician sedimentary formations were deposited in alternating shallow and deeper salt-water seas. Limestone is the predominant resulting bedrock. Shale is also found layered with the limestone, and dolomite forms a deeper subsurface layer from this period. The most common fossils from this period are bryozoans (fossil coral). Other common fossils include brachiopods, cephalopods, trilobites, horn coral, snails, clams, echinoderms, and graptolites.

Limestone is derived from the hard parts of ancient sea life and formed generally in clear water.

Shale is formed from silts and clay and often includes calcareous shell and skeletal fragments of sea creatures. Deposits of sediments and the remains of sea animals and plants settled to the sea floor in horizontal layers. Compression over time pressed out any trapped water. The remaining material was cemented together, and the result is modern bedrock of varying types.

At the end of the Ordovician period, the area was again dry land and subject to erosion. The sea soon returned and through the Silurian period varied from shallow to deep water. In eastern Mason Co., dolomite and dolomitic limestone is interbedded with clay shales. In this period, coral reefs were very common. The most common fossils include brachiopods, cephalopods, echinoderms, and clams.

The Ordovician-Silurian transition also saw the gradual uplift that formed the Cincinnati Arch.

Buried interior basins of North America are separated by broad uplifted arches such as the Cincinnati Arch. To the east and west, the bedrock dips into the Appalachian Basin on the east and the Illinois Basin on the west.

Erosion and weathering removed all traces of the later Paleozoic periods from the Northern Kentucky region, except in eastern Mason Co., as noted. Ordovician-period rock is present in eastern Mason Co., but the Silurian bedrock, which has not eroded, overlays it. Rocks and fossils from later periods, such as the Devonian, the Mississippian, and the Pennsylvanian, are found elsewhere in Kentucky, but not in this region.

Around the end of the Permian period, a major mountain-building event called the Alleghenian Orogeny occurred. The combined continents of Europe and Africa collided with North America.

This event lifted up the Appalachian Mountains and caused further uplift to the Cincinnati Arch.

As a result, during the Mesozoic era and for much of the Tertiary period of the Cenozoic era, Kentucky was above sea level and experienced a nondepositional environment. Northern Kentucky was exposed to an erosional, weathering environment through the remainder of the prehistoric time periods up to beginning of the Quaternary period. The uplifted surface was initially a flat plain known as the Lexington peneplain.

This environment prohibited the formation of thick bedrock layers. As a result, no dinosaur bones have been recovered from Northern Kentucky.

With no physical record, it is not known whether they roamed Northern Kentucky, but a few remnant fossils have been recovered in the Jackson Purchase in southwestern Kentucky.

This nondepositional environment characterized Northern Kentucky until the Quaternary period of the Cenozoic era. The Quaternary is best known as the Ice Age. During the period from 1.8 million years ago to about 12,000 years ago, glaciers advanced into the United States from Canada and retreated. The glaciers had a profound effect on the creation of the local modern drainage system, including the Ohio River, soil formation, and the deposition of glacial outwash along the major river valleys. The Licking River is one of the few local preglacial rivers that still flows close to its old course. The present channels of the Ohio River and other local streams are a direct result of the

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successive advances and retreats of glaciers in the local region. The glaciers left deposits of loess (windblown) soil and sand, and glacial outwash along the Ohio River. In contrast, the major soil deposits along the Kentucky River and Eagle Creek are from slack water clay and silty alluvium caused by localized flooding, not from glacial deposition.

The modern topography of Northern Kentucky is the result of a combination of factors, then.

The underlying bedrock formed as horizontal sedimentary layers in a succession of salt-water seas.

These horizontal layers were uplifted to form the Cincinnati Arch. Succeeding geologic periods saw the erosion of surface layers, leaving the Ordovician bedrock layers at the top of the Cincinnati Arch. Glacial advances and retreats during the Quaternary period left varying depths of windblown soil (loess) and glacial outwash, including sand and gravels along the major river valleys.

Modern soil formed both from glacial deposits and from weathering of the limestone and shale bedrock. The environment had shifted to a more depositional one during the Pleistocene Ice Age. However, the erosional environment also continues with the downcutting of stream valleys, creating stream channels, ravines, and other dissected features in the old Lexington peneplain.

Davis, Richard A. Cincinnati Fossils: An Elementary Guide to the Ordovician Rocks and Fossils of the Cincinnati, Ohio, Region. Cincinnati: Cincinnati Museum of Natural History, 1992.

Kentucky Geological Survey. “Geologic Map of Kentucky.” www.uky.edu/KGS/geoky/geologymap.htm (accessed July 25, 2006).

Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia.

Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1992.

KENTUCKY GEOLOGIC PERIODS

Era/Period

Age (Millions of Years Ago)

Precambrian Paleozoic Era Cambrian period Ordovician period

Before 544 million 570–505 505–438

Silurian period Devonian period

438–408 408–360

Mississippian period

360–325

Pennsylvanian period Permian period

325–280 280–248

Mesozoic Era Triassic period Jurassic period Cretaceous period Cenozoic Era Tertiary period Quaternary period Pleistocene epoch

Holocene epoch

248–208 208–146 146–65

Occurrence Buried deeply, no surface exposure Buried deeply, no surface exposure Central to Northern Kentucky, crest of Cincinnati Arch Around edges of Arch, eastern Mason Co. Around edges of Arch, not in Northern Kentucky Eastern, South Central, and Western Kentuck Eastern and Western Kentucky coal fields Not found in Kentucky, except possibly in Jackson Purchase Jackson Purchase

65–1.8 Jackson Purchase 1.8–present 1.8 million–12,000 yrs. Along Ohio River margins in Northern before present Kentucky, glacial advances; formation of modern river systems 12,000 to present Present-day topography of state

394 GERMAN AMERICANS Potter, Paul Edwin. Exploring the Geology of the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Region. Special Publication 22, Series 11. Lexington: Kentucky Geologic Survey, Univ. of Kentucky, 1996.

Jeannine Kreinbrink

GERMAN AMERICANS. German Americans were one of the major immigrant groups to settle in Northern Kentucky. By 1790 Kentucky’s population was 14% German, and by 1990 the population of German descent had reached 22%. The first German settlers came from the Carolinas, Virginia, and Pennsylvania and had immigrated to America before the Revolutionary War. Their main route was via the Cumberland Gap into southern Kentucky, and their settlement area of choice was the Bluegrass region. In the 19th century, Germans entered the state directly from Europe, with the Ohio River being the major travel route to Kentucky. By the 1850s, Cincinnati had developed into one of the three major urban centers of the German immigration, along with St. Louis, Mo., and Milwaukee, Wis., thereby making the Greater Cincinnati area, including Northern Kentucky, one corner of the so-called German Triangle. German immigration to and settlement in the region reflected similar patterns and origins.

The first Germans in Boone Co. arrived in 1785.

They were the family of Johannes Tanner, who established Tanner’s Station, a trading post that eventually developed into the city of Florence; north of the Ohio River, the first Germans did not arrive until 1788–1789. Tanner was a German Baptist preacher from Pennsylvania, whose congregation had moved with him to the German settlement of Germanna, Va. News of Tanner’s Station spread back to Germanna, as well as to Pennsylvania, causing more Germans to migrate to Northern Kentucky. For example, in 1805, 14 families arrived from a settlement on the Rapidan River in Virginia in Conestoga wagons, a frontier vehicle devised by the Pennsylvania Germans. The group formed the Hopeful Lutheran Church in 1806, the oldest Protestant church west of the Allegheny Mountains. In 1813 they called Pastor Wilhelm Carpenter (Zimmermann) from the Hebron Church in Madison Co., Va., and the congregation grew, attracting more Germans to the area. Carpenter, who had served in the Virginia division of Gen. Peter Muehlenberg during the Revolutionary War, established a church school. As a result of the growing congregation, the town of Florence was founded, but it was not incorporated until 1830. By 1880 its population had risen to around 600, and the town included six churches, several schools, and a brewery.

Campbell Co., organized in 1794, had several Germans among property owners in the city of Newport. Germans were engaged in a variety of occupations; for example, the first tavern was established by a German (1795). They also built roads and introduced the first brewery and the first vineyards in the hills of Campbell Co., and German mechanics helped construct the paddle wheeelers on the Licking River. German women introduced weaving as well.

The first Germans in Kenton Co. were George Jaeger and Johannes Strader (Straeter), who explored the Licking River with Simon Kenton in 1771. In 1774 several Germans from Virginia, including Jacob Harrod, Abraham Hite (Heit), and Jacob and Johann Sodowsky, came down the Ohio River and camped at the mouth of the Licking River; both of the Sodowsky brothers lived for a time in Campbell Co. and later moved elsewhere.

German settlers began to arrive in the 1790s, especially from Pennsylvania; one of them was Edmund Rittenhaus, a relative of the well-known astronomer and scientist David Rittenhouse. In 1815 the city of Covington was formed and named in honor of Gen. Leonard Covington, whose father had immigrated to Maryland from the Alsace region and whose name originally was written as Korfingthan or Kurfingthan.

After the conclusion of the Napoleonic era by means of the Congress of Vienna in 1815, German immigration greatly increased, especially after the revolutions of 1832–1833 and 1848 in Europe; during this period Germans immigrated for political as well as economic reasons. Many were attracted by the existing German element of the region and by the glowing reports of the area by the German Moravian missionary Johann Heckewelder in 1797 and by travel authors such as Charles Sealsfield and Gottfried Duden, who wrote in the 1820s.

These works commented on the beautiful river valley, the rich and cheap farmland, the political and religious freedoms, and the presence of Germans in the area, all factors that attracted immigrants.

The emerging German-language press of Cincinnati, beginning especially with the Volksblatt in the 1830s, as well as that of Louisville, also helped to publicize the area.

In ensuing years, Florence, Newport, and Covington developed as the major German American urban centers of Northern Kentucky. German congregations especially began to emerge in the 1840s.

In 1841 the German Catholics formed their congregation in Covington with Rev. Ferdinand Kühr, considered the German patriarch of Covington.

Their church, the Mutter Gottes Kirche, or Mother of God Catholic Church, stands today as one of the most majestic church edifices of Northern Kentucky. Other congregations followed in Covington, such as the German Protestant Evangelical Church (1847). Churches also established schools and various charitable institutions and sponsored German-style social events and picnics. For many Germans, life revolved around their par ticu lar congregation, which became the center of their religious, educational, social, and cultural life.

German secular societies also developed, such as the Covington Turngemeinde (1855), begun by the Turner Movement. The first such society had been formed in Cincinnati in 1848 by refugees of the 1848 revolution, including Friedrich Hecker, leader of the revolution in Baden, Germany. The word Turner came from the German word turnen, which means to turn, move, and exercise; the Turners believed in keeping physically fit. However, they were more than a gymnastic group, because they also believed in a “sound mind in a sound

body,” keeping intellectually fit as well. Their interests therefore were not only social but also cultural and political.

The influx of German immigrants transformed the region socially, culturally, religiously, and politically and was not without confl ict in the 1850s, when German Americans met with nativist opposition in the form of the Know-Nothing movement. There was a cultural clash between the predominantly Anglo nativists and the recently arrived immigrants, which was best symbolized by the two groups’ differing ideas about Sunday.

On the one hand was the notion of the Puritan Sunday and on the other the Continental Sunday.

The former held that no business or social activities should take place on Sunday, whereas the latter held that Sunday afternoons were the time for social activities, such as festivals and picnics, and that businesses, such as beer gardens, restaurants, and cafés, should be open. A number of encounters occurred in which the nativists took action against German American activities. For example, in 1856 the Covington Turners were attacked by a nativist mob during a parade held in conjunction with a German-style picnic.

Nativist hostilities subsided with the growing sectional crisis that led to the Civil War; German Americans supported the new immigrant-friendly Republican Party. Although Kentucky was neutral at the outbreak of the war, Germans from Northern Kentucky joined the ranks of the 9th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment formed by the Cincinnati Turners, the 32nd Indiana Volunteer Infantry Regiment formed by Germans in southeastern Indiana, and other German units formed later in Louisville. Pride in German American achievements, especially having to do with ser vice in the Union Army in the Civil War, led to the formation of the German Pioneer Society of Cincinnati in 1869 and then to the German Pioneer Society of Covington in 1877; another branch formed later in Newport.

Information on these groups can be found in the historical journal Der Deutsche Pionier, edited by Heinrich A. Rattermann, and in the records of the German Pioneer Society of Covington at the Kenton Co. Public Library in Covington.

The growth and development of German American societies nationally led to the founding of the National German American Alliance in Philadelphia in 1901. It was made up of statewide alliances of umbrella organizations of German American societies formed at the city level. Both Newport and Covington had branches of the German-American Alliance; the Covington branch included 27 organizations, such as the Turners and the German Pioneer Society. These and other branches across the state affiliated together as the German-American State Alliance of Kentucky, with headquarters in Covington. Its president was Alfred Reinhardt of Newport, and its secretary, the driving force of the organization, was Alban Wolff, head of the Wolff Printing Company of Covington, located at 404 Scott St. The German-American State Alliance took an active role in political affairs, strongly opposing Prohibition and supporting German bilingual

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education in the public schools, as well as physical education based on Turner principles. It and its local branches also sponsored the annual celebration of German Day, which marked the founding of the first permanent German settlement in America at Philadelphia on October 6, 1683. For example, in conjunction with the German-American Bicentennial of German Day in 1883, the Newport Turners celebrated their 23rd gymnastic and songfest event at Turner Hall in Newport, and the Covington German Pioneer Society organized a parade. A church ser vice was held at the Salem Methodist Episcopal Church in Newport (see Salem United Methodist Church) that also commemorated the birth of the German Protestant reformer Martin Luther. A cross-section of religious and secular institutions and organizations thus joined together in celebrating the German heritage of the nation, as well as of Northern Kentucky.

German Americans aimed at blending and uniting their German and American identities as German American. For example, in 1898 Newport’s German Day parade included the singing not only of German songs, but also of “My Old Kentucky Home.”

In 1909 the German-American State Alliance held its convention at Turner Hall in Covington, and in 1911 the convention was held at various locations in Northern Kentucky. More than 11,000 attended the German Day celebration at the Lagoon Amusement Park in Ludlow, and guests included Kentucky governor Augustus E. Willson (1907–1911) and Dr. O. Mezger, the German consul for the region. The last major German Day before World War I was held in 1916 and included a mass rally at the Carnegie Library Auditorium in Covington. On that occasion strong opposition to American involvement in the war in Europe was expressed.

The entrance of America into World War I resulted nationally in the so-called anti-German hysteria, which also found expression in Northern Kentucky. German instruction ceased in area schools, public and parochial. In 1918 the Covington Turngemeinde officially changed its name to the Covington Turners Society, and streets, organizations, and institutions followed suit by translating or Americanizing their names. Some families also changed their names: Braun to Brown, Baumann to Bowman, for example. German churches dropped German-language ser vices, and the German-American State Alliance of Kentucky dissolved, along with its local branches. A pacifist minister was even tied and whipped “in the name of the women and children of Belgium.” World War I was followed by the hard times of Prohibition, which struck a direct blow not only at the major industry of brewing but also at German American social life, where beer was a basic ingredient.

World War II brought another war against the ancestral homeland of Northern Kentucky German Americans, but fortunately without the local excesses of the previous world war.

The post–World War II era ushered in the ethnic heritage and “roots” revival of the 1970s and beyond.

In 1976 the Northern Kentucky Convention

and Visitors Bureau obtained state funding for the creation of Main Strasse Village, a Germanstyle village in Covington, which has become a major tourist attraction and the site of annual festivals, such as Maifest and Oktoberfest. In 1989 the German-American Citizens League of Greater Cincinnati sponsored the celebration of GermanAmerican Day on October 6 and held the celebration at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption in Covington with a program of Mozart and other German composers. The program noted that its purpose was “to provide the opportunity to not only celebrate the German heritage but to also explore the many contributions and influences German Americans have made locally and nationally.”

German American influences on the region can be found in every possible field, as could be expected, given the percentage of the population that is of German descent. According to the census for Northern Kentucky counties, approximately 45 percent claim some German ancestry, making Northern Kentuckians of German descent the largest ethnic element of the region. The business, industrial, social, cultural, religious, and political life of Northern Kentucky reflects this percentage of the population. Symbolic of culinary influence is, of course, the ever-popular German sausage, goetta, which also reflects the geographic origin within Germany of the Germans who immigrated to the area. Census records for Northern Kentucky reveal that more than three-fourths of the German immigration derived from northern Germany, especially northwestern Germany, and the same is true of the German immigration north of the Ohio River. This knowledge provides a key to understanding the German heritage of the region.

German heritage no doubt attracted the Hofbräuhaus to locate its first American outlet at Newport, which now also sponsors Oktoberfest, as does Covington. German influences dot the landscape across Northern Kentucky, from church steeples and city streets to the John A. Roebling Bridge, a central landmark. The image of Northern Kentucky has been greatly and definitely influenced by the region’s German heritage.

Rattermann, Heinrich A. Kentucky’s German Pioneers: H. A. Rattermann’s History. Trans. and ed.

Don Heinrich Tolzmann. Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 2001.

Tolzmann, Don Heinrich. Covington’s German Heritage. Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 1998.

———. German Heritage Guide to the Greater Cincinnati Area. Milford, Ohio: Little Miami, 2003.

Don Heinrich Tolzmann

GERMANTOWN. Pennsylvania Dutch people originally settled Germantown in about 1788. Initially, the town was located about three-fourths of a mile west of present-day Germantown. The original settlement was a log fort located where Asbury Rd. meets Ky. Rt. 10 and was called Buchanan Station. At one time, there were about 600 inhabitants living at Buchanan Station. Maysville was then only a landing, Augusta had not yet been thought of, and Cincinnati was an unbroken wilderness.

Because the location of Buchanan Station was

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rather remote and because the settlement was some distance from a navigable stream and too hilly for road building, not much growth occurred.

This part of Mason Co. had no rock roads, and the nearest town to the settlers’ station was Washington, Ky., which was laid out in 1785. All of Mason Co. had fewer than 3,000 people. In 1794, on the nearby high plateau, approximately five miles north of the confluence of Pummell Creek and the North Licking River, and nine miles west of Washington, Whitfield Craig and associates laid out a town of approximately 4,000 square feet. It consisted of Main St., 2,145 feet long; Broadway, 1,089 feet long; Water St., 990 feet long; Frankfort St., 2,705 feet long; and about three and one-half miles of alleys.

The Kentucky legislature granted the town a charter and incorporated it as Germantown.

The city was given authority to elect a city council, to enact ordinances for self-government, to regulate the types of business conducted within the city limits, and to enforce the ordinances by fine or imprisonment, providing that no city ordinance conflicted with state or national law. This same form of city-council government continues in Germantown today. Modern-day Germantown has a park with a walking track, a new building housing city offices and the fire department, new town streetlights, and a main sewage system. In 1797 Bracken Co. was formed out of parts of Mason and Campbell counties, and Germantown was divided, with one part in Mason Co. and the other in Bracken Co. Thus the town acquired the nickname of “the best little town in two counties.”

The central industry in Germantown was the tannery, consisting of several large vats, which was located on Tanyard Hill. A man named Currans was sent as a young man to Germantown to learn the tanning trade. While working as a tanner, he rescued a 13-year-old girl who fell into one of the vats, and soon afterward he married her. Currans eventually built the first store in Germantown and also operated the Pepper House. Jesse Grant, the father of U.S. president Ulysses S. Grant, learned the tanning trade at the tannery in Germantown.

After he finished this training, he went to Point Pleasant, Ohio; there he married Hannah Simpson, and their son, Ulysses, was born there.

The Germantown Fair, which locals refer to as “The Old Reliable,” originated at a meeting held in Germantown on July 29, 1854. The first fair was held on Thursday and Friday, October 5 and 6, 1854, in local woodlands. The grounds were enclosed by a post-and-rail fence. Admission was 10 cents, and everyone who came to the fair was given a piece of blue ribbon, which was tied securely to a buttonhole. The first permanent fairgrounds building was built a year later and improved in 1920. In 1967 the fair was moved to its present location. “The Old Reliable” is still going strong and annually draws large crowds during the first full week in August. It has been held each year since 1854, except for the years 1942 and 1943, when the fair was suspended because of World War II. During the Civil War, the Union Army camped at the town’s fairgrounds. They raided Germantown and took horses and slaves. Local

396 GERMANTOWN CHRISTIAN CHURCH slave owners built slave pits, six feet by six feet, under the floors of their homes to hide their slaves.

Two such pits were found in the home of Ruby Ashcraft during recent renovation. The Union soldiers also searched for Southern sympathizers.

One of these was Dr. E. C. Dimmitt, who, having discovered that the federal troops were searching for him, took refuge outside of town in the old Humlong Cemetery on Ky. Rt. 10. The Union soldiers passed him by and he went undiscovered.

The early settlers of Germantown were very interested in education, and schools were established as early as 1827. They were held in any place that was available and met for only a few months at a time. The Germantown Hall, one of the oldest buildings in Germantown, began as a school building; school was held on the second floor until 1878, when the school trustees purchased a lot in town for a new building. In April 1879 this new twostory, four-room structure was completed. It was regarded as being a first-class schoolhouse and the best public school in Mason, Bracken, or the adjoining counties. After the school moved to the new building, Germantown Hall was used to house a post office, a lodge, and a jail, which was added to the back of the building in October 1871, at a cost of $280.

The Germantown school that moved to the new site in 1879 became a graded school in 1909 and a high school in 1911; a new four-room brick building was built for it in 1930. The school became a part of the Bracken Co. School System in 1936, and the class of 1939 was the last class to graduate from Germantown High School. The county high schools were consolidated in 1940.

The ninth grade was transferred to the Bracken Co. High School (see Bracken Co. Public Schools) in 1956, and the Germantown School building was closed in 1987, when the county elementary schools were consolidated. Wayne McGee was the last principal of the Germantown Elementary School.

The building is currently owned by Woodmen of the World Insurance Inc. Early businesses in Germantown included a factory for the making of grey jeans and men’s clothing, the Morris Browning Drug Store, the T. T. Hill and Son Grocery, and the Pepper Funeral Home. S. C. Pincard, one of Germantown’s early storekeepers, sold everything a person might need, ranging from groceries to furniture and from horses and buggies for hire to coffins costing $1.50– $8.00. It was said that tobacco was received in Germantown in good order, which meant that it was delivered in the summer following the year in which it was grown. There were warehouses in town on Frankfort St. and Bracken Alley, and both structures remain. The Germantown Milling Company was founded in 1910, destroyed by fire on June 25, 1915, and then rebuilt. The company purchased the Sardis Mill in town so it could remain in business while the burned mill was being rebuilt. The Germantown Milling Company was the only mill in Bracken Co. making flour. The Bank of Germantown and the Farmers and Traders Bank were both operating in town in 1910; they merged in 1930 to form the Bank of Germantown. Dr. Joe Browning

owned the first automobile in Germantown, and during the 1920s electric lights replaced gasoline lights. The city bought its first fire engine and established a fire department in 1928. It purchased a new firefighting apparatus with a 500-gallons-perminute pump capacity in 1948.

In 1958 Germantown expanded its city limits for the first time, extending Frankfort St. out Bridgeville Rd. for three-tenths of a mile. In 1960 the town again extended its city limits out SalemLowell Rd. 2,200 feet.

Although Germantown is geographically divided between two counties, the residents of Germantown demonstrate loyalty to one another. They frequently band together and sponsor suppers and other such activities to raise money for new playground equipment; they support the fire department’s car shows and dances, as well as other fundraisers. Each year in September, the Germantown Festival brings townspeople together. The churches, the fire department, and local homemakers join to run the food booths, make ice cream, bake cakes, work the contests, conduct the festival’s dance, and hold baby shows. All funds received are divided equally among the participating organizations.

Bracken Co. Extension Homemakers. History of Bracken County. Bicentennial ed. Brooksville, Ky., 2002.

Bracken Homemakers History Committee. Recollections: Yesterday, Today for Tomorrow. Brooksville, Ky.: Poage, 1969.

Calvert, Jean, and John Klee. The Towns of Mason County: Their Past in Pictures. Maysville, Ky.: Maysville and Mason Co. Library Historical and Scientific Association, 1986.

Rennick, Robert M. Kentucky Place Names. Lexington: Univ. of Kentucky Press, 1984.

Mary Lou Simons

GERMANTOWN CHRISTIAN CHURCH. The beginning of the Germantown Christian Church in Mason Co. was tied to the death of a young soldier in 1826. Maj. John D. Morford, a veteran of the War of 1812, buried his son on the south side of Germantown that year. Recognizing the need for upkeep of the grave site, Morford donated a plot of ground around the grave for a church to be built. This church began as a Baptist Church and later became a Christian Church. The lovely brick building that remains includes a large auditorium and the original balcony where slaves could be seated. The first ser vice was held in this structure in 1857. The building was enlarged with Sunday school rooms and a basement in 1924. On a Sunday evening in February 1975, the building was almost destroyed by fire set by a serial arsonist.

However, it was immaculately restored and reopened in 1976.

Bracken Co. Extension Homemakers. History of Bracken County. Bicentennial ed. Brooksville, Ky.: Bracken Co. Extension Homemakers, 2002.

Caroline R. Miller

GEX. The Gallatin Co. community of Gex (pronounced jay) began during the 19th century as a

boat landing on the Ohio River west of Stephens Creek and east of Agniels Branch. The town was named for the Antoine Gex family, who were among the Swiss immigrants who settled across the Ohio River in nearby Vevay, Ind. A son of that family, John Anthony Gex (1819–1907), his wife Cyrene, and five children ranging in age from 14 to 27 were listed as residents of Gex in the 1850 Kentucky census. The settlement of the area continued as other immigrants moving in began to farm the area’s rich river bottomland, pasture livestock on the valley hills, and build clapboard or brick houses near the road that ran between Warsaw and Ghent.

A post office was established on March 19, 1898, when Thomas Mylor Jr., who in 1854 had emigrated from County Wexford, Ireland, was named postmaster. The post office was located in Mylor’s general store, and his daughter Maggie served as the assistant postmaster. It remained there until August 15, 1907, when the mail was rerouted to Sanders. The area called Gex remained a farming community and was later assigned a Ghent postal address as part of Rural Free Delivery. A one-room grade school at Gex served the community’s children until schools in the county were consolidated.

The general store was closed and the building sold in 1932, just after the road running through Gex was repaved and became part of U.S. 42. The end of the 20th century saw industry enter the community of Gex: Gallatin Steel built its plant on the south side of the highway outside of town. A firm known as Steel Technologies also located nearby, and three other manufacturing businesses now occupy what was formerly farmland. A restaurant is the only commercial building in town. Although a few of the original houses remain, most of the homes in Gex are newer structures. An exception is the 1865 Gex house, purchased by Gallatin Steel and preserved along with the house’s original outbuildings that overlook the Ohio River.

An Atlas of Carroll and Gallatin Counties, Kentucky.

Philadelphia: D. J. Lake, 1883.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

Jacquelene P. Mylor

GEX LANDING INCIDENT. Resentment against the U.S. Colored Troops (USCT) established by President Abraham Lincoln in spring 1863 dominated Kentucky politics into 1864, and it festered particularly in the north central counties where Confederate sympathies were most pronounced. The Union forces were thinly stretched across Kentucky. Confederate colonel George Jesse had been ordered to collect the scattered remnants of Gen. John Hunt Morgan’s Cavalry after Morgan’s forces were routed in June 1864 at Cynthiana, Ky. Jesse stationed himself in familiar territory at New Castle in Henry Co. As his now relatively independent forces strengthened, Jesse harassed supply lines and targeted Union supporters throughout the area.

Into this hostile territory in August 1864, recently promoted Lt. Frederick D. Seward led a detachment of Company C of the 117th USCT, mus-

GHENT

tered at Covington in July 1864. This squad of untrained infantry was sent to protect recruits obtained for the 5th U.S. Colored Cavalry (USCC) among slaves and free people of color in Carroll, Gallatin, Grant, and Owen counties. The officers of USCT and USCC units were white. Indiana native Frederick Seward had completed two years of service with Company E, 9th Minnesota Regiment, before his promotion to lieutenant. About August 22, the USCT squad arrested James Southard, a leading Confederate sympathizer and ferryman at Ghent, Gallatin Co. Southard owned land along the Ohio River that formed the Ghent landing. His brother notified Colonel Jesse, who was in Henry Co., that James Southard had been taken by USCT troops.

Jesse’s cavalry caught up with the USCT squad at the plantation of Lucien C. Gex, just outside Ghent, on August 29, 1864. According to eyewitness Virginia Craig, that night the USCT unit had been separated into two groups of six each; one group was fed dinner at the farm of her father, and the other group was fed at an unspecified nearby farm.

Jesse’s men surprised and captured the USCT soldiers, and in their first engagement with the enemy, the Union troops were scattered across the farms of Albert and John A. Craig. The CSA troops rescued Southard at John A. Craig’s farm. There were casualties among the USCT troops, but the exact number of them is unknown. Over the next day or so, several different accounts of the incident were recorded, and thus the tale of the Gex Landing Massacre was established.

On August 30, 1864, Union lieutenant colonel Thomas B. Fairleigh, at Louisville, requested aide from J. Bates Dickson, assistant adjutant at Lexington: “Last evening [Confederate colonel] Jesse with 150 men captured a squad of eight or ten colored troops at Ghent and murdered them. Other squads are in the country where he is hunting. Can’t you send some men there?”

Virginia Craig, daughter of Albert Craig, recorded in her diary of August 30, 1864, that six of the USCT soldiers were fed at her house and were surprised and captured by rebel soldiers who had searched the house. She said that Southard was being held at her cousin John’s house and was rescued. According to her diary, one USCT soldier had been killed and subsequently buried on Albert Craig’s lower farm, two wounded USCT soldiers had been put on the packet steamer Rowena bound for Cincinnati, and the rest were captured, including a white recruiter.

A Cincinnati newspaper, the Commercial Dispatch, carried the story within the week, claiming that one of the two wounded USCT soldiers had died in transit on the Rowena. This story further claimed that there had been 60 USCT and 100 CSA involved in the incident at Ghent.

A highly partisan version of the “massacre” was carried in the August 31, 1864, issue of the Louisville Daily Journal, generally a pro-Union newspaper. There it was stated that Jesse’s troops had massacred unarmed Negro troops, “shooting them like wild beasts.” The next day the Louisville Daily Journal reported that Jesse’s troops had destroyed

Lock No. 1 on the Kentucky River and had “proclaimed vengeance against all Negro soldiers and recruits. It will be [Jesse’s] policy to murder all that may fall into his hands. His recent massacre of the blacks at Ghent shows that his words [are] not simple idle bombast.”

Two days later, the newspaper corrected its earlier story: “Jesse did not murder negroes at Ghent— none killed except in attack. His men urged him to murder entire party but he refused the barbarous act.” Then on September 5, the newspaper reported that “seven of the colored soldiers reached Owenton [Ky.] from Port Royal [Ky.] on Wednesday last where released . . . one a Sgt., two wounded, fifteen captured, eight remained with rebels voluntarily . . . no bad treatment by Jesse.”

As if the story were not confused enough by the presence of two different black units at the skirmish, in November 1864 elements of the 5th U.S. Colored Cavalry were assigned to patrol duty at Ghent and Warsaw. Local citizens apparently made no distinction between the USCT and USCC units.

In December 1864, the 117th USCT, stationed at Camp Nelson in Jessamine Co., was folded into the 25th Union Brigade, and white regiments in the brigade were transferred. The 117th regiment under the 25th Corps saw action at Richmond and Appomattox in Virginia and in the final Texas campaign. Compared to these other battles, the Gex landing skirmish was insignificant. The official regimental records of the 5th USCC state that at the Ghent skirmish one soldier was killed, six were captured but later escaped, and five returned to their unit.

The story was embellished further during the early 1900s when A. L. Gex, the son of Lucien Gex, found three graves churned up by a cyclone (tornado) and reported seeing “foot bones in perfectly preserved shoes.”

The wide discrepancies concerning the numbers involved in the Ghent incident can be attributed to wartime hysteria and to newspaper reporting that was dependent on local sources for its news coverage. The presence of both cavalry and infantry units among the black troops and recent recruits of slaves from the region added to confusion about the number of deaths and about those who were released or remained with the Confederates.

From the family letters exchanged during the Civil War, it appears that the Gex and Craig families originally supported Kentucky’s neutrality but were bitterly opposed to the formation of USCT units and the military draft. By 1865 these families had affi liated themselves totally with the Conservative Democrats, a political faction that tipped the balance in the Kentucky legislature toward a pro-Southern position following the Civil War. Abbett, H. J., Warsaw, to A. G. Craig, July 18, 1865.

Craig Papers, King Library, Univ. of Kentucky, Lexington.

Carroll Co. Deed Book 2: 157, 196; 17: 119; 20: 2, Carrollton, Ky. Cincinnati newspaper clippings, September 1864, made by Lucien Gex. Craig Papers.

Craig, Virginia. Diary excerpt, King Library, Univ. of Kentucky.

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Gex, A. L., son of Lucien Gex, embellished narrative, ca. 1900. Craig Papers.

Harrison, Lowell H., and James C. Klotter. A New History of Kentucky. Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1997.

Louisville Daily Journal, August 31, September 1, 3, 5, 1864.

Prichard, James. “Colonel Jesse,” typed manuscript, privately held by James Prichard, Kentucky Libraries and Archives, Frankfort, Ky.

Diane Perrine Coon

GHENT. The town of Ghent in Carroll Co., a thriving Ohio River port throughout the 1800s, began with Benjamin Craig’s 1794 settlement of McCoull’s Bottom, a 1,000-acre tract purchased from Ann McCoull, widow of Neil McCoull of Fredericksburg, Va. The property had originally been granted to the heirs of Ann’s brother, Theodosius McDonald, who died in the French and Indian War. The McCool’s Creek settlement provided overland access to the Ohio River for several surrounding counties. A ferry soon linked it to Vevay, Ind., which was settled by Swiss immigrants as early as 1802.

In 1810 John and Samuel Sanders purchased from Benjamin Craig, who was their uncle, a 300acre tract, upon which Samuel Sanders laid out a town of eight streets and 108 lots in 1816. It was called Ghent, and the legend persists that Henry Clay, a signer of the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812, suggested the name.

Benjamin Craig sold 200 acres east of the Sanders’s tract to his brother, noted Indian fighter Jeremiah Craig. This acreage stretched from Jerry Craig’s Creek (now Black Rock) to Ferry St. in Ghent, marking where Jeremiah Craig operated the ferry for his nephew Samuel Sanders. Sanders’s Tavern was a popu lar stopping place in the early 1800s, as was the America House, a nearby hotel.

Much of Jeremiah Craig’s tract was acquired by Rev. John Scott and continues to be owned by Scott descendants today. Scott-Land Gardens, a road house with tourist cabins, operated there during the early 1900s.

In 1814 the “mother church” for the area’s Baptist churches relocated to the settlement and built a new brick sanctuary along Ferry St. in 1843, on land donated by John Scott. It is now known as the Ghent Baptist Church. “Reformers” split off to form the Ghent Christian Church in 1836, and the two congregations hosted Baptist evangelist T. J. Fisher and Disciples of Christ publisher Ben Franklin in a religious debate at the Baptist Church in 1857. The debate was transcribed and published as a book.

In 1843 Samuel Sanders’s nephew George N. Sanders organized a political meeting at Ghent, calling upon prospective presidential candidates to declare their position on the annexation of Texas. The response of little-known speaker James K. Polk launched his successful candidacy and led to the Mexican War. It also marked the beginning of George Sanders’s controversial political career, which ended in exile because Sanders was a suspect in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

398 GHENT BAPTIST CHURCH Ghent’s most notable Civil War incident occurred in 1864, when a regiment of African American soldiers arrested a man at Ghent and were subsequently ambushed near Gex’s Landing in Kentucky at the Gallatin Co. line (see African Americans in the Civil War; Gex Landing Incident). After the Civil War, African American members split off from the Baptist Church to form the Ghent Second Baptist Church, which still meets occasionally under longtime minister Rev. John Sharpe. Little is known of an African Methodist church in Ghent that is mentioned in old deeds. An African American hamlet outside of town may have given Black Rock Rd. its name.

Numerous fraternal organizations thrived in Ghent from before the Civil War through the early 1900s. Surviving Ghent newspapers mention meetings of the Masonic Order, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias, the Order of Red Men, and others. The Masons and the Odd Fellows built tall brick “temples” downtown.

In 1856 the Ghent Cemetery began as a group of adjacent cemeteries, one section operated by the Masons, another by the Odd Fellows, and a later third section operated by the Scott brothers, local undertakers. The Colored Odd Fellows added a fourth section for the black community; when the lodge disappeared, that part of the cemetery fell into neglect and was replaced by an African American cemetery southwest of town.

There were also women’s clubs and missionary and literary societies. The Caby M. Froman Club is the oldest active club in the Kentucky Federation of Women’s Clubs, and its offspring the Ghent Women’s Club still meets. The once-influential Daughters of the Confederacy is gone.

The three-story brick Ghent College was constructed on the west side of town in 1867. After 20 years the college closed and the building was used for Ghent High School.

It would be difficult to pinpoint when Ghent reached its peak before its inevitable decline. Perhaps it was in 1899, when Ghent’s newspaper, the Ghent Times, began a run that lasted several years.

Roads and shipping improved, and commerce was bypassing Ghent even before the Great Depression came, ending the steamboat culture. Well situated on high ground, Ghent was largely untouched by the flood of 1937—but not unaffected, as the already Depression-weakened Ghent Deposit Bank failed after 50 years in business.

In 1932 Ghent’s best-known native, James Tandy Ellis, returned to Ghent in semiretirement.

He was a popu lar Chautauqua entertainer, poet, and humorist, and in his widely published newspaper columns he often made reference to characters identified with his hometown. Late in life, he wrote a column lamenting Ghent’s condition. “Today we linger in the cobwebs,” he said. “Our high school gone; our bank gone; our drug store gone, our lumber and coal yard gone. We had a canning factory once, but that evaporated. . . . the town has no scales. We haven’t any hotel, and the tourists lam through town at 70 miles an hour.” Ellis further regretted that Ghent no longer had its flour mill or its bakery, that Scott’s Restaurant on the east side

of town had burned, and that the tavern west of town had closed. The town suffered another indignity soon afterward, when the old college building burned in 1940.

In the 1960s industry started to encroach on the town. Ghent prevented construction of a noxious plastics plant to its west, but the Walton Craig house was nonetheless demolished. Kentucky Utilities tore down several antebellum homes in 1973 to build a generating plant a mile east of town.

Smokestacks dominate the eastern skyline now, and electrical towers and transmission lines mar the high hills overlooking Ghent.

The automobile traffic from Cincinnati to Louisville along U.S. 42 bypassed Ghent completely once I-71 was completed in 1969; today commuters from Ghent can reach Cincinnati, Louisville, or Frankfort in an hour’s drive. In 1977 the Martha A. Graham, the last double-wheeled ferry operating on the Ohio River, ceased operation when Markland Dam was bridged, ending Ghent’s 175 years of shared history with Vevay, Ind. When the elementary school closed in 1972, Ghent lost another measure of local identity. On the site of the old college, the building remains, poorly utilized when not completely vacant.

Longtime town mayor Johnny Davis had few successes in preventing Ghent’s decline, which paralleled the decline of tobacco farming, but he did help save Ghent’s post office from closure; and before his death in 1992, he secured a sewer system for Ghent, to be shared by the North American Stainless plant being built west of town. The steel plant later expanded greatly and more plants followed, and with expansions of Kentucky Utilities, Dow Corning, and the nearby Belterra casino complex in Vevay, Ghent is surrounded by development without necessarily benefiting from it. The commonwealth of Kentucky is exploring several invasive options to deal with increased plant traffic through town.

Among the Ghent population, formerly consumers of both Cincinnati and Louisville media, the Cincinnati papers now have few subscribers.

The sole cable provider picks up local broadcasts only from Louisville, and Ghent has lost much of the affi nity it once shared with the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky area.

Despite all it has lost, many vestiges of Ghent’s past remain. The Sibley house on Ferry St. may date from Jeremiah Craig’s tenure; the 1833 Theodorick Fisher house and the James Tandy Ellis house (ca.

1861) are now bed-and-breakfasts. The business block on Main Cross is largely empty. A fire in 1915 destroyed several storefronts and weakened the Odd Fellows building; it collapsed suddenly months later and was rebuilt. An arsonist struck the 123-year-old Masonic Building in 1988, and its burned-out shell dominated the downtown for 15 years before being razed.

The Ghent Baptist Church continues to meet in its 1843 sanctuary. The Christian Church closed in 1989, and its 1871 building has been rehabilitated for city offices and a proposed museum. An earlier Christian Church building (ca. 1836) is now a private residence.

Entwined with a sycamore tree in the yard of James Bledsoe Tandy’s 1842 house on Main Cross are the remains of what some have deemed the largest grape vine in Kentucky. Across the street, the 1889 Methodist Church is in poor condition; the congregation stopped meeting during the early 1960s. Its previous church building, built in 1859, became the Ghent Deposit Bank and is now the town’s post office, operated by Retta Craig Lykins, a descendant of Benjamin Craig. An earlier Methodist Church building on Union St. became the telephone exchange and today is a private residence. Near the post office are the Charlene McPherson and Evelyn Sanders homes, both former hotels.

Many of Ghent’s small frame houses are also quite old. Some have become dilapidated, and concerns over their condemnation played a role in the 2006 election of William Mumphrey, Ghent’s first African American mayor.

Noteworthy “Ghentiles” not previously mentioned include Russell Dufour, an entertainer and music teacher who wrote articles on local history in the 1950s and 1960s; Nancy Diuguid, who became a respected theater director in England and South Africa; Pam Browning, a pioneering Kentucky women’s basketball player; Princie Brown, an African American businesswoman; Price Chamberlain, a Cleveland arts figure; Verney Sanders, a Louisville sportswriter; legendary steamboat captain C. J. Dufour; Cliff Snell, a notorious barbecue entrepreneur; Dr. J. Sam Brown, a small-town doctor with a statewide reputation; and the brothers James, Luke, and Attilla Cox, prominent businessmen. In 2000 Ghent had a total population of 371.

“Ghent Baptist Church to Celebrate 175th,” KP, August 2, 1975, 1K. “Town of Ghent in Carroll County, Ky. Dates Back to Year 1812,” KP, December 18, 1936, 26.

U.S. Census Bureau. “American Fact Finder. Data Set: Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF1) 100-Percent Data, Custom Table.” www.census.gov (accessed April 24, 2006).

Bill Davis

GHENT BAPTIST CHURCH. The Ghent Baptist Church, originally known as the Baptist Church at Port William, was organized on April 5, 1800, as an outcome of a revival held in Port William (now Carrollton) in Carroll Co. Many of its members had been members of the Traveling Church, a church group that migrated from Virginia, fleeing persecution. The new Baptist church of 10 members, constituted at Port William, met at first in homes. Its first building was a log structure at the mouth of McCool’s Creek. In 1814 a brick building was erected near McCool’s Settlement (now Ghent), and the church was called McCool’s Bottom Baptist Church. In 1843 the church built a new and larger building and became known as the Ghent Baptist Church. Donations for the construction consisted of money and farm products, including several barrels of whiskey. This building remains and serves as the present sanctuary of the church.

GIBBS, CLINTON

During its history, the Ghent Baptist Church has assisted in the constituting of 14 Baptist churches. In Kentucky the churches were White’s Run Baptist Church (1810), Craigs Creek Baptist Church (1816), Four Mile Baptist Church (1820), Sharon Baptist Church (1825), Carrollton First Baptist Church (1849), Dallasburg Baptist Church (1851), Jordan Baptist Church (1867), Ghent Second Baptist Church (1871), Ohio Valley Baptist Church (1976), and Prestonville Baptist Church (1990). In Indiana the new churches were Indian Creek Baptist Church (1810), Bryants Creek Baptist Church (1815), Log Lick Baptist Church (1818), and Long Run Baptist Church (1818). The churches at Craigs Creek, Log Lick, Four Mile, Sharon, Ohio Valley, and Prestonville no longer exist.

In August 1871 the blacks in the congregation expressed a desire to form a church of their own, and the church issued letters of dismission to any who requested them for that purpose. As a result the Second Baptist Church of Ghent was formed.

When the present church building was built in 1843, space was provided for a cemetery. By 1880, however, the cemetery was full, and by 1911 the cemetery became so neglected that relatives were asked to move the remains of their loved ones to other cemeteries. The graves were removed and the area planted in grass and trees.

In 1900 the Ghent Baptist Church and 11 other churches formed the White’s Run Baptist Association. Improvements to the Ghent Baptist Church property in subsequent years included stainedglass windows, electric lights, a new steeple, and new pews. A parsonage was built in 1914, a Sunday school annex was add in 1923, and a new education building was erected in 1969. In April 2000, the church celebrated 200 years of ministry. On several Sundays during the time of celebration, former pastors returned to preach. Ghent Baptist Church has had a total of 52 different pastors during its many years of ministry to the community.

Minutes of the Ghent Baptist Church, 1880 to the present, Ghent Baptist Church, Ghent, Ky.

Ken Massey

GHENT COLLEGE (HIGH SCHOOL). Ghent College in Carroll Co. was founded in 1867, when local citizens, led by James Frank, formed a corporation creating a private nonsectarian college for white students at Ghent. A three-story brick college was built on the western edge of town the following year, at a cost of $31,700. The U.S. Mail steamboat line donated a bell for the new building, which had four classrooms on the ground floor, residences for students and the president on the upper floors, and a dumbwaiter that carried meals from the basement kitchen to a second-floor dining room. It was a coeducational institution with three departments: primary, academic, and collegiate, the latter offering degrees in both classical and scientific courses of study.

The college’s first president was Ebenezer N. Elliot, the editor of the collection Cotton Is King, and Pro-Slavery Arguments (1860) and a past president of some small colleges in Mississippi. El-

liot left to become principal of the Carroll Seminary in Carrollton and was replaced by James Shannon Blackwell, a linguist and philologist who later taught at the University of Missouri at Columbia. H. E. Holton became president in 1870.

John A. Reubelt, a distinguished German-born linguist and author who had recently been expelled from Indiana University at Bloomington and from the Methodist Church in a doctrinal dispute, replaced Holton in 1871. Reubelt resigned in 1875, and the presidency was filled for five years by William J. Barbee, a Mississippi teacher and the author of Physical and Moral Aspects of Geology. A native of Kentucky, Barbee had obtained a medical degree before becoming a Disciples of Christ minister.

Reubelt’s and Barbee’s terms were the highwater mark for the college. It declined later, during G. C. Crowe’s five-year tenure as president that began in 1880. In 1883 a local newspaper made an oblique reference to “discouraging circumstances” at the college. Author James Tandy Ellis, who had attended the school, attributed its decline to “religious bigotry,” which troubled the college even though it had been founded on nonsectarian principles. The trustees invited the commonwealth of Kentucky to acquire the property for an agricultural and mechanical college; failing that, the college was closed in 1887, and its last president, John Thomas Walker, returned to teaching in Owen Co. During its 20-year history the collegiate department granted 17 BAs and 14 MAD (maid of arts) degrees.

The college building was sold to the Ghent Independent School District, which reopened it as a grade school and the Ghent High School in 1889, graduating five students in 1893. This high school remained for decades a small, underfunded school that seldom employed more than five teachers or graduated more than seven high school students in any given year. Ghent Independent School District merged into the Carroll Co. educational district in 1936, and the Ghent High School was closed; its students were sent to Carrollton High School in Carrollton. Elementary classes continued in the old college building until a fire destroyed the landmark on New Year’s Day 1940. On the old college grounds the Works Progress Administration constructed an elementary school building that served Ghent students from 1945 until its closing in 1972.

The property today is in private hands.

Bevarly, R. W. “History of Education in Carroll County,” MA thesis, Univ. of Kentucky, 1936.

Gentry, Mary Ann. A History of Carroll County, Kentucky. M. A. Gentry, 1984.

——— , comp. Memorable Events: 1890—1990. Carrollton, Ky.: MPS Publishers, 1990.

Bill Davis

GHENT SECOND BAPTIST CHURCH. The Ghent Second Baptist Church is an African American congregation meeting at 405 Liberty St. in Ghent in Carroll Co. It was established by black members of the Ghent Baptist Church and of some other churches. Records are not extant as to the charter, the founders, the first pastor, and the officers of the church. In 1873 Nellie Slaughters came

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to teach in the public schools and is credited with having organized the church’s first Sunday school, and she was its first superintendent. It is believed that this school gave birth to the church and that the congregation worshipped in a livery stable on the east side of town. In 1879 a local white citizen by the name of Turner gave money to purchase, for $85, the front half of lot 93 (now 405 Liberty St.), on which a church building was erected. In the same year, Simeon Dillard, a trustee of the church, bought lot 88 (now 404 Union St.), located behind the church, which later was sold to the Colored Baptist Church and became the site of the church parsonage. On March 18, 1924, the church purchased the Richard Brightwell family cemetery, located at the southeast end of Carroll St., for $300.

Additional property was purchased in 1995 and 2003, and as a result the church owns all the land between 405 Liberty and 404 Union Sts. During the 1970s and 1980s, men from the church along with men from the Carrollton Second Baptist, the Warsaw Second Baptist, and the Park Ridge Baptist churches in Gallatin Co. formed the TriCounty Chorus. This group often sang at church and community events throughout the area. The year 2002 witnessed the formation of a mass choir, directed by Raymond Brightwell. Anna Anderson and Richard Brooks were the organists of the group.

Ghent (First) Baptist Church Minutes, Ghent Baptist Church, Ghent, Ky. Hampton, G. A., ed. “Historical Sketch of the Ghent Second Baptist Church,” 2002, Second Baptist Church, Ghent, Ky.

Ken Massey

GIBBS, CLINTON (b. August 8, 1891, Petersburg, Ky.; d. May 1, 1979, Cincinnati, Ohio). Organist Clinton Gibbs was the son of Frances Gibbs.

By 1900 the Gibbs family was living along Wayne St. in the Walnut Hills neighborhood of Cincinnati. In 1926 Clinton Gibbs became the organist for the African American First Baptist Church in Walnut Hills, located just to the east and behind the former Lane Seminary complex along Gilbert Ave. Gibbs had studied music theory at Holderbach College with Prower Symon, once an instructor at the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music. Gibbs also served at Carmel Presbyterian and the St. Andrew’s Episcopal churches in Cincinnati.

He was the director of the Queen City Glee Club and was on the faculty of the local Lillian Aldrich Settlement School of Music. He became the vice president of the Cincinnati branch of the National Association of Negro Musicians and was a member of the Masonic Order (see Masons). He was affectionately called “the Professor.”

Gibbs, who never married, died at his home at 2819 Preston St. in Walnut Hills in 1970, and after ser vices at his beloved First Baptist Church, he was buried at the United American Cemetery in the nearby Evanston neighborhood of Cincinnati.

“Clinton Gibbs,” CE, May 5, 1970, 18.

“Clinton Gibbs Ser vices Tomorrow,” CP, May 6, 1970, 50.

400 GIBSON GREETING CARDS INC. Warner, Jennifer S. Boone County: From Mastodons to the Millennium. Burlington, Ky.: Boone Co. Bicentennial Book Committee, 1998.

GIBSON GREETING CARDS INC. The oldest greeting card company in the United States until it ceased operating in 2000, Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. operated in the Cincinnati–Northern Kentucky region. The firm was founded as Gibson & Company, Lithographers, in 1850 by four brothers, Stephen, Robert, George, and Samuel Gibson, with the help of their father, George Gibson. The elder George Gibson had operated a lithograph business in Scotland before immigrating with his family to St. Louis, Mo. Another brother, John, established a New York City–based lithography business that merged, off and on, with Gibson & Company, Lithographers. That firm, C. R. Gibson, currently of Nashville, Tenn., continues as a stationery company specializing in family albums.

In its early years, Gibson & Company, Lithographers, located in Cincinnati, produced Civil War prints and patriotic and reward cards and sold them in Cincinnati–Northern Kentucky shops. The company later became a jobber handling products such as imported Christmas cards from Germany. As the company found these greeting cards popu lar, it decided to develop its own mass-produced greeting cards for Christmas and later for Valentine’s Day and Easter. In 1883 Robert Gibson, the firm’s business manager, purchased his three brothers’ interests in the company and was the sole proprietor until his death in 1895. Afterward the company was incorporated as the Gibson Art Company, and its shares were divided among Robert Gibson’s surviving children (Charles, Arabella, William, and Edwin). The Gibson Art Company became one of the nation’s progressive card publishers, using new industrial processes and printing techniques. The greeting card business prospered during World War I, as American servicemen were overseas. It was at this time that the Gibson company developed a new form of greeting card called the “French-fold” card—one sheet of paper folded in half—which became the industry standard.

During the Great Depression in late 1931, J. R. Gibson, then the head of the Gibson Art Company, hired Helen Steiner Rice, the wife of an unemployed Dayton, Ohio, banker who had lost his wealth in the 1929 stock market crash. Rice suggested that the Gibson company expand public awareness of the annual Christmas seals, which at the time were sold exclusively in the nation’s department stores. While many people during the Depression had to forgo buying gifts, they could afford a Christmas seal or a greeting card. Rice underwent training in the greeting card business at Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, Pa. A successful employee with her experience in poetry, marketing, and public relations, she was later appointed as the Gibson company’s greeting card editor. She made use of her personally experienced celebrations, tragedies, and illnesses to help her understand the emotional needs of the purchasers and the recipients of the company’s cards. One of her own trage-

dies was that her husband died 10 months after she started working with the Gibson Art Company.

The Gibson Art Company was among the region’s businesses affected by the flood of 1937.

The company encouraged its employees to become involved with the region’s flood relief efforts, and Rice participated by preparing news releases on the flooding and related health concerns. During World War II, a newsletter called Gibsonews, edited by Rice, was mailed to every Gibson company employee stationed in the U.S. armed forces worldwide. In 1950 the Gibson Art Company celebrated its 100th birthday, and Rice wrote the special celebratory verses for tours, invitations, and cards of appreciation. By 1957 the company was among the five largest greeting card companies in the United States. At that time it moved to a larger site at Amberley Village, 10 miles north of Cincinnati. After nearly 40 years, Rice retired in 1971 from Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. (the company had changed to this name in 1960). Because she was respected and well-liked by many people in the Gibson company, they kept in touch with her, including executives Bill Dresman, Fred Wagner, and Jack Wiedemer. As a consultant to the Gibson company following her retirement, Rice had an office and a secretary provided by the firm until her death on April 23, 1981, at age 80.

The popularity of Helen Steiner Rice’s poems and books was welcomed by the management of the Gibson company. The firm’s executives quickly recognized the potential financial rewards of Rice’s poetry and books, especially after the broadcast reading of her poem “The Praying Hands” on the Lawrence Welk Show in 1961. This poem turned out to be “the hottest thing on the line” and “a money maker,” according to a Gibson company memo. The company then marketed Rice’s inspirational poems as a new venture in the form of booklets, stationery, plaques, and wall hangings in stores nationwide. By 1963 Gibson Greetings Cards Inc. reported sales of more than $26 million, with net earnings of $1.8 million. A Gibson company general sales manager, Bruce Forster, wrote to the company’s dealers in September 1964, stating, “Never before in the 114-year history of Gibson Greeting Cards has any merchandise received the ‘tremendous’ acclaim accorded Helen Steiner Rice’s Inspirational Books.” A Gibson company managing art director from 1959 to 1979, John T. Gimpel, reviewed Rice’s poems and approved their artwork on the company’s cards. Following a national broadcast of Rice’s Christmas poetry on the Lawrence Welk Show in 1966, Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. published a collection of her poems, For Your Christmas.

The firm was acquired by C.I.T. Financial Corporation in 1964, and the Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. name was retained. C.I.T. Financial also purchased Cleo Wrap Corporation in Memphis, Tenn., which supplemented the Gibson company’s greeting card line. In 1975 Gibson Greeting Cards Inc., celebrating 125 years as a company, published Gibson 1850–1975: Our 125th Anniversary. In 1980 C.I.T. Financial was acquired by RCA. Two years later (1982), Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. was

purchased by a group of Gibson company executives and the Wesray Corporation. In 1983 the Gibson company was renamed Gibson Greetings Inc. and became a publicly owned company on the NASDAQ stock exchange. Gibson Greetings Inc. was now the third-largest greeting card company, behind Hallmark Cards Inc. and the American Greetings Corporation. With its commitment to conservation, Gibson Greetings Inc. was the first stationery company to earn an endorsement from Renew America, a nonprofit environmental organization. The firm expanded into international markets in the early 1990s, with the names Gibson Greetings International Ltd. and Gibson de Mexico, S.A. de C.V. In the mid-1990s Gibson Greetings Inc. had 4,600 employees and sales of $546.2 million.

Through its Store-Within-A-Store program, the company sold its products in more than 50,000 outlets worldwide by 1993. The headquarters remained at Amberley Village until the late 1990s, when a new corporate headquarters was established in Covington, Ky. Gibson signed a 10-year lease in 1998 for corporate-retail space on the Ohio River at Covington’s RiverCenter (see Covington, Downtown). The company began moving its headquarters to Covington the next year and set up a distribution plant in the Pioneer Valley Industrial Park area of South Covington. Gibson Greetings Inc. continued with its traditional greeting cards for seasons, holidays, birthdays, and inspirations and developed alternative cards such as “A Good Laugh” and “With Thoughts of You.” The company was the leader for multicultural products for African American, Chinese, Jewish, and Hispanic communities; it produced “The Family Collection” on African American family life. Gibson Greetings Inc. expanded its Christian market by developing another line, “Messages of Faith, Hope, and Love.” Obtaining licenses from specific companies, the Gibson company also sold products that featured characters from the Walt Disney Company and Sesame Street.

Gibson Greetings Inc. suffered financial losses in 1994 and 1995. Wal-Mart stopped selling cards made by the Gibson greeting card company. In 1996 the American Greetings Corporation, based at Cleveland, Ohio, offered to purchase Gibson Greetings Inc. for $292 million, and the offer was rejected. The Gibson company reduced costs in its divisions, eliminated jobs, outsourced artists and art printing, and participated in the Egreetings network. But the company could not compete with the electronic and other marketing successes of Hallmark and American Greetings. Gibson Greetings Inc. lost vital accounts with the Cincinnatibased Kroger Co., a nationwide grocery retailer. In 1999, when sales of the Gibson company’s product line were down 42 percent in the second quarter, the American Greetings Corporation again offered to purchase Gibson Greetings Inc., this time for around $162.3 million. The final purchase price was $175 million, according to an agreement completed in March 2000.

In early 2000 the Gibson Gold Collection, commemorating 150 years of the Gibson compa-

GILLESPIE, HAVEN

ny’s operation, was produced by Bullseye Productions, a unit of Gibson Greetings Inc. The Gibson company’s general manager for Bullseye, George White, oversaw this project, for which 48 reproductions of vintage greeting cards from the Gibson company’s archives were selected. Later in 2000, American Greetings closed the Gibson company’s corporate offices at Amberley Village and at Covington, as well as the distribution plant in South Covington. Greeting cards produced by the Gibson company are kept in the American Greetings Corporation’s archives.

“American Greetings Corp. to Acquire Gibson Greetings, Inc. for 0.40 Times Revenue,” Weekly Corporate Growth Report, November 15, 1999, 10470.

“Business Brief: Gibson Greetings, Inc. Headquarters to be Moved to Kentucky by Next Year,” Wall Street Journal, Aug. 14, 1998, 1.

C. R. Gibson. www.crgibson.com (accessed April 4, 2006).

Driehaus, Bob. “Beginning of End for Gibson Greeting: Office Jobs Cut; Ky. Plant Remains,” CP, March 10, 2000, 10C. Gibson Greeting Cards Inc. Gibson 1850–1975: Our 125th Anniversary. Cincinnati: Gibson Greeting Cards, 1975.

“Gibson Jobs Leave,” CP, June 3, 2000, 9A. Luken, Charles, and Mark Brown. Gibson Greetings, Inc. Memphis, Tenn.: Towery, 1996.

Murray, Matt. “Gibson Rejects $292 Million Bid from Big Rival,” Wall Street Journal, March 6, 1996, A3.

Margaret Prentice Hecker

GIBSON WINE COMPANY. The Gibson Wine Company operated in Covington from 1934 until 1971. When Robert H. Gibson and Louis W. Schultz founded the company in 1933, Prohibition was in force, but rabbis could produce sacramental wines legally. By 1941 William A. Schneider was also a partner in the firm. In 1944 the Gibson Wine Company moved its headquarters to Elk Grove, Calif., near Sacramento, but a small operation remained in Covington at 235 Scott St. Although the firm had moved west, the Cincinnati area remained its top market, and a branch office remained in Cincinnati at 218 W. McMicken Ave., in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. In late 1961 the company had plants in both Cincinnati and Covington, employing roughly 150 workers. That year, the firm was acquired by Sanger Winery Associates of Sanger, Calif., and became a part of a wine cooperative owned collectively by 150 California grape growers. The Sanger cooperative’s motivation was to ensure the distribution of its product through the Gibson Wine Company’s network of outlets. Before the sale, Gibson Wine Company had purchased all of the grapes produced by the Sanger wine cooperative during the previous 10 years. Later, the Gibson Wine Company operated out of 20 W. 18th St. in Covington, in 1962 under vice president Schneider and in 1970, at the same address, under president Schulze. Its Covington plant, a bottling-finishing and warehouse facility, distributed wines throughout Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and West Virginia.

Gibson Wine Company made fruit wines, rather than table wines. The company was one of the first U.S. wine producers to attempt to quench the thirst

of Americans, challenging things cold and sweet such as Coca-Cola. In the late 1950s, “pop” wines such as those produced by the Gibson Wine Company began to be served much as soft drinks were among young people. The emerging popularity of Riunite wines during the 1950s is perhaps the best example of this trend.

Gibson’s wines were aimed for the middle-line, price-conscious consumer and the everyday drinker who keeps a jug of wine in the refrigerator for sipping. The company’s products were sold mainly in supermarkets, where they competed with inexpensive wines produced by Gallo and Almaden. The Gibson Wine Company also produced several private labels, for supermarkets and liquor stores. In 1981 it had estimated annual sales of $20 million and 9 million gallons of product in storage, making it the nation’s 18th-largest winery.

The Gibson Wine Company’s Covington operation was not without labor problems. In 1941 the company pled guilty to violating the Kentucky statute regulating the number of hours women were allowed to work. In 1956 there was a vote to determine whether the employees of the plant in Covington wished to be represented by the International Union, Allied Industrial Workers of America, AFL-CIO. Fields, Gregg. “Gibson Thinks Fruit Wines Are Ripe,” CE, October 16, 1981, C9.

“Firm Officials Fined on Hours Act Charges,” KP, June 24, 1941, 1.

“Gibson Wine Acquired by Association,” CP, November 3, 1961, 4.

“Sanger Acquired Gibson Wine Co.,” CE, November 3, 1961, 1.

“Union Ballot at Gibson Wine,” KTS, October 10, 1956. 6A.

GILLESPIE, HAVEN (b. February 6, 1888, Covington, Ky.; d. March 14, 1975, Las Vegas, Nev.).

“You better watch out, you better not cry, better not pout, I’m telling you why: Santa Claus is comin’ to town.” This is the oft-sung lyrical advice that songwriter Haven Gillespie gives children in his classic song “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town,” one of the 10 most popu lar Christmas songs of all time.

James Haven Gillespie was the sixth of nine children born to William “Will” and Anna Riley Gillespie. The family was poor and lived in the basement of a house on Third St. and Madison Ave. in Covington. Haven’s father was a painter and musician with a penchant for the whiskey bottle and a good ear for music, who had once studied for the priesthood. Haven’s mother worked as a servant. Later in life, Haven said his most vivid memory of childhood was seeing his father’s empty whiskey bottles spread all over the house. The young Haven dropped out of Covington’s Third District School in the fourth grade after a composition he wrote won second rather than first prize.

He later explained that he had dropped out of school because “he felt he was lacking.” In 1902, at age 14, Haven moved to Chicago to live with relatives and found a job as a “printer’s dev il,” which entailed cleaning printing presses and running errands. At the time Chicago was the second-largest

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Haven Gillespie, ca. 1949.

city in the United States, and Haven reveled in the city’s whirlwind of activity and quick-paced life.

As his work as a printer’s dev il progressed, he focused on words and their arrangement, developing an understanding of the English language that served him well later as a lyricist. Gillespie remained, throughout his life, first of all a printer and secondly a songsmith. As he put it, “I have ink in my blood.” By 1907, having become a qualified compositor and printing journeyman, Gillespie returned to Covington and joined the International Typographic Union; he continued as a union member for 67 years. His timing was poor in 1907, however, since that year a strike in the printing trades left him out of work. By 1909 the strike had ended, Haven had returned to his job in the printing industry in Chicago, and he had married his childhood sweetheart from Kentucky, Corene Parker. The couple began married life with a grand total of $16 between them. Gillespie initially could not read or write music, and all his early composing attempts failed. By 1911, therefore, he and his now pregnant wife had returned to Covington.

The same year, he took a newspaper printing job with the Cincinnati Times Star. Louis Mentel, a ragtime musician and president of the Associated Music Company in Cincinnati, helped launch Gillespie’s career as a songwriter by publishing eight songs, none of which met with success.

Not until 1917, with the publication of his 46th song, “The Harbor of Love,” did the young songwriter make a mark in the music industry. Becoming one of the many passing sentimental hits during war time, this song reached number three on the music charts and initially earned Gillespie $12,000 in royalties. It was the first big break for Gillespie, who was by then working at the New York Times, living in New York City, and trying to become a songwriter in the city’s famed Tin Pan Alley. An outbreak of polio that year in the city worried Gillespie’s wife so much that the couple returned with their seven-year-old son, Lamont, to Chicago. Gillespie went back to his work in the

402 GIRL SCOUTS printing trade, though he was by this time an experienced songsmith with an expanding list of contacts in the music industry. He had collaborated in composing several songs for the vaudev ille stage and also had published songs with the Remick Publishing Company, a leading national music publisher. His next big break in the music industry came in 1921, when he met Egbert Van Alstyne, a brilliant composer, pianist, and song plugger 10 years Gillespie’s senior, who had worked at the Remick Publishing Company, had written three hit songs, and was then living in Chicago. From Van Alstyne, with whom Gillespie soon paired in songwriting, Gillespie learned the requisite technical skills of lyrical composition. During the 1920s, in collaboration with Van Alstyne and others, he wrote 88 songs, including, in 1923, the lyrics for “You’re in Kentucky Sure as You’re Born,” a brief hit that was for Kentuckian Gillespie a par ticu lar delight. By then he was writing with composers, band leaders, and vaudevillians nationwide, and his lyrical compositions, most of which were written in a matter of minutes, were becoming Tin Pan Alley staples. He wrote his favorite song of all time, “Drifting and Dreaming,” in 1925 and his first classic, “Breezin’ Along with the Breeze” in 1926.

Homesick, the Gillespies returned to Covington in 1929. Haven worked enough in the printing trades during the hard times of the 1930s to maintain his union card, but his main work was as a songwriter. He soon made two important friends, Covington radio owner L. B. Wilson, who liked Gillespie and helped promote his songs, and New York native Freddie Coots, who became his songwriting collaborator and longtime friend. Having picked up his father’s fondness for whiskey, Gillespie thrived in Covington, especially after the repeal of Prohibition in 1933. Dividing his time between work as a printer and trips to Chicago and New York City to promote his songs, he was frequently, when home, seen at the Covington tavern of an old friend, ex-vaudevillian Kern Aylward.

Aylward had opened a saloon in 1934 at 530 Scott St., in the heart of Covington’s Irish neighborhood, and Gillespie was a regular customer who joined Aylward and others in singing and general merriment. Gillespie loved telling stories and drinking with his friends at Aylward’s Saloon and later, during the 1950s, could be found doing the same at Arcaro’s Tavern, a bar in Erlanger operated by the father of famed jockey Eddie Arcaro. The year 1934 was magical for the new songwriting team of Coots (music) and Gillespie (lyrics). That year they wrote their Christmas classic, “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town,” an immediate hit that charted a second time in 1947 when Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters recorded it. Another CootsGillespie national hit, “You Go to My Head,” was made popu lar in 1938 by the Glen Gray Orchestra, with vocalist Kenny Sargent. A popu lar torch song with sophisticated lyrics, it was recorded by top singers such as Billie Holliday, Lena Horne, Peggy Lee, and, a generation later, Linda Ronstadt backed by the Nelson Riddle Orchestra. Between 1939 and 1947, Gillespie published just 14 songs, with only one, “The Old Master Painter” (1945), later (in

1950) becoming a charted success. Gillespie’s alcoholism was beginning to affect his work. However, he had an idea that temporarily stayed the decline.

In 1949 he published “That Lucky Old Sun,” a megahit that Gillespie had first thought about writing several years earlier. He was inspired by sitting in his backyard along Montgomery St. in Covington, watching the sun pass over the twin spires of Mother of God Catholic Church.

There followed, during the next three decades, a long list of songs written by Gillespie, only one of which, “God’s Country,” sung by Frank Sinatra, charted. Haven Gillespie published his last song, “I Love to Dream,” in 1972. A recovering alcoholic, he was living at the time in Las Vegas.

In a songwriting career spanning six decades, 1911–1972, more than 300 of Gillespie’s songs were published, he collaborated with more than 100 other songwriters, and he wrote songs for eight musical revues and variety shows. Forty-four different music publishers printed Gillespie’s works; 20 songs that he wrote charted, including 3 that were number one (“Breezin’ Along with the Breeze” [1926], “Honey” [1929], and “That Lucky Old Sun” [1949]); and his songs were heard in 17 movies. Haven Gillespie, one of the world’s most prolific songwriters, died of cancer in 1975. He was cremated and his remains were buried in Bunker’s Memory Gardens in Las Vegas, next to his wife, Corene.

First, William E., and Pasco E. First. Drifting and Dreaming: The Story of Songwriter Haven Gillespie. St. Petersburg, Fla.: Seaside Publishers, 1988.

Reis, Jim. “Songwriter Gillespie Brought Santa to Town,” KP, February 16, 2004, 4K. Steitzer, Stephanie. “Santa Song No Hit with Writer,” KP, December 22, 2003, 1K.

James C. Claypool

GIRL SCOUTS. Girl Scouting, which came to Northern Kentucky only a few years after the organization began in the United States, helps cultivate values, social conscience, and self-esteem in young girls, while teaching them critical life skills that will enable them to succeed as adults. Through Girl Scouts, girls discover the fun, friendship, and power of girls together. The organization serves all girls of ages 5 to 17 through various levels: Daisy, Brownie, Junior, Cadette, and Senior. The U.S. branch of the Girl Scouts was founded by Juliette Gordon Low in 1912 in Savannah, Ga. By 1918 there were several Girl Scout troops in the tri-state area. Because so many Northern Kentucky girls were interested in the program, volunteer leaders soon formed a Girl Scout council in Northern Kentucky, separate from the Cincinnati council. At the time, Girl Scouts participated in numerous events such as first aid, bed-making, and signaling. As the number of Girl Scout troops in Northern Kentucky grew, four more councils were chartered. In 1950 Kentucky Girl Scout leaders combined the five smaller councils into one large council to serve the entire Northern Kentucky region. With this merger, the Licking Valley Girl Scout Council received its charter in 1951 and set up an office in Newport. The headquarters were

relocated to Covington in 1973 and to Erlanger in October 1986. In order to comply with standards set by the national organization, the council changed its legal name to Girl Scout Council of Licking Valley Inc. in April 2000. The council served 12 counties: Boone, Bracken, Campbell, Carroll, Fleming, Gallatin, Grant, Kenton, Mason, Owen, Pendleton, and Robertson.

In 1955 the Girl Scout Council of Licking Valley received from the Campbell family a generous donation of 211 acres in Fleming Co. for use as a camp. This property, which became known as the Campbell Mountain Girl Scout Camp, opened to the first group of girls in 1959. It eventually included two camping units, each containing platform tents, restrooms, a shower house, a unit house– bunkhouse, and a cabin for staff housing. Camp facilities also include a dining hall, a swimming pool, a health center, a camp office, a trading post, and a craft center. In 2007 the property was sold and the facility was closed.

In 2001 the cities of Newport and Covington chose to honor the thousands of past and present Girl Scouts of Northern Kentucky by naming a new bridge the Licking Valley Girl Scout Bridge.

The bridge, a replacement for the former ShortWay Bridge, connects Newport and Covington.

Community ser vice is at the heart of the Girl Scout program. Girl Scouts stresses social responsibility and the importance of helping others. Licking Valley Girl Scouts conduct a variety of ser vice projects, from collecting used books for libraries or baby clothes for women’s shelters, to cleaning up local waterways, participating in civic events, and sending personal supplies and Girl Scout Cookies to military personnel stationed overseas.

In 2006 the Licking Valley Council became part of the Girl Scouts–Wilderness Road Council, which still maintains a local office in Erlanger. Because of the merger, one of the Northern Kentucky counties—Carroll Co.—was transferred to the Kentuckiana Girl Scouts Council.

“Council of Girl Scouts Is Started,” KTS, March 1, 1918, 10.

“Goodies Being Readied for GI,” KP, February 14, 2003, 1K. “Our Scouts—Activities of Northern KY Scouts Individuals Listed,” KP, January 12, 1918, 2.

Elizabeth Comer Williams

GIRTY, SIMON (b. 1741, Chambers Mill [now Dauphin], Pa.; d. 1818, Mauldin, Canada). Simon Girty, who later fought with the British in the Revolutionary War, spent his early childhood at Sherman’s Creek, in the northwestern part of Pennsylvania. While he was a teenager, his family moved into Fort Granville, in modern central Pennsylvania, because of Indian attacks near their home. In 1755 the fort was overrun by a group of French soldiers and their Indian allies. Simon’s stepfather was burned at the stake and his mother and her four children, including Simon, were taken captive. Simon soon learned the Seneca language, was adopted into the Seneca Tribe, and was given the Indian name of Katepacomen. As part of a peace

GLACIERS

treaty signed in 1758, the Indians agreed to release Simon and all other captives. He reluctantly returned to the European settlements and took up residence near Fort Pitt (Pittsburgh, Pa.). Girty served as a scout and interpreter for various traders and later for the British Army, during Lord Dunmore’s War (1774). About that time, he met and became a close friend of Simon Kenton. The two men made a pact, promising to be blood brothers for life. That act later saved Kenton’s life when he was captured and sentenced to death by the Indians. In 1778 Girty joined with the British and the Indians to fight in the Revolutionary War. He was a leader during the British-led Indian sieges of Fort Boonesborough and Bryants Station in Kentucky and also at the British victory in the Battle of Blue Licks (August 19, 1782) in present-day Robertson Co. He led the British and the Indians in 1779 in the Battle of Dayton, Ky. (see Rogers’ Defeat), where 60 Kentucky militia soldiers, under Col. David Rogers (see Rogers’ Defeat) and Col. Robert Benham, were ambushed and savagely attacked.

Girty played an active role in an Indian victory in 1791 over American frontier military forces (St. Clair’s Defeat), as well as in Indian defeat of the Americans at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in 1794.

He also assisted the British in the War of 1812 and participated in the British defeat at the Battle of the Thames in 1813. After the end of hostilities, Girty retired to a farm in Malden, Canada. There he married and raised a family. He attempted to become a good citizen; however, his bad reputation preceded him, and his neighbors would have little to do with a person they considered to be both a murderer and a savage. Simon Girty died at Malden in 1818, at either 76 or 77 years of age.

Ohio History Central. “Simon Girty.” Ohio Historical Society. www.ohiohistorycentral.org.

Reis, Jim. “Men Who Fought on the Other Side,” KP, May 23, 1988, 4K. RootsWeb.com. “Simon Girty.” www.rootsweb.com.

GIST, CHRISTOPHER (b. ca. 1705, Baltimore Co., Md.; d. 1759, Cherokee country [Virginia, South Carolina, or Georgia]). Explorer Christopher Gist was the son of Richard and Zipporah Gist. He grew up in Baltimore. His father, a surveyor, had laid out the city of Baltimore. By 1729 Christopher Gist had married Massachusetts-born Sarah Howard, and he appears to have worked as a surveyor before becoming a fur trader. By 1750 his family was living in the Yadkin River Valley of western North Carolina, not far from the home of another future Kentucky explorer, Daniel Boone. The newly founded Ohio Company of Virginia hired Gist to explore its 500,000-acre land grant west of the Allegheny Mountains in preparation for eventual settlement. When he crossed the Ohio River into Kenton Co. during his trip west in 1751, he became one of the first documented white men ever to set foot in Kentucky. His party camped at the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, and he stopped at Big Bone Lick in Boone Co. for salt.

He then returned to Virginia and reported on the scenic beauty of Northern Kentucky. Gist made two more trips to Kentucky; on one of the occa-

sions, he served as a guide for Maj. George Washington shortly before the French and Indian War began. On July 25, 1759, Gist and 62 Catawba Indians left Williamsburg, Va., en route to Winchester, Va. He was attempting to enlist the help of the Indians against the French, but he died of smallpox on this journey. His burial place is unknown. A Northern Kentucky historical society is named in his honor.

Hicks, Irle R. “Christopher Gist, First Ky. Visitor, Also First Reporter,” KP, February 13, 1964, 4K. Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia.

Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1992.

Read, Fred. “Gist Served as a Guide for Washington,” KTS, February 22, 1957, 3A.

GLACIERS. Glaciers profoundly affected the topography of Northern Kentucky. A glacier is a “river” of ice. When the rate of snowfall exceeds the rate of snow melt, the resulting buildup compresses from its own weight. This compression is called firnification, and the compressed snow is known as firn. Over time, the firn compresses further into ice and a glacier is born. Once a large mass of ice reaches more than one square kilometer in size, it is officially designated a glacier. Gradually the glacier’s increasing size and mass causes it to begin to move slowly, either downhill or outward from its center.

Glaciers are found in two main forms, alpine and continental. Alpine glaciers originate high in mountainous terrain and are associated with steep mountain valleys. Flowing down the valleys, they impact the terrain but generally stay confi ned within the original valley walls. Continental glaciers, also known as ice sheets, are very large in scale and may cover an entire continent. A glacier is considered a continental glacier when it grows to more than 50,000 square kilometers (19,305 square miles) in size. At the present time, continental ice sheets are found in Antarctica and Greenland.

A glacial system has three main components: (1) the ice and the sediments contained within the glacier itself, (2) the landscape over which it flows, and (3) any deposits left behind by its advance or retreat. All three components are dependent on one another. As the glacier or ice sheet moves across the landscape, it accumulates sediments, such as rocks, gravel, sand, and other debris. The sediments become embedded in the ice and are carried along with the glacier. As it moves, it leaves some debris behind. Low areas may be filled in, or higher areas may be scoured off and deposited some distance away. These deposits have many names, including kame, esker, moraine, or outwash deposits. Each defines a particular type of collected sediment. As glaciers begin to melt and retreat, large volumes of material are often left behind as outwash deposits in river and stream valleys. Large deposits of sand and gravel found along the Ohio River in Northern Kentucky were left by glaciers. Windblown sediments often accumulate south of the glacier’s furthest advance. Called loess, these fine, silty sediments contribute to modern soil development.

The Ice Age is a common name for the geologic period known as the Pleistocene, which is in turn

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part of the Quaternary period. From 1.8 million years ago to about 12,000 years ago, a series of glaciers advanced from Canada into the United States and later retreated. The glaciers had a profound effect on the creation of the local modern drainage system, including the Ohio River, soil formation, and the deposition of glacial outwash along the major river valleys. The Licking River is one of the few local preglacial rivers that still flows close to its old course. The present channels of the Ohio River and other local streams are a direct result of the successive advances and retreats of glaciers in Northern Kentucky. The glaciers left deposits of loess, eolian (windblown) sand, and outwash along the major stream channels in their path. Modern soil formed both from glacial deposits and from weathering of the limestone and shale bedrock. In contrast, the major soil deposits along the Kentucky River and Ea gle Creek derive from slackwater clay and silty alluvium caused by localized flooding, not from glacial deposition.

During the Pleistocene, four major ice sheets directly or indirectly impacted Northern Kentucky. The two oldest, the Nebraskan and the Kansan, often referred to as pre-Illinoian, both occurred before 300,000 years ago. Because of the actions of the two more recent glaciations, the Illinoian and the Wisconsinan, deposits from the earlier glaciers are rare. In Northern Kentucky, deposits from the earlier ice sheets may include thin layers of eroded stony and clayey till. When found, such deposits occur in in-fi lled shallow preglacial stream valleys.

The time period between the pre-Illinoian glaciations and the Illinoian is known as the Yarmouth interglacial. During this period (approximately 425,000–200,000 years ago), the old Licking River, the old Kentucky River, and the old Eagle Creek continued to develop and became entrenched.

The Illinoian glaciation occurred between approximately 200,000 and 132,000 years ago. Little evidence of this period is found in Northern Kentucky. One well-known geologic feature, however, known as Split Rock in Boone Co., may date to the Illinoian period. Split Rock, at the confluence of Woolper Creek and the Ohio River, is a collection of conglomerate rock deposited by a glacier. The only other documented deposit in Northern Kentucky is a narrow band of sediment that stretches from Silver Grove in Campbell Co. into Bracken Co. After the Illinoian ice sheet retreated, by about 132,000 years ago, the next interglacial period, lasting until about 70,000 years ago, was known as the Sangamon Paleosol. Mature soils developed in Northern Kentucky during this period from weathering bedrock and older glacial till.

The last glacial advance that affected Northern Kentucky, albeit indirectly, was the Wisconsinan (also called Wisconsin), which occurred between 70,000 and at least 10,000 years ago. Divided into three individual glacial advances and retreats, this final stage reached its maximum extent about 20,000 years ago and had retreated by about 10,000 years ago. The glacial ice did not reach directly into Northern Kentucky, but it did influence stream

404 GLENCOE drainages by depositing sand and gravel in the Ohio River channel, and loess reached the northern tier of hills in Boone, Kenton, and Campbell counties. In the northern parts of the counties, soil types such as Nicholson also formed partly from loess, windblown soils deposited during the Pleistocene glacial advances. Some soils along the ridgetops were formed partially from glacial till and have a thin loess cap.

One of the most famous Northern Kentucky geologic features, Big Bone Lick in Boone Co., was formed partly as a result of indirect glacial impacts. The geology and the soils at Big Bone Lick that created its unique landform characteristics are the indirect results of the Pleistocene glacial advances. The drainage features that developed throughout the Big Bone area initially were part of the Teays River system, which was the major, northward-flowing preglacial river of the area.

Several periods of glacial advancement and retreat, however, forced the abandonment of the Teays River system, and the modern Ohio River system of today developed as a result. During the most recent glacial retreat (the Wisconsin), the floods of meltwater carried by the Ohio River (to the north of Big Bone Lick) deposited in the major valley vast quantities of sand and gravel, which built up and trapped the waters of the northward-flowing Big Bone Creek, forming temporary lakes. During these periods the lacustrine silty clays and clayey silts (“blue clay”) that provided the soils in which the Pleistocene mammals became entrapped were deposited in these lakes. The combination of mineral springs and clay beds contributed to the formation of the Pleistocene animal fossil beds for which Big Bone Lick is famous.

Hedeen, Stanley. Big Bone Lick: The Cradle of American Paleontology. Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 2008.

———. Natural History of the Cincinnati Region.

Cincinnati: Cincinnati Museum Center, 2006.

Kentucky Geological Survey. www.uky.edu/kgs (accessed October 6, 2006).

McDowell, Robert C., and Wayne L. Newell. “Contributions to the Geology of Kentucky: Quaternary System.” http://pubs.usgs.gov/prof/p1151h/ quat.html (accessed October 6, 2006).

Potter, Paul Edwin. Exploring the Geology of the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Region. Kentucky Geological Survey, Special Publication 22, Series 11. Lexington: Univ. of Kentucky, 1996.

Teller, James T. “Preglacial (Teays) and Early Glacial Drainage in the Cincinnati Area, Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana,” Geological Society of America Bulletin 84, no. 11 (1973): 3677–88.

gin of its name. The name is said to derive either from Glen Coe, Scotland, where the Campbells massacred the McDonalds in February 1692, or from “glen of crows,” a reference to the large flocks of crows in the area. A third possibility is that the town was named for a famous racing stud, Glencoe, which was active in Kentucky until the early 1850s.

The original land grant in the area was made around 1795 to Col. Robert Johnson, who built and operated a gristmill on a natural millrace just north of the town before 1800. Johnson later sold a substantial portion of his land holdings, including the mill, to John Castleman. The Castleman family operated the mill into the early 20th century. Glencoe is adjacent to an important intersection of two of the earliest roads that passed through the county—Boone’s Trace and Steele’s Rd (U.S. 127).

The fi rst post office was established in March 1848, and the town was incorporated in February 1876. Some accounts argue that the town was founded later, with the construction of the Louisville, Cincinnati, and Lexington Railroad, between 1867 and 1869. In 1869 M. J. Williams laid out land on the west side of Steele’s Rd. in lots, creating the core of the settlement. That same year, Dr. O. B. Yager, a Confederate physician and a friend of Frank and Jesse James, settled there, where he practiced until his death in 1934. During the 1870s, two churches, a school, and a Masonic lodge (see Masons) were established. Businesses included a hotel, two general-merchandise stores, a drug store, a shoe and saddle maker’s shop, an undertaker’s establishment, and a blacksmith business owned by James Ruddle, the inventor of the Ruddle hoe. By the early 20th century, there was also a movie house, an egg hatchery, a tomato cannery, a tobacco warehouse, a coal yard, and a lumberyard. The Great Depression of the 1930s and World War II had a devastating impact on Glencoe; from the 1950s, with the decline of the railroad, the town declined also, losing most of its commercial businesses, in addition to population.

Notable residents have included Yager and Ruddle, as well as Pascal H. Duncan, a member of the Kentucky legislature in the 1870s; Franklin R. Shirley, a professor of drama, debate, and communications at Wake Forest University in WinstonSalem, N.C.; Henry Beach Jr., president of Georgetown College, Georgetown, Ky.; and Mary Frances Penick, better known as country singer Skeeter Davis. In 2000 Glencoe had a population of 251.

Jeannine Kreinbrink

GLENCOE. Glencoe is situated along the northern bank of Eagle Creek, which forms the southern boundary of Gallatin Co. In the 1780s, Daniel Boone surveyed a trace road through this part of Northern Kentucky; his road has become Ky. Rts.16 and 467 and the Boone Rd. Glencoe is the third-oldest incorporated town in the county, although there is some debate as to when the community was originally founded and about the ori-

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

Gray, Gypsy M. History of Gallatin County, Kentucky. Covington, Ky.: Self-published, 1968.

Perrin, William Henry, J. H. Battle, and G. C. Kniffi n.

Kentucky: A History of the State. Louisville, Ky.: F. A. Battey, 1888.

U.S. Census Bureau. “American Fact Finder. Data Set. Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF1) 100-Percent Data. Custom Table.” www.census.gov (accessed July 15, 2006).

Welcome to Gallatin County. www.gallatincountyky .com (accessed June 29, 2006).

Sabrina Alcorn Baron

GLENCOE BAPTIST CHURCH. In April 1877, Lewis H. Salin, a converted Jew and a Baptist preacher, began a religious meeting lasting several days in Glencoe in Gallatin Co., first in a barroom and then in a blacksmith shop. On January 11, 1878, a council was called by a company of men and women to establish an independent church at Glencoe. Messengers from the Ten Mile Baptist Church, the Poplar Grove Baptist Church, the Oakland Baptist Church, and the Pleasant Home Baptist Church, upon hearing the covenant and the articles of faith read, agreed unanimously to include them in the constitution of the new church.

Salin was elected the Glencoe Baptist Church’s first pastor.

The first church building was built in 1878, at a cost of $656. In July 1898 a new church building, 35 by 55 feet in size and costing $1,550, was dedicated on the site of the present church. In 1921 the church was remodeled at a cost of $6,306. In 1952 a concrete-block educational-recreational building was built. In June 1969 the property of Mae Duvall was purchased and the five-room house on the lot was converted into the Sunday school building for the church. In 1975 a new educational building was added at a cost of $69,860.

The Glencoe Baptist Church joined the Ten Mile Baptist Association in 1878 and has participated in the Southern Baptist Convention’s Cooperative Program for many years. It has used Southern Baptist materials and programs and has supported numerous Southern Baptist mission endeavors. Glencoe Baptist Church has been listed in the top 100 churches in per capita gifts to the Kentucky Baptist Convention for several years. In fiscal year 2004, the church ranked 30th, with a per capita gift of $157.

No church meetings were held from September 1918 through January 1919, because health authorities canceled meetings in response to the outbreak of the Spanish influenza. The church was closed again in March 1919, when there was a smallpox outbreak.

In July 1936, Mr. and Mrs. J. L. Hendrix willed their home to the Glencoe Baptist Church for use as a parsonage. A new, brick parsonage was built on the site in 1963, at a cost of $12,700. Lucille Courtney was elected church clerk in 1959. The first woman to hold an elected office in the Glencoe Baptist Church, she served for 13 years. No church members served in the military in World War I. But in World War II, seven members of the church served: Raymond “Bud” Beverly, 8th Air Corps; M. E. “Dude” Boots, navy; Russell Eugene Clark, army, as a member of the invasion force at Normandy in 1944; Allen Eugene Hamilton, army (awarded a Purple Heart for wounds received in Italy); Oran “Mac” McKinney, marines, South Pacific; J. D. Poland, army; and Rev. Everett Rountree, army. While Rountree was stationed at Paris, France, he was secretary to Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower.

GOEBEL, WILLIAM

Two pastors have had long tenures: Roundtree, 1966–1981, and Rev. Hardin Lowe, 1989–2005. The Glencoe Baptist Church remains a thriving part of the community.

Bogardus, Carl R., Sr. The Story of Gallatin County.

Ed. James C. Claypool. Cincinnati: John S. Swift, 2003.

McKinney, Maureen, and Everett Roundtree. “A History of the Glencoe Baptist Church,” 1978, Glencoe Baptist Church, Glencoe, Ky.

Hardin Lowe

GLENN, DUDLEY A. (b. October 2, 1847, Boone Co., Ky.; d. October 11, 1911, Latonia, Ky.). Dudley A. Glenn, a lawyer, was the son of Jerimiah “Jerry” and Louisa Yelton Glenn. His father was a farmer and livestock dealer and, at one time, was the innkeeper at the Gaines Tavern, Walton. He attended public school, graduated from Transylvania University in Lexington, and studied law at the Lebanon Law School in Tennessee. In 1870 Glenn was admitted to the bar; he moved to Covington in 1872.

Glenn was elected to the Kentucky legislature for one term (1877–1878), representing Covington, and was a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1890. In 1897 he was elected commonwealth attorney. He was instrumental in the formation of the town of Latonia (now part of Covington) in 1894 and served on its first town council as a trustee. Glenn was a member of several fraternal organizations.

He married Lucy Mason, the daughter of George and Mary Mason. The Mason estate became the Dinmore Park section of Latonia, and the Glenns settled there. After their first home burned, they lived at 3612 Glenn Ave. They were devout Episcopalians, and some of the organizational meetings for the establishment of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church took place in their parlor. Lucy Glenn was the organist for the small parish for many years.

In 1910 Dudley Glenn suffered a stroke at Covington City Hall and was left partially paralyzed, so he traveled to Florida to recuperate. After returning to Latonia, he died in 1911 at his home and was buried in Highland Cemetery, Fort Mitchell.

His wife and all seven of their children survived him.

“Dudley A. Glenn Passes Away at Home in Latonia,” KP, October 11, 1911, 3.

Kentucky Death Certificate No. 26252, for the year 1911.

“Miss Olive Glenn,” KP, June 7, 1971, 4K.

Karl Lietzenmayer

GLORIA DEI LUTHERAN CHURCH. Although it can trace its origins back to 1916, Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, in Crestview Hills, was actually established in 1982 with the merger of the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church and the Faith Evangelical Lutheran Church.

Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church (originally First English Lutheran Church) was founded in 1916 to serve the growing number of Lutherans,

many of German heritage, in Covington. In 1917 the church received its first resident pastor, Rev. Henry W. Little. After worshipping in a remodeled house on Madison Ave. in Covington, in 1934 the congregation voted to move to Park Hills; they changed the church’s name to Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church and broke ground for a new building at the corner of Amsterdam and Hamilton Rds. on June 9, 1937. The financial constraints of the Great Depression forced the church to rein in its building plans, so initially only the finished basement was completed. On February 27, 1938, the church held its first ser vice, dedicating the completed portion of the building. The church continued to add onto its building over the next two decades and finally completed the structure in 1955. The acquisition of a nearby existing building in 1963 allowed the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church to expand again by adding an education center and office space in Park Hills.

The other church involved in the formation of Gloria Dei Lutheran Church was Faith Evangelical Lutheran Church of Erlanger. This church began as a small group worshipping in the homes of members, with the assistance of Rev. Lorin L. Spenny, the pastor at Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church in Park Hills, and Rev. J. Paul Rimmer, the pastor at Hopeful Lutheran Church, near Florence, Ky. In 1946 the group grew large enough to need different accommodations, worshipping at several different locations. In 1947 the congregation purchased property at 3804 Dixie Highway in Erlanger and worshipped first in the existing two-story house on the property, which at that time was used both as a chapel for worship ser vices and as the home of the church’s pastor. Due to the small size of the congregation, finances were extremely limited.

Though a parsonage was erected at 49 Price Ave. in Erlanger in 1953, the congregation did not begin building the main sanctuary until 1961. The old chapel was demolished and the new building was erected on the site and opened in 1962.

In the early 1980s, both churches remained small. After Faith Evangelical Lutheran Church lost its pastor, one of the pastors helping out was the new minister in Park Hills. Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church was in somewhat better circumstances, having a new full-time pastor, but its congregation remained small. Both congregations were struggling financially. As the two churches were located so close to each other and were, to a limited extent, being served by the same minister, they began to consider merging. The merger became official on October 3, 1982, and an interim church council was selected. The first ser vice of the new Gloria Dei Lutheran Church was held in Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church’s building on January 15, 1983.

Eventually it was decided that the church needed to move into a different building to provide the merged congregations a fresh start as a unified body. The Faith Evangelical Lutheran Church’s building was sold to Dixie Nautilus & Fitness, the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church’s building was sold to the Faith Christian Center, and Gloria Dei purchased land in Crestview Hills, halfway be-

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tween the merged churches’ former locations, for a new church site. In the meantime, the new church rented a storefront in the Heritage International Shopping Center in Erlanger. With the resources of both churches now available, the congregation began to grow.

Ground was broken for the current church building on May 12, 1985, but all did not go smoothly. Halfway through construction, the contractor went bankrupt. The bonding agency soon afterward went bankrupt too. In anticipation of the move, the merged church’s rental contract at the shopping center had not been renewed, so the young church was forced to relocate yet again, this time to nearby Dixie Heights High School in Edgewood. The congregation of Gloria Dei Lutheran Church struggled together through these difficult times and continued to grow. After a generous loan from a Lutheran church in Indiana, construction finally resumed, and the completed building was dedicated on October 26, 1986. An education wing was added early in 1989, allowing the church to move forward on a new project, a preschool. Under the leadership of the pastor, Rev. Vicki Garber, the Gloria Dei Lutheran Church launched a fund drive and broke ground for an $850,000 addition in 2008, completed in January 2009.

Carmack, Anita, church organist. Interview by Jennifer Gregory, July 25, 2006, Crestview Hills, Ky. “Church to Offer Classes: Preschool Opens in September,” KP, July 25, 1989, 2K. “Gloria Dei Historical Timeline,” Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Crestview Hills, Ky. Waltman, Henry G., ed. History of the IndianaKentucky Synod of the Lutheran Church in America. Indianapolis, Ind.: Central, 1971.

Jennifer Gregory

GOEBEL, WILLIAM (b. January 4, 1856, Sullivan Co., Pa.; d. February 3, 1900, Frankfort, Ky.).

William Goebel is the most recent governor of Kentucky (1900) who was a resident of Northern Kentucky. He is also the only governor in U.S. history who died in office as a result of an assassination.

William Justus Goebel, the oldest child of German-born immigrants William (Wilhelm) and Augusta Goebel, spoke only German in his early years. His father served in the Union Army during the Civil War and then moved to Covington, where he held a variety of jobs and was a member of numerous organizations. Although the younger Goebel later emphasized his family’s poverty, an area newspaper described the elder William Goebel, at his death in 1877, as “one of the most prominent and highly respected German citizens.”

Three years later, Goebel’s mother died and he, in his early 20s, became the guardian of two younger siblings.

Ambitious, hard-working, highly intelligent, and strong willed, Goebel had sold newspapers and worked as an apprentice at Duhme’s Jewelry Store in Cincinnati while he pursued his education. He attended Kenyon College’s Grammar School at Gambier, Ohio, and in 1877 graduated from the University of Cincinnati Law School. His abilities had attracted the attention of the two most

406 GOEBEL, WILLIAM powerful political figures in Covington, and he eventually served as a law partner of John White Stevenson, U.S. senator and former Kentucky governor (1867–1871), and Covington native John G. Carlisle, Speaker of the U.S. House and secretary of the treasury. Goebel soon became a wealthy attorney, specializing in cases against corporations and railroads. He also served as a director of Covington’s Citizens National Bank.

Despite his success, Goebel lived simply. He resided in boarding houses and apartments on Sixth and Seventh Streets, near his office at 11 Boone Block on Scott St. in Covington. He read studiously, had few friends, and apparently had almost no female attachments. He never married.

Instead, Goebel focused almost solely on his work and on his new interest of politics. When the Democratic Club organized in 1880, members elected Goebel as the first secretary; within four years he sat on the local Democratic Executive Committee. Backed by powerful friends, the 31-year-old Goebel decided to run in 1887 to fi ll a vacant seat in the Kentucky Senate. Republicans supported the Union Labor Party candidate in the election, and that political combination almost defeated Goebel, but he won by 56 votes.

Goebel differed in several ways from typical Kentucky politicians of his era. At a time when well-to-do ex-Confederates or Confederate sympathizers dominated his Democratic Party, his nonaristocratic family had supported the Union.

Moreover, his German background varied from the more typical English or Scotch-Irish origins of state leaders in Kentucky. And his approach to power was out of the ordinary. In the absence of good speaking skills or a pleasing public personality, he operated behind the scenes, making deals, working out coalitions, scorning established ways.

As a result he became known as a machine politician, “Boss Bill,” “the Kenton King.” Such tactics also made him seem atypical. In addition, he led a younger group of voters who challenged an establishment he portrayed as venal and corporatecontrolled. Goebel supported black rights and women’s rights; he advocated strict controls on the powerful Louisville and Nashville Railroad (L&N) and its lobby; he pushed for an end to the corrupt lottery; he initiated laws aiding laborers; he advanced restrictions on convict labor; he reduced or ended road and bridge tolls. He was an unusual figure in the politics of the commonwealth of Kentucky. In something of a contradiction, Goebel used the methods of the political boss to achieve his urban progressive goals. Some people opposed both the means and the ends. Others saw him as a long-overdue reformer.

In his hometown of Covington, his stands and tactics also angered important leaders, such as Theodore Hallam and Harvey Myers Jr. Another opponent was John Sandford (also spelled Sanford), who countered Goebel on several fronts.

“Boss Bill” purchased the Covington Ledger to present his views, and soon it referred to Sandford as “Gon_h_ea John.” On April 11, 1895, the two men accidentally met in front of a bank and shots rang out. Goebel had a bullet hole in his coat, and

Sandford had one in his head. Goebel’s opponent soon died. A judge determined that “reasonable doubt” existed over which man had drawn his pistol first, so Goebel went free. Later a grand jury failed to indict Goebel. But now his growing list of enemies saw him not only as a political boss, a demagogue, and an upstart, but also as a murderer.

The Sandford shooting seemed to have little effect on Goebel’s continuing rise to power, however.

In 1889 he had won reelection to the state senate without opposition. After that, he had served on the convention that drafted the Kentucky’s current constitution. In 1893 he had successfully defeated Hallam in the primary and had kept the seat by a three-to-one margin. Then in 1897—two years after the Sandford affair—Goebel overcame primary opponent John C. Droege (a bank director at Sandford’s old bank) and subsequently defeated Republican Charles E. Clark in the general election by a 5,553–4,696 count. First named Kentucky Senate president pro tem in 1894, Goebel continued to hold that post through 1900. With his political base secure, Goebel now turned his eyes to the governorship.

In 1898 Goebel introduced, and the Kentucky legislature passed, a controversial bill to change the system of regulating elections. Numerous members of his own party opposed what became known as the Goebel Election Law, while some Republicans viewed it as a dangerous attempt to ensure the “Kenton Czar’s” eventual election. In the midst of that unrest, the Democratic convention met at the Music Hall in Louisville in June 1899 to select a gubernatorial nominee from among P. Wat Hardin, the leader; William J. Stone, who commanded the second-largest number of delegates; and Goebel, who trailed the field going into the convention. But Stone and Goebel joined forces to get rulings unfavorable to Hardin’s cause, and then Goebel outmaneuvered Stone and narrowly received the nomination on the 26th ballot. Disgruntled Kentucky Democrats formed a third party and nominated ex-governor John Young Brown (1891–1895). Thus, a divided party faced Republican nominee William S. Taylor. Observers predicted a very close race, with every vote important.

Though faced with opposition from his former law partner Carlisle and other key party leaders, Goebel continued speaking out against trusts and concentrated wealth, saying the question was “whether the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company is the servant or the master of the people of this Commonwealth.” The L&N then poured huge sums of money into opposing the nominee.

Goebel responded, “I ask no quarter and I fear no foe.”

Election Day passed rather quietly, but results showed that Goebel and Taylor were locked in a very close race. The election commission met and, to the surprise of almost everyone, voted 2–1 against Goebel’s claims. It certified Taylor the victor with 193,714 votes to Goebel’s 191,331 and Brown’s 12,140. The third-party ballots had cost Goebel dearly. Three days later, Kentucky’s second straight Republican governor was inaugurated.

But the contest had not ended. The legislature was the final judge of the governor’s race, and the legislature had a Democratic majority. Goebel’s allies fi led a “Notice of Contest,” arguing that illegal ballots had been used and that those votes should be voided, which would make Goebel the rightful governor. As a 10–1 Democratic joint legislative committee heard evidence, observers expected it to rule soon in Goebel’s favor. A few years earlier, similar actions had voided a Tennessee governor’s race, and Kentucky Republicans feared the same result. They called in armed allies from Eastern Kentucky—“the Mountain Army”—to put pressure on the legislature, and that action only added to an already volatile mix.

On January 30, 1900, as the contest continued, Senator Goebel walked to the state capitol to preside over the senate. Just a few steps from the building, he was shot. As he battled for life, the legislative committee recommended that he be named governor. Meanwhile, the Republican chief executive declared that a state of insurrection existed, adjourned the legislature to meet in the mountains, and called out a militia force that surrounded the capitol grounds. Democratic legislators termed those actions illegal, met secretly in a hotel room, adopted the committee report, and named Goebel as governor. On January 31, 1900, Goebel was sworn in, and in his only official action he ordered the Taylor troops removed and directed the legislature to reassemble in Frankfort. Some questions about the legality of the actions prompted a second swearing in the next day. At the same time, Goebel’s lieutenant governor signed an order replacing the Republican adjutant general with one sympathetic to Democrats. The new appointee called out a militia force friendly to his party. Since Taylor and the Republicans refused to recognize the validity of those actions, two governors, two separate legislative assemblies, and two separate armies—facing each other across a street—vied for power. Civil war seemed possible.

Meanwhile, Goebel’s strength ebbed. The rifle bullet had shattered ribs, punctured a lung, and gone through his body. Goebel died at 6:44 p.m. on February 3, 1900, at the age of 44. His officially reported last words were, “Tell my friends to be brave, fearless, and loyal to the great common people.”

Goebel had been governor for three days and had lived for little over 100 hours following the assassination. He was not governor when he was shot; whether he was governor when he died would now be decided by the judicial system.

State courts found in favor of Goebel. In May 1900 the U.S. Supreme Court (in contrast to its action in the 2000 presidential race decision) ruled that it was a state matter and that the decision of the majority of the legislature should stand. Taylor fled the state, since he was under indictment as an accessory before the fact. Republicans charged that the Democrats had stolen the election; Democrats countered that Republicans had killed their governor. Kentucky’s already strong party feelings intensified.

In the end, jurors indicted 16 people in connection with the murder of Goebel. Five went to

GOLDBERG, MAX H.

trial and three were convicted. According to the prosecution’s case, Caleb Powers, the secretary of state, had planned the assassination, Henry Youtsey of Cold Spring, a stenographer in the auditor’s office, had handed the gun to the assassin and pointed out Goebel, and Jim Howard, a Clay Co. feudist, had pulled the trigger. However, packed juries, partisan judges, and perjured testimony leave the scenario somewhat open to question. Of those known to have been involved, the unstable Youtsey seems a more likely candidate as the assassin. Yet the assassin could also be someone who remains virtually unknown to history. In the end, the Republican-dominated high court in the state invalidated several of the convictions. Seven trials occurred over seven years, and eventually all three convicted men received pardons.

After his death, Goebel lay in state at Odd Fellows Hall (Independent Order of Odd Fellows) at Fift h St. and Madison Ave. in Covington and then was buried in Frankfort Cemetery. A statue was later erected over his grave and another was placed in front of the new capitol. A half century later, the statue was moved from the new capitol to the Old Capitol yard, near the scene of the shooting. That monument, which portrays a serene Goebel, contrasts with the controversial nature of his life. To his supporters, he was a martyr to the cause of reform. To his enemies, he stood as a boss who sought power by any means. Whatever the case, Goebel’s death and the trials that followed cast a long, dark shadow over Kentucky life.

Hughes, R. E., E. W. Schaefer, and E. L. Williams.

That Kentucky Campaign. Cincinnati: Robert Clarke, 1900.

Klotter, James C. William Goebel: The Politics of Wrath. Lexington: Univ. of Kentucky Press, 1977.

James C. Klotter

Family recipes and preparation reflect local preference and tradition. Originally, goetta, like scrapple, was prepared as a loose porridge that was scooped up with bread from a bowl, a practice consistent with goetta’s probable medieval origin as a farmhouse food item. By the 19th century, however, goetta in northwestern Germany had a firmer, loaf-like texture, and that preparation method was brought to the Northern Kentucky area.

Traditionally eaten as a breakfast food, goetta is now served at all mealtimes and also as a snack food. The recent innovations such as goetta links and goetta pizza demonstrate goetta’s popularity in the region. Goetta is also featured at local restaurants, church events, and German-American functions. And Goettafest is now celebrated during the summer in Covington and Newport.

A basic dietary item in the region, goetta serves as a cultural marker revealing the influence of German immigration. It is produced by several companies and various regional meat markets, the main company today being Glier’s Meats of Covington. Glier’s produces more than 1 million pounds annually at its Goetta Place address, the largest goetta plant in the United States. Others include Finke’s Market in Fort Wright, which makes 50,000 pounds each year, both traditional and hot and spicy flavors, and the Hoff man Sausage Company in Cincinnati. At one time most of the local butcher shops in the region made their own goetta for retail sale. When Finke’s operated its 824 Main St. location in Covington, it sold goetta to the nearby Irish, calling it “Irish mush.” The family has been making and selling the product ever since George Finke opened his shop in 1876.

Here is a typical recipe for goetta: 8 cups water 2 teaspoons salt 1 pinch pepper

GOETTA. The word goetta, for a German dish that came with immigrants to Northern Kentucky, is derived from the Low German Götta, or High German Grütze, which is related to the English word groats. The Low German Göttwurst (Grützwurst in High German) refers to a sausage consisting of pork, beef, oatmeal (pinhead or steel cut), and spices. The recipe and the term were brought by German immigrants from northwestern Germany, especially Hanover, Oldenburg, and Westphalia, to Northern Kentucky and to nearby German American communities in the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana region. The term goetta is a direct German loan into American English as spoken in the area. Moreover, it reflects a specific regional origin in northwestern Germany and the process of chain migration to the Ohio River Valley.

Variations of goetta are produced in other regions of Germany but are known by other terms, especially by the High German Grützwurst. An example of Grützwurst in America is Pennsylvania German scrapple, which contains similar ingredients but uses cornmeal rather than oatmeal.

Goetta is usually made into loaves, but it is also available in sausage links. Some cooks prepare goetta by breaking it up and frying it as ground meat.

21 ⁄ 2 cups oatmeal (pinhead or steel cut). Dorsel’s Pinhead Oatmeal is preferred 1 pound ground pork and 1 pound ground beef 1 large onion, sliced (optional) 1 to 4 bay leaves (optional) (2 teaspoons savory may be used instead of the onion and bay leaves) Boil the water in a large pot with a lid; add the salt, pepper, and oatmeal. Cover and cook for two hours, stirring the mixture often.

Add the meat, onion, and bay leaves (or savory), and mix well. Cook for another hour with continual stirring. Remove the bay leaf (if used) and pour the mixture into bread pans. Refrigerate overnight.

To serve, goetta can be sliced and fried until it is crispy, or just heated; or it can be crumbled and fried. It may be used as a breakfast food with eggs, pancakes, and so forth or served on bread or rolls to make a sandwich. Anyone who does not want to prepare goetta from scratch can readily find it in regional meat markets and grocery stores or at Findlay Market in Cincinnati’s Over-the-Rhine neighborhood.

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“Gaga over Goetta—Business Produces about a Million Pounds Annually,” KP, February 22, 2003, 6K. Oehler, Martha Finke. “Goetta Making in Covington.” Unpublished paper, goetta vertical fi le, Kenton Co. Public Library, Covington, Ky. Paeth, Greg. “Gotta Get It to Get a Goetta,” KP, November 15, 1992, 3K. “Talk about Goetta, You ‘Getta’ Finke,” KP, February 25, 1957, 1.

Tolzmann, Don Heinrich. German Heritage Guide to the Greater Cincinnati Area. Milford, Ohio: Little Miami, 2003.

Don Heinrich Tolzmann

GOFORTH, WILLIAM (b. December 25, 1767, New York City; d. May 12, 1817, Cincinnati, Ohio).

Physician William Goforth was the son of William Goforth and Catherine Meeks. He studied medicine under Dr. Charles McKnight and the surgeonanatomist Dr. Joseph Young. Like numerous other medical students and physicians, he left New York City in 1788 amid turmoil and riots fueled by controversy over the use of human cadavers in the study of anatomy. Goforth’s westward travels led him first to Maysville and then to Washington, Ky., where he settled in 1788 and practiced medicine for more than a decade. In 1799 he moved to Ohio, eventually settling in Cincinnati, and again established a large medical practice. He was one of the earliest physicians to introduce vaccination to residents of the Greater Cincinnati area.

During his initial journey to Kentucky, Goforth became acquainted with the Drake family and many years later honored a request by Isaac Drake that he someday teach medicine to Drake’s then three-year-old son Daniel. Goforth is today highly recognized for this role as preceptor to his apprentice Dr. Daniel Drake, another legendary early Cincinnati physician.

Possessing a wide spectrum of interests in the natural sciences, Goforth was also intrigued with paleontology. He was instrumental in leading an 1803 archaeological dig for mastodon and mammoth fossils at Big Bone Lick in Boone Co., an event visited that year by Meriwether Lewis of the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1803–1806).

Goforth relocated to Louisiana in 1807. There he became involved in political affairs and served as surgeon to a regiment of the Louisiana militia. He returned to Cincinnati in 1816 and died of hepatitis on May 12, 1817. He was buried at Columbia Grounds in Cincinnati, but his remains were moved to Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati in 1854.

Johnson, Allen, and Dumas Malone. Dictionary of American Biography. Vol. 4. New York: Charles Scribner’s, 1959.

Juettner, Otto. Daniel Drake and His Followers: Historical and Biographical Sketches. Cincinnati: Harvey, 1909.

The National Cyclopedia of American Biography.

Vol. 23. New York: James T. White, 1933.

Obituary. Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette, June 2, 1817, 2.

Judy L. Neff

GOLDBERG, MAX H. (b. April 5, 1913, Falmouth, Ky.; d. December 18, 2007, Morehead, Ky.).

408 GOLD VALLEY

Max Goldberg, 1978.

Few people have lived a more exciting and fulfi lling life than Max Goldberg, the former mayor of Falmouth. He was a racecar driver and a World War II bomber pi lot and owned businesses including a motel, a restaurant, and several movie theaters. Goldberg attended the local public school and graduated from Falmouth High School. His parents, Solomon (Sol) and Jennie Yanfaki Goldberg, emigrated from Russia around 1900 and operated a clothing store in Falmouth. Max was trained extensively in electricity, aeronautics, and engine mechanics. During the 1920s and 1930s, he began building and racing automobiles at the Falmouth Fairgrounds. As his racing career progressed, he competed at tracks throughout the Northern Kentucky region and as far north as Dayton, Ohio. In the late 1930s, Max took a job with the Wright Aeronautical Corporation in Dayton, where he repaired airplane engines. His employer sent him to England to work as an airplane mechanic.

Max was in England at the outbreak of World War II and while there joined the British Royal Air Force (RAF). He trained to become a pi lot of multi-engine propeller-driven aircraft. Shortly after the United States entered the war in 1941, Max left the RAF and became a pi lot with the U.S. Army Air Corps. During the war he flew 43 bombing missions over Germany and France. Numerous times his planes were hit by enemy gunfire, so that he had to return them to base, often with only one or two of their four engines running. Twice a plane he was pi loting was shot down; one time he parachuted to safety, and the other time he was severely injured in the crash. At war’s end, Max went to Knoxville, Tenn., where he operated several drivein theaters. He later moved to Mason Co., Ky., where he bought the well-known Washington Opera House. There, his customers were entertained with live stage performances and motion pictures.

In the 1950s he returned to Falmouth and bought the Past-Time Movie Theatre, which he operated for many years. He became a friend of

broadcasting pioneer L. B. Wilson, who owned movie theaters and radio stations in Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati. Max entered politics in 1965, was elected mayor of Falmouth as a Democrat, and held that office for 33 years. He was very proud of the way he directed city finances: he never raised real estate tax rates, never installed parking meters, had no city payroll tax, and never required residents to buy automobile stickers. He attempted to pay cash for all public projects, rather than have the city incur debt. His one regret was that he was not able to persuade the Commonwealth of Kentucky to build a Licking River dam at Falmouth, which he felt would help alleviate flood damage and provide recreational jobs. He loved Falmouth and even in his nineties could regularly be seen around town, shaking hands with fellow citizens, chatting with old friends. Max acquired a reputation of romancing ladies from around the world, but he never married. Goldberg died in 2007 and was buried in Riverside Cemetery in Falmouth.

“Falmouth Mayor Makes Few Waves in 30 Years,” KP, February 24, 1997, B1B. “Falmouth Says Goodbye to Mayor Max,” KP, December 11, 1989, 1K–2K. Goldberg, Max. Interview by Jack Wessling, August 12, 2005, Falmouth, Ky.

local tournaments. The NKGA, now with golf courses and country clubs from several Northern Kentucky counties listed as members, contributes to the Northern Kentucky Invitational Golf Tournament Scholarship Fund to support the men’s and women’s intercollegiate golf teams at Northern Kentucky University in Highland Heights.

The golf association now has established a foundation to extend its contributions to other worthy golf endeavors. The NKGA conducts seven amateur tournaments each summer, with entrants numbering about 1,000. The organization estimates that each year more than 700,000 golfers play rounds on member courses. The NKGA established a Hall of Fame in 2001 to honor Northern Kentucky golfing pioneers, saluting golfers who have “complied with the highest standards of integrity, sportsmanship and good conduct in connection with golf.”

For more than 60 years, thousands of other young men and women have developed their interest and honed their golf skills by competing in the NKGA Amateur and Junior Amateur tournaments and have gone on to compete successfully in state and national tournaments. In recent years, two Northern Kentuckians have played on the PGA Tour: Ralph Landrum and Steve Flesch.

Jack Wessling

GOLD VALLEY. Gold Valley, in western Grant Co. not far from the Owen Co. border, was so named because it was mistakenly thought that gold had been discovered there. The first record of community action at Gold Valley was a gift of onefourth acre of land by Richard Osbourne and his wife in 1856 on which to construct a school and a church meetinghouse. Local schools are now long gone. The church was reorganized as the Concord Baptist Church in a new building in 1884. The current building was built in 1922. Concord Baptist Church remains at the center of community life in Gold Valley.

Mount Pisgah United Methodist Church, organized in the late 1800s, is also on Gold Valley Rd. This church’s first building burned in 1910. The second building burned in 1962 and was replaced by the current structure. One of the most scenic views in Grant Co. can be seen from the front yard of the Methodist church. It sits 200 feet above one of the larger of the Eagle Creek horseshoe bends and its extensive fertile valley.

Conrad, John B., ed. History of Grant County. Williamstown, Ky.: Grant Co. Historical Society, 1992

John B. Conrad

GOLF. Golf began to make its mark as a popu lar sport in Northern Kentucky during the 1920s as golf courses were established at Fort Mitchell Country Club in Fort Mitchell, Summit Hills Golf and Country Club in Crestview Hills, Devou Golf Club in Park Hills, and Twin Oaks Golf Course in Latonia. In 1940 these four entities formed the Northern Kentucky Golf Association (NKGA) to promote amateur golf and conduct

Members of NKGA Hall of Fame William Deupree Jr., a former Northern Kentucky (1952) and Kentucky state amateur (1950) champion and nine-time Fort Mitchell Club Champion who also won two Cincinnati Metropolitan amateur titles (1954, 1959).

Herb Fitzer, who won the Kentucky State High School Championship at Summit Hills in 1937 and has been head professional at both A. J. Jolly Golf Course in Campbell Co. and the Fort Mitchell Country Club.

Robert Gray, a three-time Northern Kentucky Champion (1965, 1966, 1974), Senior Amateur Champion (1982), and Northern Kentucky Player of the Year (1982).

Angie Grubbs, who won the Women’s Northern Kentucky Amateur Championship five times between 1959 and 1970.

Gary Herfel, a past champion of the Northern Kentucky Tournament (1983), a two-time winner of the Mid-Amateur (1986, 1999), a fourtime winner of the Senior Amateur (1996, 1997, 1999, and 2002), and a Carran Memorial winner (1999). Herfel also has won the Northern Kentucky Invitational Tournaments seven times, has been named Player of the Year three times, and was chosen Senior Player of the Year six times, most recently in 2004, when he won both the Kentucky State Senior Amateur and Open titles. He is the only player to have won all five of the men’s NKGA championships in a span of 19 years. Herfel founded the Northern Kentucky Invitational, was president of the NKGA from 1998 to 2003, and has been club champion at Highland Country Club 10 times.

Bud Humphreys, a first-year inductee, who won the Northern Kentucky Amateur Championship in

GOODWILL INDUSTRIES

1960 and 1961, who is a nine-time Fort Mitchell Club Champion, and who won the Kentucky State Senior Amateur in 1989.

Dennis Hurley, who was a member of Covington Catholic High School’s State Championship Golf Team in 1969 and winner of the Kentucky Junior Championship in 1971.

Margaret Jones, a part of the first group of inductees, who is a two-time winner of the Northern Kentucky Women’s Championship, won the Kentucky State Women’s Championship four times between 1962 and 1971, and was a threetime champion of the Cincinnati Metropolitan Women’s Tournament.

Spencer Kerkow, who was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2004, won the Northern Kentucky Amateur and the Central Kentucky Amateur Championships, and was a five-time club champion at Fort Mitchell Country Club before his death at age 26. The Amateur Championship was played in his honor and referred to as “The Kerkow” for a number of years.

Robert Leach, a founding honoree, who won the Northern Kentucky Senior Amateur in 1995 and was the first recipient of the NKGA Distinguished Ser vice Award for his work in promoting local golf. He and Bob Schultz won the two-man Senior Championship in 2003 and 2004.

Harry McAttee, another of the first-year inductees, who was head professional at the Highland Country Club for 36 years, was active in fundraising in the community, and loved to teach golf to old and young alike. The Harry McAttee Memorial Tournament is played each year to benefit the St. Luke Hospital Foundation.

John Meyers, a first-year inductee and an original founder of the NKGA, who won the Northern Kentucky Amateur five times between 1946 and 1959, captured a Cincinnati Metropolitan title in 1951, and was a 13-time club champion at Summit Hills.

Robert Schultz, a first-year inductee, who holds four Northern Kentucky Amateur Championships (1956, 1964, 1967, and 1978) and five Carran Memorial Titles, was Senior Amateur in 2001 and 2003, was named Senior Player of the Year in those years, won the Cincinnati Legends of Golf title three times, is a seven-time Summit Hills Country Club titleholder, and was the NKGA president from 2004 to 2006. A member of the Thomas More College Hall of Fame, he formerly coached the golf team there.

Ralph “Pete” Stuntebeck, a first-year inductee, who began his golfi ng life as a caddie at Fort Mitchell Country Club; was the youngest golf professional in the United States, as club pro at Fort Mitchell at the age of 18; regained amateur status in 1937 and won numerous amateur titles including three Northern Kentucky titles and one Cincinnati Metropolitan; turned professional again in 1951 and was the head professional at Twin Oaks Golf Course for 26 years; and won both the Greater Cincinnati Stroke Play and Kentucky State Senior Open championships in 1955.

“Deupree Keeps on Winning,” CP, May 15, 1998, 1B. Northern Kentucky Golf Association. www.nkga .com (accessed on December 27, 2006).

Dennis W. Van Houten

GOOCH, DANIEL L. (b. October 28, 1853, Calhoun, Ky.; d. April 12, 1913, Covington, Ky.). Businessman and politician Daniel Linn Gooch (known as Linn) was born near Owensboro, where he was educated in a private school. At age 17 he entered the business world, by starting a company for the manufacture of medical supplies. The business was very successful, and after several years, Linn moved to Covington, hoping to fi nd an even larger market for his products. There he started the Cincinnati Drug and Chemical Company. Linn married Virginia Stout, and the couple had two daughters. The Gooch family lived at 520 Greenup St. As his wealth grew, Linn purchased a summer home, which he called Gooch Island, on the St. Clair River in the Virginia mountains. He entered politics in 1900 and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, as a Democrat, serving from March 4, 1901 through March 3, 1905. Linn lived a sedate existence during his retirement years, in the Arthur Apartments, at 545 Greenup St. In 1907 Gooch donated a 127-volume set of books, The War of the Rebellion, to the Covington Library (see Kenton Co. Public Library). He died in his Covington apartment at age 59 and was buried in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Dayton, Ohio.

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.

“Gooch, Daniel Linn.” www.bioguide.congress.gov (accessed November 22, 2005).

“Linn Gooch Dies at Home in Covington,” KP, April 14, 1913, 2.

GOOD SHEPHERD LUTHERAN CHURCH. Established in 1995 as a grassroots church with a handful of families, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church (a member of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod) now has about 350 members. The congregation dedicated a new building at 9066 Gunpowder Rd. in Florence, Ky., in 1998, and a Family Life and Education Center was scheduled for completion in spring 2008.

“Good Shepherd Lutheran Bible School to Start,” KE, July 20, 2006, 4C. Good Shepherd Lutheran Church. www.gslutheran .org/index.htm (accessed October 9, 2006).

“Good Shepherd to Dedicate Sanctuary,” KP, November 7, 1998, 6K.

Melinda G. Motley

GOODWILL INDUSTRIES. Since 1916 Ohio Valley Goodwill Industries, which includes several Northern Kentucky counties in its ser vice area, has been providing ser vices for individuals with disabilities and other barriers to employment. The organization moved to its present facility in the village of Woodlawn, Ohio, in 1957 and in 2004 celebrated a grand reopening that marked a complete renovation of its 13-acre campus at 10600

409

Springfield Pk. Over the years, many new programs and ser vices have been added.

The Goodwill story is a simple but important one. Working in partnership with the community, Goodwill sells donated items in retail stores, and the funds received support programs and ser vices, such as the employment and training programs. At the core of Goodwill’s mission is its commitment to assist people with disabilities and provide services that encourage self-sufficiency.

Goodwill’s rehabilitation employment and training division offers a multitude of programs and ser vices for individuals with disabilities and other barriers to employment. Ser vices for individuals include work evaluation, occupational skills training, work adjustment training, placement ser vices, job coaching support, and assistive technology. In 2005 Ohio Valley Goodwill provided ser vice to 2,609 individuals who were searching for vocational independence; 735 men and women were placed into competitive community employment.

Goodwill’s work evaluation program assesses the individual’s need for additional rehabilitation ser vices such as skills training, placement assistance, job coaching, and assistive technology services. To help people develop needed vocational skills, Goodwill offers occupational skills training in four areas: office procedures and computer technology, janitorial ser vices, food ser vice, and grounds keeping and light janitorial.

The job placement department provides services in the areas of job development, vocational exploration, market surveys, job-seeking skills training, and job retention. After individuals obtain employment, the job coaching department provides support including on-site job training, off-site ser vices, training in appropriate work behavior, self-advocacy skill training, travel training, personal adjustment, and long-term followup ser vices.

Goodwill’s work adjustment training program offers an individualized program that reflects individual goals, wishes, and desires. The program serves individuals sponsored by county boards of mental retardation and developmental disabilities. In addition, Goodwill provides ser vice for transition students from various local school districts who are making the move from school to work.

In 2004 Goodwill introduced its newest program option, CARE (the Center for Advocacy, Recreation and Education). The CARE is a ser vice that diversifies Goodwill’s program offerings to individuals with developmental disabilities, particularly those with personal care support needs.

Goodwill also offers assistive-technology support for individuals either at home or in a work setting. The department helps to provide ser vices in a variety of areas including ergonomics, computer access, home accessibility, job-site accessibility, job accommodations, and seating and wheeled mobility.

In Kenton Co., Goodwill has operated stores in Covington since at least the 1950s, in two locations

410 GOURMET STRIP along Pike St. and, for the years 1990–2003, at 25 W. Seventh St. The organization developed and owns the Goodwill Village Apartments for the handicapped along Banklick St. in Covington and has a store along Taylor Mill Rd. in Independence. In Boone Co., Goodwill has a facility along Tanner’s Ln. In Campbell Co., after being located for years at Fifth and York Sts. in Newport, the organization now has a store along Donnermeyer Dr. in Bellevue. In Mason Co., Goodwill operates a store at 505 Market Place Drive in Maysville.

“Covington to Have New Goodwill Shops,” KTS, April 1, 1955, 1A. “Goodwill Expands,” KTS, July 20, 1956, 4A. “Goodwill Relocating Its Covington Store,” KE, March 28, 2003, B2.

“Goodwill Strengthening N. Kentucky Presence: Tanners Lane Store 12,000 Square Feet,” KP, March 27, 1993, 11K. “Invalid Needs ‘Job Therapy,’ ” KP, November 19, 1969, 1K. Ohio Valley Goodwill Industries. www.cincinnati goodwill.org (accessed October 14, 2006).

“Record Turnout Greet Goodwill Store’s Opening in New Location,” vertical fi le, Kentucky Gateway Museum, Maysville, Ky.

Gus Sanzere’s Golden Goose, 1504 Dixie Hwy., originally known for its Italian food and now the home of the Szechuan Gardens.

Chappie’s Tavern, 1560 Dixie Hwy., later renamed Tom and Jerry’s and now demolished.

Town and Country Restaurant, 1622 Dixie Hwy., opened in 1936 as the Blue Star Tavern, operated by the Wooten family; now the home of Chuck McHale’s The Gardens of Park Hills.

Old Mill Grill, on the northeast corner of Dixie Hwy. and St. James Ave., built for the tourist trade about 1930 or before, with distinctive roadside architecture featuring an operating windmill. Gasoline pumps stood outside, and there was also a restaurant offering chicken and steak dinners.

George Palmer

GOURMET STRIP. This was the name given to a string of restaurants, nightclubs, and taverns stretching along the Dixie Highway (U.S. 25/42), from Covington to Florence, Ky. The Gourmet Strip was a popu lar destination for Cincinnatians, Northern Kentuckians, and travelers, particularly from the 1930s through the 1970s. Dining varied from fine cuisine to tavern food to the new fastfood drive-ins of the 1940s and 1950s. A number of entertainment spots featured illegal gambling, such as bookmaking, slot machines, and gaming tables. The end of gambling in Kenton Co. in the 1950s, the opening of I-75 in 1963—diverting interstate travelers—and various fires brought an end to the Gourmet Strip, and only a few buildings remain. Some of the prominent restaurants included these, listed by city.

Park Hills Hahn Hotel, 1424 Dixie Hwy., a 19th-century inn and tavern where drovers of livestock stopped (see Meatpacking).

Marshall’s, 1450 Dixie Hwy., which featured a dining room, a cocktail lounge, and party rooms.

Colonial Bake Shop, 1470 Dixie Hwy., open 24 hours daily, offering coffee and baked goods to travelers.

Lamplighters Club of Nick Behle, 1491 Dixie Hwy., a late-night gathering spot principally for musicians and workers from the restaurants and clubs along the strip.

White Horse Tavern, 1501 Dixie Hwy., opened in 1936 and operated by Ben S. Castleman; destroyed by fire on January 26, 1972. Castleman reopened the restaurant across the street in the old Golden Goose, closing it in September 1972.

In 1977 he and other investors opened a new White Horse at 3041 Dixie Hwy. in Edgewood, but it closed in 1978.

Oelsner’s Colonial Tavern, Lookout Heights.

Lookout House Supper Club.

Fort Wright (including old Lookout Heights) Jerry’s Restaurant, 1663 Dixie Hwy., featuring J-boy hamburgers. It was one of the early drivein restaurants along the strip. Later it became Clyde’s Steak House, and then Cassidy’s; the building was demolished in 2006.

Lookout House, 1721 Dixie Hwy., a posh nightclub featuring Hollywood entertainers that was destroyed by fire on August 14, 1973.

Oelsner’s Colonial Tavern, 1730 Dixie Hwy., opened in March 1937 and operated by three brothers, Russell, Richard, and Charles Oelsner.

It was a favorite gathering place for Cincinnati Reds baseball players during the 1930s and 1940s. The tavern was demolished and a Skyline Chili stands on the site.

GRACE UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST

Kanebrake Restaurant, 1830 Dixie Hwy., later the Hillcrest Tavern, featuring chicken dinners. The restaurant was demolished and a dry cleaner now occupies the site.

Schilling’s Drive-In Restaurant, 1939 Dixie Hwy., demolished and replaced in 1962 by the Hofbrau Haus Restaurant, now called Shimmer’s Tavern.

Fort Mitchell Hearthstone, 2053 Dixie Hwy., currently Indigo’s.

Robertson’s, 2216 Dixie Hwy., founded by Cliff Robertson in 1959 and closed in 1972.

Frisch’s Restaurant, 2498 Dixie Hwy., featuring Big Boy hamburgers, one of the early drive-in restaurants along the strip.

Greyhound Tavern, 2500 Dixie Hwy., opened as the Dixie Tea Room in 1921.

Stevie’s Clubhouse, 2501 Dixie Hwy., opened by Joe Stevie in 1901 and later renamed Zimmer’s Clubhouse and then Kentucky Tavern. It was demolished in 1957 for a Remke Market.

Saddle Club, 2587 Dixie Hwy. Lakeside Park Barleycorn’s Five Mile House, 2542 Dixie Hwy., an eatery that dated from the 19th century and was later renamed Retschulte’s. The current name is Barleycorn’s Five Mile House.

Erlanger McDonald’s, 3096 Dixie Hwy., the first of this chain in Northern Kentucky.

Roundup Club, 3100 Dixie Hwy., a nightclub with an eclectic Wild West exterior facade that opened in 1950, closed in 1982, and was demolished.

Cabana, 3126 Dixie Hwy., destroyed by fi re on July 13, 1971. The restaurant was rebuilt, operated for a time, and is now the home of shops and offices.

Colonial Cottage, 3146 Dixie Hwy., now at 3140, opened in 1933.

Tom Cody’s Farm, 3227 Dixie Hwy., now Forest Lawn Cemetery.

Seven Mile House, 3236 Dixie Hwy., just north of the Cincinnati Southern Railroad underpass on the west side of the road, later renamed the Rightway Café.

Dixie Club Café, 3424 Dixie Hwy. Arcaro’s (see Eddie Arcaro), 3510 Dixie Hwy., previously Joe Anderson’s Restaurant.

Dixie Chili, 3702 Dixie Hwy. Frisch’s, 4016 Dixie Hwy. Elsmere Swan, 4311 Dixie Hwy., now the home of Swan Florist.

Kenton Terrace, music and dancing, just south of the Swan.

Doc’s Place, on Dixic between Park and Eastern Aves.

Florence Caintuckee Grill, a short-order eatery located on the northeast corner where U.S. 25 and U.S. 42 divide, opened about 1949 by the Cain family.

Hilda Ramler purchased the business in 1954, and it closed in 1984.

“Deals Closed for Business Places Here: Road house Building to Be Erected Near Covington, Contractors Reveal,” KP, July 24, 1936, 5.

“Fire Rips through Restaurant,” CE (Ky. ed.), July 14, 1971, 13.

Hicks, Jack. “Boone County Movers and Shakers Losing an Old Haunt,” KE, June 19, 1984, B1.

———. “Breakfast Lovers Losing Landmark on Dixie Hwy.” CE (Ky. ed.), September 29, 1972, A1.

“History of Famous Old Northern Kentucky Resorts Recalled as Good Beer Comes Back,” KP, April 6, 1933, 3. “ ‘Hofbrau Haus’ Opened at Motel,” KP, July 24, 1962, 1K. Jacobs, Gabriella. “Nightspot Heads for Last Roundup,” KP, June 25, 1982, 1K. Johnson, Omer. “Dixie ‘Strip’ Fades Away into History,” KP, June 17, 1982, 4K. “Marshall’s Formal Opening Announced,” KP, February 19, 1955, 1.

“Prosecutor Leads Own Raids of Cabana, Arcaro’s, and the Swan,” CE (Ky. ed.), October 17, 1949, 1.

Reis, Jim. “Dixie ‘Gourmet Strip’ Outshone Cincinnati with Food, Gambling,” KP, January 10, 1983, 4K. “Six Beautiful Dixie Cities Visited by Kentucky Times-Star,” KTS, June 25, 1957, 5A.

Paul A. Tenkotte

GRACE UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST. German Protestants living in the West Side of Covington established the Grace Evangelical Reformed Church in 1862. On April 18, 1862, 18 individuals met at the home of Heinrich Wilhelm Schleutker at the corner of Pike and Craig Sts. in Covington to organize the congregation. Soon afterward, a lot was purchased in town at the corner of Lockwood and Willard Sts. as a site for the new church. While the church was under construction, the congregation met in a neighboring schoolhouse or in the local fire station. The cornerstone of the new Gothic Revival church was set into place on June 13, 1862, and the structure was dedicated formally on April 6 of the following year. The twostory building included classrooms and meeting space on the first floor and a large worship space on the second floor. Many of the members of the congregation were recent immigrants from the German state of Prussia. The members of Grace Church strongly desired to maintain their German language and traditions, so worship was conducted in German for many years. The congregation established a school, restricted to children of German parents, at the same time as the founding of the church. Tuition of 25 cents per month was charged.

As the German population of Covington increased, so did the membership of Grace Church; by 1868 it had reached 300. Among the early leaders of the congregation was John Schleutker, a German baker renowned locally for his pumpernickel bread.

His association with the church was so strong that many Covingtonians referred to the congregation as “the pumpernickel church.” Schleutker’s son John served as the church organist for more than 50 years.

During the last decades of the 19th century, the congregation continued to expand. In 1889 a new

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three-story parsonage was erected as an addition to the rear of the church building. In 1894 a daughter congregation, named the Immanuel German Reformed Church, was established in the nearby city of Bromley. A frame church was constructed for the new congregation at the corner of Boone and Harris Sts. in Bromley.

A large-scale renovation of this church building occurred in 1896. At that time, a new Gothic Revival facade was added. The new facade included two entranceways, a large central Gothic window, and a bell tower . At the same time, new art-glass windows were installed in the sanctuary.

The use of the German language in worship slowly declined in the World War I period as fewer immigrants settled in Covington. In 1904 Sunday school teachers were given permission to use English classroom materials. At about the same time, the church board agreed to have brief Englishlanguage ser vices between the Sunday school classes and the main German Sunday ser vice. In 1913 the congregation voted 80-2 to conduct English and German ser vices on alternate Sundays.

The use of the German language was ended entirely when the United States became involved in World War I, and the name of the congregation was officially changed to the Grace Reformed Church.

The Grace Reformed Church remained stable in size during the interwar years. Membership stood at about 300 during this period. During the 1940s and 1950s, however, membership dropped.

Many residents of Covington were leaving the city for the suburbs, and as a result, Covington’s West End was changing. Once home to thousands of immigrants and their children, the West End was losing population. Most of the newcomers, furthermore, were arrivals from the Appalachian region of Kentucky, people whose heritage was British. Despite these struggles, the Grace Reformed Church continued to carry out its mission. In 1957 the congregation officially became a member of the United Church of Christ.

During the 1960s, the church board seriously considered leaving Covington for the suburbs. A number of other Protestant congregations had already made such a move. The congregation voted to remain in the city, however. By 1975 membership had decreased to 103. Seven years later, only 73 active members were on the parish rolls. In 1995, when only 20 active members, many of them elderly, were attending ser vices, the decision was made to close the church. The last ser vices were held on October 29, 1995, and the church building was eventually sold to another denomination. The Grace United Church of Christ, under names changing with the times, had continued for more than 130 years.

Hicks, Jack. “Members Bid Church Goodbye,” KP, October 30, 1995, 1K. Seventy-Fifth Anniversary of Grace Reformed Church, Covington, Kentucky, 1862–1937. Covington, Ky.: Grace Reformed Church, 1937.

“Still a Good Neighbor,” KP, October 28, 1995, 9K. Vercouteren, Karl J. Th e German Churches of Covington. Covington, Ky.: Self-published, 1977.

David E. Schroeder

412 GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH. In the mid-1850s, a group of worshippers who had relocated to Northern Kentucky from Cincinnati began meeting as “The Society” in the Bagby home at Eighth and Monmouth Sts. in Newport, led by a missionary named Conrey. Worship meetings continued into spring 1858, when the society united with a Bellevue group and formed a circuit. The Newport link held ser vices in Newport’s German Methodist Church, located along Seventh St., until 1861. As membership grew, a larger facility became necessary, and property in Newport on Eighth St. was purchased for $1,250; in 1861 a frame building was erected. After the Civil War and growing financial hardships forced the society to sell the church property, the group met on the second floor of Hayman’s Hall at Fifth and Monmouth Sts. In 1863 the area’s Methodist circuit was divided and Newport became an independent charge. In May 1866 the Grace Methodist Church paid $4,290 for a lot in Newport along Jefferson St. (now Sixth St.) between Monmouth and Saratoga Sts. Henry Tinsley drew construction plans for a church building, F. A. Stine provided the lumber for the building, J. K Stone supervised the carpentry, and William McGill ground the ornamental figures in the window glass. The fi nished structure was dedicated as the Grace Methodist Episcopal Church on Sunday, December 2, 1866. Newspaper accounts reported that the Newport church was “one of the most beautiful structures in the city.” The building was later enhanced by the addition of a pipe organ; 10 stained-glass windows, many of them donated by the Root family of Newport; and chimes.

From 1880 to 1882, a Rev. Watson served the congregation; under his direction the missionary outreach programs grew and the Women’s Foreign Missionary Society began. In 1903 the Women’s Home Missionary Society was initiated. In the early 1900s, a parishioner died and willed to the church his home at 18 W. Eighth St. in Newport.

That house was then used as a parsonage. On July 7, 1915, a tornado destroyed the church’s steeple, which was not replaced. The church celebrated its Golden Jubilee on May 26, 1918.

From 1922 to 1936, the pastor was Rev. W. F. Gregory, who was an active participant in a group working within Campbell Co. to clean up vice activities. In that connection, he testified before the grand jury with other Newport ministers. In 1924 Gregory’s home was damaged when an explosion of a carbide and potash mixture was set off by his basement door. A note was left warning him to quit the grand jury investigations.

In 1941 the congregation had 314 members.

After World War II, Newport’s citizens began moving to the suburbs, and as a result, Grace Methodist Church’s list of inactive members became the largest in the region’s Methodist district.

The church celebrated its 90th anniversary in November 1956, as membership continued declining.

In 1975 Rev. Don Drewry reported that the church was set to celebrate its celebrate its 110th birthday. The congregation was presented with a Kentucky Landmark certificate for its historic building, and the church, located in Newport’s

Monmouth St. Historical District, is listed on the survey of historic sites in the state. In June 2001 the Grace United Methodist Church merged with the Southgate Methodist Church and the Calvary Tower United Methodist in Bellevue to form New Hope United Methodist Church in Southgate. The old Grace United Methodist Church building is currently vacant and for sale.

“Blast Damages Pastor’s Home,” KP, June 18, 1924, 1.

“Dedication,” CE, November 2, 1866, 2.

“Homecoming Dinner Set to Celebrate 90th Anniversary,” KTS, November 23, 1956, 9A. “Memorial Windows,” KP, May 16, 1905, 5.

Reis, Jim. “Flames Char the Past,” KP, May 20, 1996, 4K. “The Reopening of Grace Church,” KP, May 10, 1906, 5.

Reynolds, Howard. The History of Grace Methodist Church Newport, Kentucky. Newport, Ky.: Grace Methodist Church, 1966.

Tortora, Andrea. “Church Tries to Save Itself,” CE, April 22, 1996, A5B.

Jeanne Greiser

GRANDVIEW GARDENS. From 1933 through the early 1970s, the Santini and Peluso families owned and operated Grandview Gardens at the top of Widrig St. on a knob off Grandview Ave. in Clifton, which was later annexed by Newport (see Italian Americans). Th is Italian restaurant was home to summer fireworks (1940s), dances, boxing events (Elgin Harris versus Bobby Leen, 1941), political party conventions (National States’ Rights Party, 1970), fish fries (1950s), Santa Claus visits (1940), and gambling. Former Kentucky governor A. B. “Happy” Chandler (1935–1939; 1955–1959) dined there. Pasquale Santini owned and operated the Grandview Gardens until 1967, when he sold the business to Johnny “TV” Peluso, who renamed it New Grandview Gardens. Peluso once proposed building a cable-car ride across the Ohio River to Mount Adams, an entertainment district on the east side of downtown Cincinnati. Another time, Newport Mayor Peluso became embroiled with city commissioners over city crews’ blacktopping the road up to the gar-

Jesse Root Grant House, Greenup St., Covington.

dens. In 1980 Specialty Restaurants of California took an option on the property in anticipation of making it into an entertainment complex, but neighbors successfully opposed the plans. For awhile the Landmark Baptist Church of Newport used the site on Sundays; in 1988 developers gained zoning approval for a 56-unit housing project, which is known as the Grandview Condominiums today.

“Harris and Leen Are in Main Event,” KP, February 28, 1941, 14.

“Restaurateur Pasquale Santini,” KP, October 14, 1982, 3B. “S. Newport Tots Will See Santa,” KP, December 20, 1940, 24.

“To State Fireworks Display at Gardens,” KP, May 29, 1940, 4.

Michael R. Sweeney

GRANT, JESSE ROOT (b. January 23, 1794, near Greensburg, Pa.; d. June 29, 1873, Covington, Ky.). Jesse Root Grant, a successful businessman and the father of U.S. president Ulysses S. Grant (1869–1877), was one of six children. His mother, Rachel Kelly Grant, died when he was 11 years old, and his father, Noah Grant, a shoemaker, was unable to care for all his children. So Jesse migrated to Ohio, and later to Maysville, where he learned the tanning trade from his half brother Peter Grant.

At age 26 Jesse Grant became a partner in a tannery in the river village of Point Pleasant, Ohio.

At age 27 he married Hannah Simpson, and the following year (April 27, 1822) his oldest son, Ulysses, was born. Jesse Grant prospered in business, and the family moved to Georgetown, Ohio, where he served a term as mayor. He sent Ulysses to school in Maysville. Without consulting his son, he made arrangements for Ulysses to receive an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, where he graduated in 1843. Jesse knew that Ulysses was not a businessman, and besides, he had two other sons who could help him with his business. Jesse Grant accumulated a fortune of more than $100,000.

GRANT CO.

For a time Grant and his wife lived in Galena, Ill., where he owned a successful leather goods business. When they moved to Covington in 1855, Grant continued to operate the business from Covington as Ulysses worked in Galena before the Civil War. From 1859 to 1873, Jesse Grant lived in the home now known as the Grant House at 520 Greenup St. in Covington. He became semiretired when he moved from Galena to Covington. The family were active Methodists, worshipping at the First Methodist Church at Fifth and Greenup Sts, just across the street from their home. During the Civil War, Gen. Ulysses Grant’s wife and children spent extended periods of time at the Jesse Grant home on Greenup St. From 1866 to 1872, Jesse Grant was the postmaster of Covington, appointed by President Andrew Johnson (1865–1869) as a favor to Grant’s son Ulysses.

After Ulysses became the 18th president of the United States (1869–1877), Jesse, unlike his wife, loved sharing in the limelight. He made many trips to Washington to stay at the White House. It is said that Hannah did not visit her son in the White House, partly because of shyness and partly because she was a “died-in-the-wool” Democrat.

Jesse Grant died in Covington in 1873 after a long illness. His funeral was held at the First Methodist Church at Fift h and Greenup Sts., and he was buried in Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati, with his famous son in attendance. Today, a Kentucky Highway Marker in front of their church in Covington notes the former presence of the Grants in the neighborhood.

“June 23rd Mr. Grant Celebrated 50th Anniversary,” CJ, June 24, 1871, 2.

Reis, Jim. “Grant’s Father Also Died in 1873,” KP, July 20, 1998, 4K. ———. “Grants Worshipped at Covington Church,” KP, November 15, 1999, 4K. ———. “Ulysses S. Grant Linked to Covington,” KP, February 25, 1991, 4K. Spring Grove Cemetery Records, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Paul L. Whalen

GRANT, WILLIAM L. (b. April 1, 1820, Lancaster, Ky.; d. May 5, 1882, Covington, Ky.). William Letcher Grant, a lawyer, a businessman, and a politician, was the son of Moses V. and America Letcher Grant. He was a student at the Lancaster Seminary in Lancaster in his early teens when his family moved to Covington. He attended Cincinnati College and later studied law with the Covington firm of Stevenson and Phelps. One of the partners, John White Stevenson, became a Kentucky governor (1867–1871) and a U.S. senator (1871–1877). On September 10, 1845, Grant married Laura Southgate, who was the daughter of William Wright Southgate, a former Northern Kentucky congressman. Grant served as a Covington city clerk, a councilman, and a Kenton Co. state representative.

A Democrat for most of his life, Grant backed the Union cause during the Civil War. In the early 1870s, he was elected to the Covington City Council. He resigned his council seat in November 1874 to become a candidate for state represen-

tative. Realizing that he needed the support of the African American community, he met with African American community leaders Isaac Black, a Mr. Dixon, George Durgan, and Rev. Jacob Price.

Grant proposed that if the African American voters supported him for the legislature, and if he was elected, he would amend the City Charter of Covington to provide for an African American public school. He proved to be a man of his word. Grant won election to the state legislature and pushed for the amendment. He deeded over his own land for the school, which was first named Seventh St. School and later William Grant High School. On October 5, 1880, the Seventh St. School opened with an enrollment of 200 students. Grant died on May 5, 1882, and was buried in Linden Grove Cemetery in Covington.

With the annexation of Latonia by Covington in 1908, the Lincoln School in Latonia, another African American elementary school, was combined with the Seventh St. School to form the LincolnGrant Elementary School and the William Grant High School. In 1932, when a new school building was completed on Greenup St., all the grades were consolidated into one building. A Kentucky Historical Society Highway Marker, detailing the histories of Covington’s African American schools, was placed in front of the building of the former Lincoln-Grant School on August 2, 1997.

“Col. Wm. L. Grant,” DC, May 3, 1882, 2.

“Death of Wm. L. Grant,” DC, May 6, 1882, 2.

“Funeral of Col. W. L. Grant,” DC, May 8, 1882, 2.

“Special Election,” CJ, November 14, 1874, 3.

“William Grant Helped Launch a Beginning in Education on the Path toward Equality,” KP, July 8, 1991, 4 K. “William L. Grant,” CJ, July 31, 1875, 3.

“William L. Grant,” Covington Ticket, July 17, 1875, 1.

Theodore H. H. Harris

GRANT CO. Established on April 1, 1820, by an act of the Kentucky legislature, Grant Co. consists of 259 square miles that were taken from the western half of Pendleton Co. Grant Co. is located in the Outer Bluegrass region, where the land is mostly rolling plains with some hilly areas. It is bordered on the north by Gallatin, Boone, and Kenton counties, to the east by Pendleton Co., to the south by Harrison and Scott counties, and to the southwest

by Owen Co. It is believed that the county was named for one or more of the three sons of William and Rebecca Boone Grant, nephews of Daniel Boone: Col. John Grant (1754–1826), who developed saltworks on the Licking River; Samuel Grant (1762– 1789), who was killed pursuing Indians in Indiana; and Gen. Squire Grant (1764–1833), who became a developer of adjoining Boone Co. One of the last Indian massacres in Kentucky took place in Grant Co. at the Andrew Brann cabin on Bullock Pen Creek west of Crittenden. It most likely occurred in 1807 rather than “around 1805,” as indicated on a historical marker. Brann and some of his children were killed. The mother was scalped, but she and six children survived and resettled in Harrison Co.

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In 1827 a small section of land was transferred from Harrison Co. to Grant Co., moving the county boundary line southward from Crooked Creek to the dividing ridge between the Crooked Creek and Raven Creek watersheds. In 1852 a small portion of Kenton Co. adjoining the Crittenden area was transferred to Grant Co. In 1876 the Kentucky legislature transferred an extensive area of Owen Co. into Grant Co. This area became the Corinth and Keefer voting precincts.

During the Civil War, more than 500 Grant Co. men, draftees and volunteers, served in military ser vice for the Union, and about as many volunteers served for the South. A number of skirmishes took place in the county, including a Confederate raid in 1864 on Williamstown, in which U.S. moneys and muskets were seized (see Williamstown Raid).

Also in 1864, three native Grant Co. Confederates, federal prisoners of war, were returned home and executed in reprisal for the killing of the local U.S. marshal and other Northern sympathizers.

Much of the development of Grant Co. took place along the Dry Ridge Trace, the crest of the great dividing ridge that separates the waters of the Licking River on the east from the tributaries of the Kentucky River on the west. The Norfolk Southern Railway and U.S. 25 (Dixie Highway) follow the crest, where there were no streams to cross or bridges to build. I-75 parallels the dry ridge crest and has interchanges leading into Crittenden, Dry Ridge, Williamstown (the county seat), and Corinth, the incorporated towns in the county. Traveler and tourist facilities are readily available in all four towns. Jonesville, on the western side of the county near Owen Co., was once incorporated but surrendered its charter of incorporation some years ago. There are 28 identifiable communities in Grant Co. Agriculture has been important historically to the county’s economy. Tobacco now has only a limited commercial market, but other crops and livestock production continue to play significant roles in the economy. Major employers include Wolf Steel at Crittenden; the Dana Corporation, Grant County Foods, and Powell Structures at Dry Ridge; and Gusher Pump, Performance Pipe, and Sun Manufacturing at Williamstown.

A major need was met when the Grant Co. Hospital opened its doors in 1964, providing both inpatient and outpatient ser vices. By the mid-1980s, however, some specialist physicians stopped serving at the hospital because of the extremely high malpractice insurance premiums they were being charged. Their departure caused staffi ng and financial difficulties for the hospital. Corrective steps included the construction of a wing to the hospital that included multiple examination and treatment rooms with added medical facilities. A fully lit helicopter pad was built so that patients could be transported rapidly to other facilities in emergencies. In 1990 a contract was entered into with St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Kenton Co. to provide specialized and auxiliary ser vices, an arrangement that continues today.

Northern Kentucky University, whose main campus is located in Highland Heights, has

GRANT CO. PUBLIC LIBRARY

opened the Grant Co. Educational Center, making higher education more convenient for Grant Co. residents. The former Williamstown City Building has been remodeled to provide four classrooms, a conference room, technology laboratories, and offices. Twenty-four courses are offered each spring and fall semester. Currently, about 400 students are enrolled, and 180 of these are taking more than one class at a time. An associate degree in liberal studies may be earned upon completion of 64 credit hours.

The population growth of the county is due to its location halfway between Covington on the north and Lexington on the south. Many residents commute to work in these areas. The county had a population of 9,999 in 1970, 13,308 in 1980, 15,737 in 1990, and 22,384 in 2000.

Conrad, John B., ed. History of Grant County. Williamstown, Ky.: Grant Co. Historical Society, 1992.

Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia.

Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1992.

John B. Conrad

GRANT CO. ANIMAL SHELTER. In 1988 the citizens of Grant Co. decided that the homeless dogs in the county’s care deserved better treatment. The February 9, 1988, Grant County News reported that these animals existed, and often died, in horrific conditions—enclosed in one unsanitary pen without enough food or water. On August 23, 1991, Grant Co. dedicated its first shelter for castoff pets. However, the shelter’s five indoor and three outdoor pens quickly became inadequate.

Scott Caudill, the dog warden in 1998, told the Grant County News that it was too small, forcing him to euthanize dogs quickly to open space for other animals. In 1997, 96 percent of the dogs entering the shelter were destroyed. Again citizens and the fiscal court responded. With help from state funds and from prisoners performing workrelease jobs, the county built a larger, modern shelter in two phases. On May 31, 2003, the county dedicated the second wing of the new facility, which accepts both dogs and cats. The facility is located at 204 Barnes Rd. in Williamstown. Also in 2003, the fiscal court created Grant Co. Friends of the Shelter, a group focused on improving shelter animals’ conditions and fate. Even with these improvements, many discarded Grant Co. pets die. During the first seven months of 2004, the county euthanized 195 animals.

Clayton, Laetitia. “Shelter Dogs Dying for Lack of Homes,” Grant County News, October 29, 1998, 1.

“County Animal Control Center Opens for Business,” Grant County News, August 24, 1991, 1.

“Dog Warden Loses Job over Allegations,” Grant County News, February 9, 1988, 1.

Brenda L. Wilson

GRANT CO. DEPOSIT BANK. The Grant Co. Deposit Bank opened for business on March 2, 1882, at 106 N. Main St., Williamstown, where its main office remains today. Seven men served on the original board of directors, and by 1886 the

bank’s capital had grown to $80,000; today the bank has 10 directors and its capital and surplus are worth $4.44 million. The first dividends were paid to stockholders on January 3, 1885, and dividends have continued to be paid annually without interruption. The bank has been honored as one of Kentucky’s Centennial Businesses. The Grant Co. Deposit Bank began with six stockholders and has increased to more than 100 shareholders today; some of the stock is still held by descendants of the first stockholders. On August 9, 1984, a bank holding company known as Grant Co. Bancorp Inc. was organized. The Grant Co. Deposit Bank, in an effort to improve its ser vice to the citizens of Grant Co. and its stockholders, has opened branches at five locations: 1100 N. Main St., Williamstown, in 1983; Ky. Rt. 330, Corinth, in 1987; 225 Violet Rd., Crittenden, in 1991; 14830 Jonesville Rd., Jonesville, in 1995; and 26 Taft Hwy., Dry Ridge, in 2001.

ATMs are available at all of these branches and offsite at I-75 and Ky. Rt. 36 in Williamstown and at 33 Broadway in Dry Ridge. The bank also offers Internet banking to its customers.

Grant County Deposit Bank. www.gcdb.net (accessed April 25, 2006).

“Northern Kentucky’s Well-Seasoned Firms,” KP, July 31, 2001, 3K. Williams, Tom. “Bank Sale Means Jonesville Keeps Community Bank,” KP, June 6, 1995, 8K.

D. W. Dills

GRANT CO. HIGH SCHOOL. A consolidated school that opened in 1954, Grant Co. High School replaced Corinth High School, Crittenden High School, Dry Ridge High School, and Mason High School. The county’s other secondary school, Williamstown High School, part of the Williamstown Independent Schools, remains in operation. Originally located in south Dry Ridge, Grant Co. High School moved in 1998 to a new multimillion-dollar facility at 715 Warsaw Rd. in Dry Ridge. It is centrally located for all county residents and is the hub of school and community activities. Over 40 percent of its student body is classified as “academic achievers,” defined as those students who achieve at high levels, attend school regularly, and exhibit exemplary behavior.

The high school features modern art studios and science labs. In 1998 Grant Co. High School’s marching band won a second-class AA state band championship; it won the state championship in 1995. Roger Bingham, a teacher at the high school, gained national recognition as a participant on the popu lar network television program Survivor, where he was nicknamed “Kentucky Joe” and was frequently asked to make public appearances. In 2008 Grant Co. High School enrolled more than 1,000 students.

Conrad, John B., ed. History of Grant County. Williamstown, Ky.: Grant Co. Historical Society, 1992.

James C. Claypool and Paul A. Tenkotte

GRANT CO. HOSPITAL. See St. Elizabeth Medical Center.

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GRANT CO. NEWS. Robert Lee Westover established the weekly newspaper the Grant Co. News at Dry Ridge in 1906. In 1909 the Grant Co. News acquired the office and plant of the Williamstown Courier and relocated to Williamstown.

The Grant Co. News was successfully managed and operated by Westover until his death in 1947, at which time Edythe Harrell, who had worked for the paper for 16 years, acquired the newspaper. She sold the paper and the printing plant in 1966 to Clayton Roland, who operated it until his death.

The paper was sold in 1975 to the Scripps Howard newspaper chain (see Newspapers); Susan Arena became its publisher and W. J. Stanchina its editor.

Landmark Community Papers acquired the Grant Co. News in 1988 and installed Ken Stone as publisher. He has maintained and operated the paper since that time. Jamie Baker-Nantz serves as editor and oversees a staff of 12 employees.

Harrell, Edythe G. “History of Newspapers and Journalism in Grant County.” In Grant County Sesqui- Centennial. Williamstown, Ky.: Publications Committee, 1970.

John B. Conrad

GRANT CO. PARK. The Grant Co. Park is located on U.S. 25 in the south end of Crittenden. It once was part of the Lloyd Wildlife Center (see Curtis Gates Lloyd Wildlife Area), where Curtis Gates Lloyd had a log cabin and where he built the Lloyd Welfare House, a center established to be used for nonprofit meetings by residents of the county. After Lloyd’s death in 1926, the land was deeded to the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife. On March 18, 1969, the Grant Co. Fiscal Court signed a lease with the Department of Fish and Wildlife for the use of the land as a county park.

The terms of the lease specified a payment of $1.00 per year. The county cleared some of the dead trees and built restrooms on the property. Other buildings were built as well, and the county fair was moved to the park. On Oct. 7, 1999, the Department of Fish and Wildlife transferred the 55 acres to the Grant Co. Fiscal Court. Subsequently, the county has cleared scrub trees and planted replacement trees. The park now has basketball, baseball, and soccer fields, a horseshoe-pitching area, and a playground for children. The county fair grounds in the park include a cattle barn, a horse ring, a tractor-pull track, and two other buildings for exhibits. Several thousand people come to the park for the fair during one week in the summer. Parties, reunions, and weddings, as well as the District Track Meet, Senior Day, CETA’s Art Show, and other events are held in the park. Many people enjoy simply walking in the park each day. The park has a well-kept, rolling landscape and is a great asset to Grant Co. Grant Co. Lease Book 110, p. 26.

Quit Claim Deed to Grant Co., Deed Book 254, pp.

621–30.

Edna Marie Cummins

GRANT CO. PUBLIC LIBRARY. Taxsupported library ser vice became available to Grant

416 GRANT CO. PUBLIC SCHOOLS Co. residents in 1954 when the county’s first public library opened in the basement of the courthouse in Williamstown. The Williamstown Women’s Club and the Grant Co. Younger Woman’s Club petitioned the Fiscal Court for space and funds.

For decades thereafter, club members volunteered thousands of hours and continued to carry out fundraising efforts to support library efforts.

In 1967 the library moved next door to the Old County Records Building, after the state threatened to withdraw state funds and terminate bookmobile ser vices unless the county increased its investment in library ser vices. In 1976 the county Fiscal Court accepted a petition from residents to create a library taxing district. A two-story building addition was completed in 1978. The library remained at its downtown Williamstown location for more than 35 years, then moved to a new building at 201 Barnes Rd, one-half mile east of I-75 at exit 156.

The new facility is located on a site of more than four acres. The 12,500-square-foot library, built at a cost of nearly $2.2 million, was dedicated on April 27, 2003. The Children’s Garden, created with donated labor and funds, and attractive landscaping frame the structure’s red-brick exterior. The dramatic interior features exposed trusses, 27-foot ceilings, window walls, and an octagonal reading room. The open floor plan is an ideal environment for the library’s collection and ser vices. On the west side of the public ser vice area, children have access to a collection of 14,000 books, educational games, and toys. The building’s east side, the adult area, houses a print collection of 21,000 books and magazine and newspaper subscriptions, along with 2,000 media titles that include music and books on CDs, books on tape, and movies in DVD and VHS formats. A teen area was created in 2004. The Kentucky Room is home to reference materials about the county and the state, genealogical information, local and family history fi les, census records, and the Grant Co. newspapers on microfi lm. The Community Room has a fully equipped kitchen and is the site of educational, informational, and cultural programs as well as events for adults and children, including weekly toddler and preschool story hours.

The building was designed with space for 65,000 titles, and at least 15 percent of the library’s operating budget is dedicated to collection development.

The library’s catalog and circulation functions are computerized. The catalog, the calendar, and a variety of online reference sources are available via the library’s Web site. Library cardholders may also access their accounts online. Wireless access to the Internet and 15 public-use computers are very popular with patrons.

From a collection of 1,400 books and a parttime and volunteer staff in 1954, the library has grown to 35,000 print and media titles and a staff of nine. Thus the library can fulfi ll its mission of enhancing the quality of life for Grant Co. residents by serving their informational, leisure, and lifelong learning needs.

Grant Co. Fiscal Court Orders, 16:36, 37, 38.

“Joint Club Meetings,” Grant Co. News, March 20, 1953, 4.

“Library Plans Move to Square,” Grant Co. News, April 27, 1967, 1.

Paschke, Margaret. “Club Makes Library Come Alive,” KP, February 14, 1968, 15K. Russell, Burl. “Underground ‘Book Nook’ Emerges into Light of Day: Grant Co. Library on the Move,” KP, June 28, 1967, 19K. Williamstown Woman’s Club. “Minutes Book, 1942– 1958,” pp. 299–300, March 12, 1953, Grant Co. Public Library.

Ann Stanchina

GRANT CO. PUBLIC SCHOOLS. When Grant Co. was created by the Kentucky legislature in 1820, two buildings in the county, both crude log structures, were being used for public school purposes. One was located on Fork Lick Creek, at or near where the creek is crossed by present-day Ky. Rt. 36. The first teacher at that school is said to have been James Williams. The other school was located at or near the site of Campbell’s Blockhouse, east of U.S. 25 (Dixie Highway) and just south of the corporation line separating Williamstown and Dry Ridge. The first teacher there was William Littell. Both schools were maintained financially by the tuition that was charged. A surviving record states that Littell charged $1.50 per student per school quarter, “one half to be paid in money and the rest in coonskins.”

Kentucky state laws, enacted at various times, made provision for additional schools to be built as the population increased and partially funded by taxes, reducing the tuition paid by the parents. In 1838 Kentucky established a system of common schools, whereby Grant Co., like the other counties, was divided into a number of school districts. Each school was operated by a board of three trustees elected by the male property owners in the district.

With the approach of the Civil War, the activation of once dormant districts ceased. During the war, many active school districts occasionally were closed for a time. After the war, the schools that had suspended operations reopened. Burl N. Carter, an educator and a lawyer, was elected Grant Co. commissioner of schools. He was successful in restoring the existing districts and establishing new ones, so that by 1870 there were 55 one-room schools functioning in the county, each offering grades one through eight. An interest in education beyond eighth grade led to the establishment of academies in Corinth, Crittenden, and Williamstown.

In 1875 state law required the establishment of “colored” school districts for black children residing in the county. Accordingly, District A was organized at Williamstown, District B at Crittenden, and District C at Corinth. The boundaries of Districts D and E, at Dry Ridge and near Jonesville, were frequently revised because of the large area covered.

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, county school boards were developed and replaced the three-trustee system of managing individual schools. However, not all schools in Grant Co. were

managed by the new board. The 1921 minutes of the Grant Co. Board of Education recognize the totally independent status of the Williamstown Graded Free School Board and the Corinth Graded Common School Board, both free of any control by the county board. In 1924 the Corinth board joined the county system in order to finance a new school building that was needed.

The first high school in the county was operating in the Williamstown District by 1891. The Williamstown schools were also the first “free” schools, wholly paid for by taxes (requiring no tuition charges). Other high schools in the county included Crittenden High School, which graduated its first class of one in 1911; Dry Ridge High School, which graduated its first class of four in 1912; Corinth High School, which graduated its first class of three in 1918; and Mason High School, which graduated its first class of one in 1921.

Grant Co. High School was opened in 1954 in Dry Ridge to replace the four county high schools. The old high schools graduated their last classes in 1953. Also constructed was a countywide middle school adjacent to the high school. Students in the seventh and eighth grades of the middle school were bussed from all over the county along with high school students. Elementary students in grades one through six continued attending classes at their old school buildings for a time. A new Crittenden–Mount Zion Elementary School was built in 1973 for students in that area. After the old school building in Dry Ridge burned in 1973, a new Dry Ridge Elementary School was built next to the Grant Co. Middle School. A new MasonCorinth Elementary School was built in 1991 on U.S. 25 between Mason and Corinth.

A large increase in population throughout the county made the county high school in south Dry Ridge inadequate, so a new, larger one was built on the Warsaw Rd. on the west side of Dry Ridge and dedicated in 1998. The county middle school in south Dry Ridge, which was also overcrowded, expanded into the adjacent high school property.

Conrad, John B., ed. History of Grant County. Williamstown, Ky.: Grant Co. Historical Society, 1992.

John B. Conrad

GRANT FAMILY. Many Kentuckians with the surname of Grant, including numerous Northern Kentucky persons, can trace their lineage to William and Margery Verner Grant, who came to America in 1725 from the highlands of Scotland, landing at the port of Philadelphia. The first record of the family in America is of a son William II in February 1726. The family moved with a group of relatives and friends to the Yadkin Valley in Rowan Co., N.C. in 1749. Margery, on horseback, with a newborn child, and a female slave drowned while attempting to cross the Yadkin River. In the Yadkin Valley, the Grants lived near the Boones and the Bryans. William II married Elizabeth Boone, daughter of Squire and Sarah Morgan Boone and a sister of the famous pioneer Daniel Boone. They had 11 children, all born in North Carolina. In

GRASS HILLS

1777 the family came to Kentucky and settled with Daniel Boone at Boonesborough. William II sent his son Squire back to North Carolina to finish his schooling and to train as a surveyor. Eventually, Squire was made deputy surveyor for land grants being given by the State of Virginia to North Carolina veterans of the Revolutionary War. He surveyed numerous tracts of land in North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky. For his military ser vice, Squire was given a 1,400-acre tract on Elkhorn Creek, near Lexington. While on a salt-making trip to Blue Licks in 1778, Daniel Boone was captured by a band of Shawnee Indians. The Grants, believing Daniel to be dead, went back to North Carolina. They returned to Kentucky in 1780. William II soon became quite discouraged with his new life and in 1783 decided to go once again to North Carolina. In preparation for the trip, he traded 400 acres of his land for an Indian pony, but the next day the pony and all his horses were stolen, making the trip impossible. Reluctantly, he remained in Kentucky for the rest of his life. William II died in 1804; his wife, Elizabeth, died in 1814.

Both were buried on land that they owned about 10 miles east of Lexington.

Three of William II’s sons, Samuel, John, and Squire Grant, played significant roles in the early history of Northern Kentucky. Samuel, for whom Grant Co. was named, married Lydia Craig, daughter of Capt. Elijah Craig, and they had two children. Indians killed Samuel while he was on active duty with Col. Robert Johnson. John started a saltmaking operation at present-day Grants Lick, ran several gristmills, operated a ferry across the Licking River to Wilmington, Ky., and served for one term in the Kentucky House of Representatives.

John died in Missouri at age 72. Squire lived at Wilmington, on the west side of the Licking, opposite Grants Lick. In 1804 he became a brigadier general of the 4th Brigade of Kentucky Militia.

Squire was one of the few soldiers to escape unharmed at the Battle of Blue Licks in 1782. He also fought in the Battle of the Thames at Chatham, Ontario, on October 18, 1813, in which the great Shawnee Indian chief Tecumseh was killed. Squire served as sheriff of Campbell Co. in 1810 and also operated a general store and tavern near his brother’s saltworks at Grants Lick. He served as a state senator from 1801 to 1806. Squire married three times, fathering 13 children. In 1832 Squire Grant traveled on horseback to Calloway Co., Mo., to visit his son Israel; during his return, he visited his stepdaughter Mrs. Blythe in Indianapolis, Ind. He died on October 6, 1833, at his home in Errondale (later known as Grants Bend), on the Licking River, during a cholera epidemic. During the last 13 years of his life, Squire acquired 40,000 acres in Campbell and Kenton counties but lost all except about 1,000 acres as a result of lawsuits over faulty deeds, overlapping claims, and poorly fi led paperwork. In his will he left the remaining land to his children.

Grant Family Files, Kenton Co. Public Library, Covington, Ky.

Jack Wessling

GRANT MANOR HEALTH CARE CENTER. In 1984 a group of Northern Kentucky businessmen recognized a need to establish a long-term health care facility in Grant Co. to provide private, Medicaid- and Medicare-qualified skilled care for area residents. Following several meetings, five men, Dr. R. Michael Goodman, Arthur Moore, W. Michael Stanley, and William C. Wilson, all of Williamstown, and Bernie Poe of Owenton, formed Grant Manor Health Care Center Inc., for the purpose of securing a certificate of need from the Commonwealth of Kentucky to construct and operate a long-term health care facility. After more than two years, their efforts were successful; the certificate of need was granted and Grant Co.’s first modern, completely dual-certified long-term health care facility became a reality. A one-floor brickveneer building was soon constructed along Barnes Rd. in Williamstown, adjacent to the Grant Co. Hospital, and opened to the public in November 1987. The facility, located on a 10-acre tract of land purchased from the Grant Co. Fiscal Court, was initially certified for 60 beds.

Just before the health care center opened, the corporation was sold to SeniorCare of Louisville, a corporation with much experience in providing long-term health care through its operation of five other similar facilities in Kentucky. The first administrator was Julia Poe, who served for about 18 months. She was succeeded by Glenda Walton and then by the current administrator, Bettye Tackett, who has served since November of 1989.

In 1995 an addition to the facility provided space for 35 more beds, bringing the total number of certified beds to 95. All of the SeniorCare facilities in Kentucky were sold in July 2006 to Harborside Rehabilitation and Nursing Centers of Boston, Mass., which operates Grant Manor as one of its 62 health care facilities, located in 10 states.

Conrad, John B., ed. History of Grant County. Williamstown, Ky.: Grant Co. Historical Society, 1992.

“Facility of Year,” KP, October 15, 1998, 2K. “Grant Manor Near Completion,” Dixie News, October 26, 1995, 18.

William Michael Stanley

GRANTS LICK. The salt beds that were deposited 450 million years ago, when Northern Kentucky was covered by the Ordovician Sea, gave rise to many place names in the region. In 1793 Samuel Bryan discovered salt in southern Campbell Co. along Phillips Creek, where he had purchased property. A newspaper article in 1890 mentioned that the spot had always been known as the deer lick because of the number of animals that went there to lick salt. John Grant (see Grant Family) drilled a well in the area, and then he and several others formed the Grant and Company Salt Works that gave Grants Lick its name. The need for salt was critical for settlers, and the production and distribution of it led to the early roads and development of southern Campbell Co. The production of salt was a large undertaking.

Once salt water was drawn from the well, it was put into a large kettle and boiled until the water evapo-

417

rated, leaving only salt. It took approximately 250 to 900 gallons of salt water to distill a bushel of salt. An early report stated that Grant’s well was one of the best in the state. There, only 130 gallons of salt water were required, usually, to produce a bushel of salt.

Many hands were needed to cut wood for fires and to tend kettles. These laborers required food, drink, and lodging. So did the buyers and haulers who came to obtain salt for their communities.

The horses and oxen doing the hauling needed feed, stabling, and perhaps blacksmith ser vices. So a settlement arose around the lick to meet the demands of men and animals.

Soon after Campbell Co. was created in 1794, road-building began in earnest in the area. Most of the early roads were in the southern end of the county and led to the salt lick. One of the first was from the lick to Wilmington on the Licking River.

In 1797 Grant requested a road from the well to Newport, some 20 miles to the north, and to the forks of Harris Creek in Pendleton Co. Again in 1799, Grant asked to have a road constructed locally from Reed’s Tavern along the Dry Ridge to his saltworks. An 1803 petition was for a road from the Ohio River west across Campbell Co. to Roberts’ Ferry (now the Plum Creek area) on the Licking River.

The second post office in the county was established at Grants Lick in 1800. In 1805 Grant petitioned the Campbell Co. court for a tavern license.

A store had been in existence there before 1804. A blacksmith shop operated at the site from early times until the 1940s.

In the mid-1820s, the salt water began to become scarce. The competition from other salt makers in Ohio and Virginia began to take its toll on the Grants Lick salt well and, later, on the settlement. A newspaper article in the Newport Local in 1878 mentioned that Grants Lick was beginning to rebuild. It had a post office again, three stores, two blacksmith shops, a steam saw and grist mill, two taverns, a large Baptist church, and a district schoolhouse. The Grants Lick area remained rural until recent times, when the widening of U.S. 27 has been bringing new population and development to the southern end of Campbell Co. Today, the area has two churches, an elementary school, a store, a tavern, and a funeral home. It is also home to the Oakland Cemetery, where Mary Boone Bryan, sister of Daniel Boone, was buried.

“Correspondence,” Newport Local, December 5, 1878, 1.

“Dedication Marks Finds at Salt Works,” KE, April 21, 1979, A3.

“Grants Lick,” KSJ, April 15, 1890, 2.

Kleber, John E., ed. The Kentucky Encyclopedia.

Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1992.

Vertical fi les, Campbell Co. Historical and Genealogical Society, Alexandria, Ky.

Martha Pelfrey

GRASS HILLS. Grass Hills was the homestead of Lewis Sanders (1781–1861), one of Kentucky’s first agricultural experts (see Agriculture). Famous as an antebellum experimental farm, Grass

418 GRASSY CREEK CHRISTIAN CHURCH Hills was home to Sanders and his descendants until 1883. It was also the site of many political meetings during the 1830s and 1840s, especially during the buildup leading to the Mexican War. This unusually constructed home was built on 750 acres that Ann Nicholas Sanders, the fi rst wife of Lewis Sanders, inherited from her father, George Nicholas, a politically powerful Lexington attorney. Lewis Sanders began construction on the foundations and barns in 1819. The main house, which dates to 1823, was built chiefly by slave labor of notched logs, shingles, and rafters hewn and shaped by hand on-site. According to biographer Anna V. Parker, there was no sawmill available.

A stickler for detail, Sanders had his men age the cut flooring in the farm pond for two years to season it before they used the boards as planks.

The main floor of Grass Hills has two large front rooms about 20 feet square connected by a 15-footwide main corridor. At the far end of the hall is a dining room with a large kitchen adjacent to the right side. On the left are two small bedrooms. Another three bedrooms, used for guests, are behind the right chimney corner, and a narrow, winding staircase leads around the chimney to an upstairs bedroom. A large veranda fronts the hall, and a small porch at the back is accessed by a door out of the dining room. The two front rooms have large wood fireplaces. All of the rooms are plastered except for Lewis Sanders’s own room on the left, which has exposed rafters and chinked logs. There are traces of early Georgian moldings, and some of the staircases are typical of early log construction.

In the hall and right (east) large room, Greek Revival elements were added in the 1830s or 1840s, at a time when Sanders hosted many political events at Grass Hills. The basement includes a wine cellar, and when two families occupied the house, Lewis Sanders’s kitchen was located there as well. Upstairs are two large rooms, each with a separate stairway, and a wide hall between them.

Grass Hills included the rambling main house, the barns, several outbuildings, a large pond, a 25acre orchard, a racetrack just beyond the front-yard fence, and fields of experimental grasses, grains, hemp, and other crops. In addition to thoroughbred racing horses, Sanders imported strains of Merino sheep and shorthorn cattle. He became an expert and a judge of Kentucky’s hemp and wool production. His longtime friendship with the Dufour family of Switzerland Co., Ind., gave him an interest in vineyards and wine production as well.

There is a Kentucky State Historical Marker at Grass Hills, and on August 22, 1975, the house was listed on the National Register of Historical Places.

About 91 acres were taken from the Grass Hills estate when I-71 (see Expressways) was constructed through Carroll Co. Parker, Anna V. The Sanders Family of Grass Hills.

Madison, Ind.: Coleman, 1966.

Diane Perrine Coon

GRASSY CREEK CHRISTIAN CHURCH. This church, located in northwestern Pendleton Co., was organized in 1838 with 13 charter mem-

bers. The first church building was constructed of logs and was located along the South Fork of Grassy Creek, but the church building was later moved to a parcel of land donated by Richard Mullins, who had moved to the area from Virginia. In 1851 the original log church was replaced with a frame structure. In 1895 the interior of the building was remodeled so that it had an arched ceiling and a new platform with windows at the rear. The flood of 1937 damaged the interior of the church, requiring extensive repairs, and the building was also raised up on a three-foot foundation. Nevertheless, several subsequent floods did damage to the church over time. The building was raised again in the 1940s and a basement was added. In 1963 a building fund was started with the idea of moving the church to higher ground. In March 1964, one of the worst floods filled the church with water about four and a half feet deep in the auditorium. Then, on January 31, 1965, shortly after the morning service, a fire broke out in the ceiling of the building and the entire structure burned to the ground.

The congregation rebuilt on higher ground, next to the old Richard Mullins homestead, on land willed to the church by Theodore Blackburn.

On June 27, 1965, a groundbreaking ser vice was held and construction began. In spring 1974, the church began work on a new parsonage, where the Richard Mullins homestead once stood.

Belew, Mildred Boden. The First 200 Years of Pendleton County. Falmouth, Ky.: M. B. Belew, n.d. [ca.

1994].

“Roads Damaged; One Bridge Washed Out by Sunday’s Storm,” KP, June 27, 1928, 1.

“Rural Store Fills Niche for Village,” KP, May 19, 1993, 9A. “Society—Grassy Creek,” KP, May 7, 1931, 6.

Mildred Belew

GRATZ. Located on the western edge of Owen Co., the community of Gratz sits on the eastern shore of the Kentucky River, six miles west of Owenton along Ky. Rt. 22 and 28 miles upriver from Carrollton. A bridge at Gratz carries Ky. Rt. 22 across the river into Henry Co. It is believed that the city was named for Benjamin Gratz Brown, the grandson of Kentucky’s first U.S. senator, John Mason Brown, whose family owned most of the land in the area. A post office was established in 1844 as Clay Lick, from the name of the local creek that empties into the river, but in 1851 the post office was renamed Gratz. There was a resort hotel on Clay Lick Creek, which catered to travelers and their desire for sulfur water, and a saloon was located nearby. The town was surveyed in 1847 and incorporated as a sixth-class city in 1881. The city’s three landings were once congested, with wagons busily off-loading coal, hardware, and general merchandise for inland Owen Co. The population of Gratz reached its peak of 300 residents around the year 1900; at that time the town had four churches, two schools (one for whites and one for African Americans), two hotels, a bank, three medical doctors, two drugstores, a dentist, an opera house, a band, and a baseball team. Showboats such as

Billy Bryant’s visited Gratz annually. During the last quarter of the 19th century, Cedar Grove College operated in Gratz, and a student there for a short time was Judge James W. Cammack Sr. A lead mine flourished nearby in the early part of the 20th century. About that same time, there was a ninth-grade school at Gratz. The building it used is today’s community center. In recent years, Ky. Rt. 35, which runs along the Kentucky River through Gratz, has been improved and widened as part of a general upgrade to facilitate access to the new Kentucky Speedway at Sparta. In the year 2000, the Gratz population was 89.

An Atlas of Owen County, Kentucky. Philadelphia: Lake, 1883.

Dias, Monica. “Town Bristles at Flow of Trucks to Speedway,” KP, April 25, 2000, 1K. Houchens, Mariam Sidebottom. History of Owen County: “Sweet Owen.” Louisville, Ky.: Standard, 1976.

Rennick, Robert M. Kentucky Place Names. Lexington: Univ. of Kentucky Press, 1984.

U.S. Census Bureau. “American Fact Finder. Data Set. Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF1) 100-Percent Data. Custom Table.” www.census.gov (accessed February 21, 2005).

Doris Riley

GRAVES, BARTLETT (b. November 22, 1766, Louisa Co., Va.; d. January 6, 1858, Erlanger, Ky.).

Bartlett Graves, an early landowner and politician, was the son of Thomas and Isabel Bartlett Graves.

He came to Bryants Station in Central Kentucky in 1785 and in the 1790s moved to Newport. There he became a representative to the state legislature and accumulated substantial amounts of property.

He moved to modern-day Erlanger shortly after 1800. About 1806, he was widowed for a second time; he later married Elizabeth Leathers, the daughter of John Leathers, who owned much land in the area. In 1813 Graves purchased 500 acres, on which much of the city of Erlanger now stands, for $1,375. In 1819 he completed a large colonial home built of bricks made by slaves on the site. He named his home Walnut Grove and established a plantation on the property, where he lived for the rest of his life. Graves remained active in public affairs.

He served as sheriff of Campbell Co.; was instrumental in the building of the Covington and Lexington Turnpike, which ran near his property in Erlanger; and was also involved in the creation of Kenton Co. from Campbell Co. in 1840.

He raised a family of 13 children. Walnut Grove was sold to the Bedinger family after Graves died, and when the property was subdivided, the streets were named Bartlett and Graves in honor of this early settler. Graves died in 1858 and was buried at the Florence Cemetery in Boone Co. Onkst, Wayne, ed. From Buffalo Trails to the TwentyFirst Century: A Centennial History of Erlanger, Kentucky. Erlanger, Ky.: Erlanger Historical Society, 1996.

Reis, Jim. “Erlanger Pioneer and Land Owner Bartlett Graves Played an Active Role in the Life of His Community,” KP, May 17, 1993, 4K.

Wayne Onkst

GREAT DEPRESSION

GRAY, RALPH (b. ca. 1802, England; d. November 30, 1863, Covington, Ky.). In 1848 Ralph Gray, in partnership with Robert Hemingray, founded the Gray & Hemingray Glass Works, the predecessor to the Hemingray Glass Company. Together they became pioneer industrialists in Covington and were quickly recognized nationwide as leaders in glassware manufacturing.

Ralph Gray came to the United States and settled in Birmingham, an industrial suburb of Pittsburgh, in the early 1840s, with at least two brothers, James and Anthony. Ralph gained employment as a glassblower and mechanic in one of the numerous glassworks located along the south side of the Monongahela River. Following the Great Fire of 1845, which destroyed most of the industrial and commercial district of Pittsburgh, he joined Robert Hemingray in a move down the Ohio River to Covington. Their intent was to establish a glassworks at Covington, taking advantage of a market in great need of domestic and commercial glass products of all descriptions. However, no suitable site was immediately available; they had to lease a small lot just across the river in Cincinnati, where they constructed a furnace and began making glass in late 1848. By 1852 they had moved their factory to Second St. and Madison Ave. in Covington.

Ralph Gray married Ann Frier in Pittsburgh.

Although they had no biological children, they raised five children of deceased brothers and sisters. The Gray family resided at 45 W. Fourth St. in Covington.

One of the principal products of the Gray & Hemingray Glass Works was fruit jars. Gray and Hemingray received a patent in 1863 for an improved closure for fruit jars. Those Gray & Hemingray jars were popu lar with homemakers throughout the Ohio River Valley for many years. During the 1880s the glassworks employed about 500 men and boys at peaks of production.

Ralph Gray died in 1863, at the height of the Civil War. In his will he stipulated that his onehalf undivided interest in the glassworks should be sold and the proceeds invested to provide for the comfort of his widow. This requirement caused consternation for Hemingray, who was executor of the will. Not only had he lost his partner and friend, but also he was burdened with the task of securing the future of the glassworks during greatly disturbing times. Robert Hemingray, with the assistance of his brothers Joseph C. and Samuel J.; his brother-in-law, Richard Evans; and a close friend, James L. Foley, was able to buy Gray’s interest and ensure the continuation of the glassworks as a family concern.

Ralph Gray’s younger brother, Anthony Gray, married Robert Hemingray’s sister-in-law, Susan Carroll, in Pittsburgh. In 1848 Anthony came to Cincinnati to work as a glassblower. Although he never became a partner in the company, Anthony remained as a glassblower until 1862, when ill health forced his retirement. Anthony died April 27, 1865, and Susan died in 1868. The five children of Anthony and Susan Gray, two boys and three girls, were taken into the Robert Hemingray home.

The glassworks employed the eldest son, John C. Gray, who eventually become plant manager.

Originally buried at Linden Grove Cemetery in Covington, Ralph Gray was reburied at Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati. His widow, Ann, died in 1901 and was buried beside him.

City Directories, Cincinnati, Ohio, Covington, Ky., and Pittsburgh, Pa. “Death Notice,” CDE, December 1, 1863, 2.

Hyve, H. G. (Bea). The Hemingray Glass Co.: A Most Colorful History. San Diego: Clarice Gordon, n.d. [ca. 1998].

Probate and Deed Records, from Hamilton Co., Ohio (Cincinnati), Kenton Co., Ky. (Covington and Independence), and Allegheny Co., Pa. (Pittsburgh).

Spring Grove Cemetery records, Spring Grove Cemetery, Cincinnati, Ohio.

419

2005, Grayson was named Outstanding Young Kentuckian by the Kentucky Jaycees. He is currently serving in a variety of leadership capacities, most notably as chairman of the Republican Association of Secretaries of State and as chairman of the elections committee of the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS). As a former vice chairman of the NASS committee on voter participation, Grayson also serves on the association’s committee on business ser vices and the subcommittee on presidential primaries. In 2008 Grayson was elected president of NASS. Dixie Heights High School Annual. Edgewood, Ky.: Dixie Heights High School, 1990.

Kentucky Secretary of State. “Biography.” www.sos.ky .gov (accessed July 10, 2006).

“Official to Speak to United Way,” KP, May 24, 2006, A2.

Glenn Drummond

David Sorrell

GRAYSON, TREY (b. April 18, 1972, Fort Thomas, Ky.). Charles Merwin Grayson III (Trey) is the son of Charles Merwin Jr. and Susan Rhodes Grayson. Trey Grayson’s father has been one of the most respected bankers in the Northern Kentucky community for more than 40 years. Trey Grayson was educated in the Kenton Co. schools. He attended Dixie Heights High School in Edgewood, where he participated in the Kentucky Governor’s Cup and other academic competitions.

Because of his achievements there, he was named a member of the Hall of Fame of the Kentucky Association for Academic Competition. In 1989 Grayson was named a Governor’s Scholar, and the next year he graduated as valedictorian of his high school class. He earned his BA in government from Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., where he graduated with honors in 1994 , and his MBA from the University of Kentucky at Lexington (UK) in 1998. He received one of the first two Bert Combs scholarships to the UK College of Law. After graduation, Grayson worked as an attorney, focusing on estate planning and corporate law. He married the former Nancy Humphrey of Lexington on January 8, 2000, and they make their home today in Boone Co. with their two daughters, Alex and Kate.

In his first run for political office, Grayson was elected to the office of Kentucky secretary of state in November 2003; he was then reelected in November 2007. During his first three years in office, he modernized the office of the secretary of state by bringing more ser vices online, enhanced Kentucky’s election laws through several legislative packages, and revived the civic mission of schools in Kentucky by leading the effort to restore civics education to the classroom.

Grayson is recognized as one of the top young political leaders in the United States. In 2004 the Council of State Governments selected him to participate in the prestigious Toll Fellowship Program, and the United Leaders recognized him as a “Rising Star” in the Republican Party. In 2005 he was selected as part of the inaugural class of the AspenRodel Fellowships in Public Leadership, which recognizes the nation’s “emerging leaders.” Also in

GRAZIANI, BENJAMIN F. (b. November 16, 1858, Newport, Ky.; d. January 13, 1929, Covington, Ky.). Lawyer and legislator Benjamin F. Graziani was the youngest of nine children born to Charles and Emma Sanham Graziani. He lived with his family on a farm near Cold Spring. One of his grandfathers was the Italian count of Oneglia.

Benjamin’s father, a political exile and an artist who had immigrated to the United States in 1845, was killed on August 6, 1866, by a boiler explosion aboard the steamboat General Lytle. Benjamin’s early education was in the Campbell Co. public schools. During his early teens, he worked as a salesman for the John Shillito Company in Cincinnati. Graziani entered the Cincinnati Law School in 1882 and received his degree two years later.

He was admitted to both the Kenton Co. and the American Bar associations and practiced law in Covington, where he became a highly successful criminal attorney. Graziani handled many of the high-profi le cases in Northern Kentucky. In 1890 he was elected to the Covington School Board, which he served as president. He married Eliza York in 1892, and they had five children. Graziani served two terms in the Kentucky legislature as a Democrat. When James P. Tarvin was elected Kenton Co. circuit court judge in 1902, he appointed Graziani as Campbell Co. master commissioner. Graziani was an active member of the Scott Street Methodist Episcopal Church in Covington. In 1929 he died at his home at 326 E. Second St., in Covington and was buried in Evergreen Cemetery.

“Death Claims Graziani,” KP, January 15, 1929, 1.

Perrin, W. H., J. H. Battle, and G. C. Kniffi n. Kentucky: A History of the State. 7th ed. Louisville, Ky.: F. A. Battey, 1887.

“The ‘Squire,’ ” KP, August 22, 1893, 1.

USGenWeb Archives. “Campbell County Biographies.” www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/newsearch .htm (accessed June 1, 2005).

GREAT DEPRESSION. Of the six economic depressions in U.S. history, the Great Depression (1929–1941), as suggested by its name, is generally regarded as the worst one endured by this nation.

420 GREEN, ELISHA Black Tuesday (October 29, 1929) is often considered the Depression’s beginning, but there were earlier portents of the collapse of the stock market and economy. In Covington, the real estate boom had begun falling a few months before. By the time the Great Depression had supposedly ended in late 1941, both the nation and Northern Kentucky had changed. It took entrance into a long-lasting external world conflict, World War II, to revive the nation’s economy and remove its people from the doldrums of unemployment and general strife.

Most importantly, with America’s entry into the war in 1941, people no longer believed that they were living during a depression, perhaps the most telltale sign of any recovery.

The federal government’s response to the joblessness and hunger of the Great Depression was to create countless programs (known best by their acronyms) to feed, shelter, and provide jobs for the people most affected. Some of those programs continue today. The SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) was started as a watchdog orga nization to prevent any future catastrophic economic collapse. Social Security was a relief program aimed at the middle class. Several programs by their very nature were more noticeable within Northern Kentucky.

The most visible of the federal programs in Northern Kentucky was the WPA (Works Progress Administration), which was established in 1935 as part of President Roosevelt’s New Deal. Its name changed to Works Projects Administration in 1939. It was the largest and most comprehensive of all the new governmental agencies. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, the WPA funded the building of high school football stadiums in both Dayton and Bellevue, Ky. In 1936 construction began on two new Kenton Co. high schools built by the WPA, Simon Kenton High School and Dixie Heights High School. During the Ohio River flood of 1937, the WPA assisted the American Red Cross and the American Legion in their flood relief efforts in Campbell Co. At one point, a WPA rescue team found 80 patients, 15 nurses, and others marooned on the first floor of Speers Hospital in Dayton, Ky. (see Speers Memorial Hospital). Similar flood-related activities were conducted in Boone, Bracken, and Mason counties. The WPA helped to build the 200-foot sand and gravel extension to the John A. Roebling Bridge in Covington to keep the bridge open during the flood. As of February 20, 1937, within the WPA’s District 3 (mainly Northern Kentucky), 176 projects were in operation, employing 5,010. Local projects at that time included new sewers in Newport, street improvement in Covington, and renovations at the Fort Thomas Military Reservation. In 1937 South Fort Mitchell (later merged into Fort Mitchell) received money for a fire department building, Butler for a waterworks, and Williamstown for work on its courthouse and electric distribution system. In Maysville, the new Limestone Creek Bridge opened for traffic that year thanks to the efforts of the WPA. In 1938 Covington received money for its city infirmary, its waterworks, and its fi ltration plant. By 1939, as

economic conditions improved, WPA workers were being released from the program. Early in 1941 the WPA was responsible for construction within Covington’s Devou Park, in par ticu lar the band shell (see Devou Park Band Shell). The agency provided some $45,000 for the construction of a new school in Elsmere and at the same time granted $53,000 for improvements to the roads and streets within the Fort Thomas Military Reservation. The WPA participated in local planning efforts in Boone Co. and funded cultural projects. The agency kept historians working with the writing of historical tour books for both Cincinnati (including the suburbs in Northern Kentucky) and the entire state of Kentucky.

Although no bank failed during the Great Depression in Campbell Co., at least two failed in Kenton Co., one in Latonia and one in Ludlow; and the First National Bank of Covington was closed for a few months to regroup its financial structure.

In an attempt to preclude any more bank failures, the WPA began a series of monthly reports on each bank, savings and loan, and insurance company offering home loans in the region.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was another program that put young men to work during the Great Depression, mainly constructing public structures along highways. The CCC built camps in which the workers lived in tents. Northern Kentuckians who were part of the CCC were required to leave the region and work in places such as Camp Robinson in Eastern Kentucky’s Breathitt Co. Jack Kaiser, a 1933 graduate of Newport High School, delayed college and went to Camp Robinson that year along with 68 other Northern Kentucky men. They built about eight bridges in the forests of Breathitt Co. As late as 1982, Kaiser was still involved with an organization of former CCC men who were trying to persuade the U.S. Congress to reinstitute the program.

Kaiser retired from teaching at Highland High School in Fort Thomas, where he directed the school band.

Other similar programs operated in Northern Kentucky. The National Reemployment Ser vice (NRS) placed some 230 workers in employment in 1936, some with private firms. The Civil Works Administration (CWA) funded several street projects in Covington in 1934.

After several of President Roosevelt’s relief proposals were ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court, Roosevelt, believing that a friendly court mainly appointed by him would reverse these decisions, made a failed attempt in 1937 to increase the number of Supreme Court justices from 9 to 15; by mid-1938, new programs of the New Deal had ceased. Roosevelt declared, upon signing the Wage and Hours Act of 1938, that the last major act of the New Deal had been taken.

Thus, the Great Depression outlasted the New Deal in that respect.

The highest-ranking administrator within the New Deal programs from Northern Kentucky was Allen Cammack, a scion of the famous legal family of Owen Co. Cammack was in charge of the National Youth Administration (NYA) Industrial

Work Shop Training program for Kentucky from 1936 through 1942.

The Great Depression in Northern Kentucky should not be thought of with the destitute images projected in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. Northern Kentucky did not have the physical or economic climate of the western American dustbowl. Northern Kentucky, with its more diverse economy, experienced less unemployment than those areas. Life was tough, but Northern Kentuckians survived. Edna Phirman of Dayton, Ky., for example, worked in the shoe factories of Cincinnati and ate beans, rice, and goetta, swearing that she would never serve the latter two if she ever got out of the Great Depression. Her son never tasted those items until his own maturity a few decades later.

“Bank in Latonia Shuts Its Doors,” KP, January 14, 1932, 1.

“554 on WPA Here to Go, Court Told,” KP, July 27, 1939, 1.

McElvaine, Robert. The Great Depression. New York: Times Books, 1984.

National Archives. Preliminary Inventories Number 125: Records of the Public Works Administration. L. Evans Walker, comp. Washington, D.C.: National Archives, 1960.

“New County School Work Starts Soon,” KP, February 25, 1936, 11. “$100,000 Allotted on 2 Local Projects,” February 20, 1941, 1.

Reis, Jim. “CCC Taught Young Men about Living,” KP, September 27, 1982, 4K. ———. “Depression Years Recalled,” KP, May 24, 1982, 4K. “Report on Bank,” KP, March 11, 1933, 1.

Works Progress Administration. Guide to Civilian Organizations, Kenton County, Kentucky. Louisville, Ky.: Works Progress Administration, 1942.

GREEN, ELISHA (b. ca. 1818, Bourbon Co., Ky.; d. November 1, 1893, Maysville, Ky.). Elisha W. Green, founder and pastor of African American Baptist churches in Maysville, Flemingsburg, and Paris, Ky., and one of the foremost African American leaders in post–Civil War Kentucky, was born into slavery. His short autobiography printed in 1888 indicates in its subtitle what Green himself saw as his accomplishments—“one of the founders of the Kentucky Normal and Theological Institute—now the State University at Louisville, Ky.; Eleven Years Moderator of the Mount Zion Baptist Association; five years moderator of the Consolidated Baptist Educational Association and over thirty years pastor of the Colored Baptist churches of Maysville and Paris.” Those achievements and more were earned in the context of slavery and racism, conditions that Green faced with dignity and courage.

As a youth in Bourbon Co., he barely escaped a group of patrollers who broke up a religious service of slaves with whips. Around age 10, Green was moved to Mayslick in Mason Co. On many occasions through the years he had contact with “negro traders” and remembered particularly a group of 50 slaves who came through the community during his youth. Observing them brought

GREEN DERBY RESTAURANT

him, and at least one white witness, to tears and led him to write, “The stain of slavery and its degrading impressions will long linger in the minds of generations yet unborn.”

Green went through a succession of owners and was put up for auction on the square at Washington, Ky. In the early 1830s, he was converted while plowing a field and baptized six months later in the north fork of the Licking River. In 1835 Green married Susan Young, who was also a slave.

In 1838 he moved to Maysville, 12 miles away, and often had to walk that distance to visit his wife, being questioned along the way by skeptical whites as to why he was alone.

Green became a sexton for the white First Baptist Church in Maysville and was allowed to attend ser vices. The leaders of that church recognized his devout nature and his singing ability.

He was permitted to have ser vices for the African American community in 1844. On May 10, 1845, the Baptist Church licensed Rev. Green to preach, and he organized the Bethel Baptist Church in Maysville that year. He founded the Mount Zion Baptist Church in Flemingsburg in 1853 and the First Baptist Church in Paris for African Americans in 1855.

Although Green had contact with operators of the Underground Railroad and had many opportunities to escape while he was traveling in Ohio to perform religious ser vices, he did not. After buying his freedom, he was able to purchase freedom for his wife and three of his children in 1858. He and his wife saw the removal of their son John in Maysville and watched him being sold in Paris. They never had contact with him again.

After the Civil War, Green was elected vice president of the Kentucky Negro Republican Party at its convention in Lexington in 1867. In 1875 he and his congregation built a brick structure for the Bethel Baptist Church in Maysville that served the congregation for a century. He continued to pastor his churches, worked for the education of the freedman, and lobbied against discriminatory laws such as those that prevented blacks from testifying against whites in judicial proceedings.

During the period of emancipation, many freed slaves left their former masters or were ejected from their former homes. In Paris a group of such freedmen were housed in a stable for 10 dollars a month.

Its chimney was a hole in the roof. Because Green believed it was “as much my duty to look out after the interests of my people as to preach the gospel,” he persuaded his Paris congregation to buy houses in a development from Samuel Clay. The lots measured 60 by 75 feet, and on each was built a cottage with a door and a chimney. This led to a community of home-owning African Americans.

On June 8, 1883, while riding the Maysville and Lexington Railroad from Paris to Maysville, Green was attacked by two white professors of the Female Millersburg Institute in Kentucky for refusing to give up his seat. Green brought charges against Professors Gould and Bristow in Paris and was awarded damages in the amount of $24. In the controversy that followed, many newspapers in Kentucky commented on the case, favoring Green.

The Maysville Bulletin called Green a man respected by his own race and “by the white population of Maysville.”

Rev. Green baptized some 6,000 individuals, many in the Ohio River. He died at his home in 1893. His funeral was a community event and the church overflowed with mourners. Green was buried in the Maysville Cemetery, which was segregated at the time.

Green, Elisha. Life of the Rev. Elisha W. Green. 1888. http://docsouth.unc .edu/neh/greenew/greenew.html (accessed April 2, 2006). Part of the Documenting the American South series.

Kentucky Gateway Museum fi les, Maysville, Ky.

George Vaughn and John Klee

GREEN DERBY RESTAURANT. The Green Derby Restaurant has long been a fi xture at the northwest corner of Ninth and York Sts. in Newport. Its history is tied to the importance of family and friends, which are as essential to a visit there as any ingredient in the food.

Helen Azbill Haller Cummins (1912–1986) started the Green Derby Restaurant in 1947 with her husband. In 1912 the Azbill family had a farm in Clover Bottom (Jackson Co.). Helen’s father, William Azbill, was a dentist from Sweden. He had married Mollie McCann, an Appalachian woman of Irish and Cherokee ancestry. In the 1920s many families in that part of Kentucky, including Helen’s oldest sister Lula, found opportunities for employment scarce and headed north to the more populated cities of the state. Before long the rest of the family followed Lula north.

Helen married Jacob Haller, a German immigrant employed in Newport at the Interlake Steel Plant (see Newport Steel). The Great Depression took his job, and the story is that he became an entrepreneur in the “bathtub gin” business (bootlegging). Helen and Jake had four children, John (Jack), Glen, Ron, and Mollie. When her marriage ended, Helen turned to waitressing to support her family. A large picture hangs in the Green Derby Restaurant today showing Helen and her sister Lula at Arnold’s Restaurant on Eighth St. in Cincinnati during World War II. Helen married Wilber Cummins, who was an experienced restaurant cook. After the war, they decided to buy the bar on the corner of Ninth and York Sts. and start their own business. Helen named the restaurant the Green Derby because the Brown Derby was a famous restaurant on the West Coast at the time. Green in the name was a nod to her Irish ancestry. The place had a red tile floor, high pressed-tin ceilings, dark paneling, a jukebox, and a bar that stretched all the way from the front door to the tiny kitchen. And of course there was a “bookie” (a bookmaker) who sat in the corner booth. Wilber oversaw the business, while Helen, her mother, and two sisters cooked and served food to the bar patrons. Not much is known about the previous history of the building itself, except that it dates from the mid-1800s and that during the Ohio River flood of 1937, the water rose to the second floor.

421

As the Green Derby began to prosper, Helen and Wilber would drive south on U.S. 27 to vacation in Florida. They made a point of stopping along the way to sample regional foods and specialties. A family story tells of the time they tried a side dish similar to hush puppies but made with mashed potatoes. Helen knew she had found something and marched back to the kitchen. She charmed the astonished cook out of the recipe, made a few changes of her own, and the Green Derby Restaurant’s popular Potato Puffs were born.

The Derby Salad is also one of her unique adaptations, of hot slaw and wilted lettuce.

All four of Helen’s children have been actively involved with the restaurant at one time or another, although Glen and John made their careers in other businesses. In 1989, after retiring from a corporate position with Kmart, John (Jack) moved back to the region. Helen had died and Ron and Mollie wanted help with the business end of the restaurant. So Jack started a new career, and Ron and Mollie had a new partner. Glen, meanwhile, was always there behind the scenes.

There have been many expansions of the restaurant, including the addition of a bar/lounge and a large nonsmoking dining room. The Green Derby Restaurant rose to become the area’s “Fish King,” lauded by the Cincinnati Enquirer many times as having the “Best Fish Sandwich in Town.”

The Green Derby Restaurant has witnessed many of Newport’s eras and changes. During the 1960s the Jai Alai Club, a notorious local strip club and gambling joint, was located across Ninth St. from the Green Derby. The bus boys would fight over who got to deliver carryout orders to the club.

Helen would periodically come out of the kitchen and patrol the seating areas to make sure the girls who worked at the club were not sewing sequins on their outfits in the Green Derby Restaurant during lunch. All were welcome, but the “family atmosphere” was of utmost importance. All had to be comfortable, too.

Through the years, the Green Derby Restaurant has become a favorite in the region. The soups and pies are homemade, and the large menu includes hard-to-find items like beef and chicken liver and country ham with true redeye gravy. Cincinnati Reds and Bengals players, judges and lawyers, politicians and celebrities—all make regular visits for “comfort food.” So do many people who have moved out of town, considering a meal at the Green Derby Restaurant a “must” during their return trips.

The Green Derby Restaurant’s significance is not that it has been in business for so many years, or that the fourth generation of the family is now working there. The restaurant’s lasting impression is as one of the few places remaining where customers frequently stop at three or four tables to visit with other diners before sitting down at their own table. A visit to the Green Derby Restaurant, customers seem to feel, is as much a social event as an eating experience. The restaurant is regarded as a truly unique Northern Kentucky business and appears to live up to its motto, “Good Food, Good Friends, Good Times.”

422 GREENE, MARY BECKER “A Good Fit for Regulars,” CE, January 5, 2006, E1.

“The Green Derby: 50 Years of Family,” KP, July 24, 1991, Timeout sec., 16.

“Still the Champion of Fish Sandwiches,” CE, March 10, 2000, R8–R9.

“Woman Captain Leaves River Boat for Her Boy,” CP, August 14, 1907, 10.

“A Woman Pi lot: Mrs. Greene Tells of Her Experience on the River,” Wheeling (W.Va.) Daily Intelligencer, February 3, 1896, 2.

Lori Haller

Sienna Spooner

GREENE, MARY BECKER (b. June 20, 1868, near Marietta, Ohio; d. April 22, 1949, aboard the Delta Queen steamboat on the Ohio River). Pioneer female river pi lot Mary Becker Greene was one of eight children born to Peter and Rhoda Becker. Her father was the postmaster at Hill’s Post Office in Marietta, Ohio, and the proprietor of a prosperous country store. She attended school in Marietta, where she met her future husband, Captain Gordon Christopher Greene. After their marriage in 1890, she began her life on the river. In 1896 Mary Greene became one of the few women issued a captain’s pi lot license. After having served five years as a striker on her husband’s boat, the H.K. Bedford, Greene felt she was entitled to the license; it also allowed her to stay close to her husband. By the time her fi rst son, Henry Wilkins Greene, was born in 1898, her pi lot license had been elevated to a master’s pi lot license.

She continued to serve as a pi lot on the river. She had two other sons, Christopher Becker, born in 1901, and Thomas Rea, who was born aboard the Greenland on February 3, 1904. The Greenland, the boat Greene pi loted, made a specialty of taking women and children on excursion trips and by 1907 had carried nearly 100,000 passengers.

For a short time, Greene thought about leaving the river after the death in 1907 of her fi rst son.

She even told reporters that she would never go back to river life. Yet, Greene stayed on the river and continued to pi lot the Greenland. She later moved to the Gordon C. Greene, where she lived onboard for many years. After her husband’s death in 1927, Greene continued to carry on the business of the Greene Line Steamers, with help from her two sons Christopher and Thomas. In 1944 her son Christopher, Captain Chris Greene, collapsed and died of a heart attack, leaving Mary and her son Thomas to run the company. Captain Tom Greene bought the Delta Queen steamboat in 1948 and moved his mother to her own rooms onboard before the vessel’s inaugural passenger cruise on June 30, 1948. Less than a year later, she died aboard the Delta Queen, following a voyage to New Orleans, and was buried beside her husband in the Newport, Ohio, Cemetery. Today a bronze statue of Mary B. Greene stands on the Northern Kentucky river walk near Riverside Dr. in Covington, honoring her contributions to river life.

Greene, Letha C. Long Live the Delta Queen. Toronto: Saunders, 1973.

“Life Voyage Ends for Mary Greene: Famed Pi lot Dies aboard Delta Queen,” CP, April 23, 1949, 7.

Simcox, Betty Blake. Greene Line Steamers, Inc. Celebrates Its 75th Anniversary. Cincinnati: Green Line Steamers, 1965.

“Vikings of the River: Adventure Rewards Mary Greene’s Long Time Devotion to Ohio,” CP, September 14, 1933, 13.

GREEN LINE COMPANY. The Green Line Company, officially the Cincinnati, Newport, and Covington Railway Company (CN&C), began as an amalgam of four earlier horsecar transportation companies operating from the cities of Bellevue, Covington, Dayton, and Newport in Kentucky to Cincinnati. The first horsecar transport line commenced operation on Covington’s Madison Ave. in 1867. Formed in 1887 as the South Covington and Cincinnati Street Railway Company (SC&C), the Green Line Company was initially owned by a group of local investors headed

by George F. Abbot (see also Streetcars). It came to be called the Green Line because its cars were painted green, to distinguish them from the orange cars of the much larger Cincinnati Street Railway Company that was operating in downtown Cincinnati.

The Green Line began converting its newly purchased horsecar transportation lines to electric streetcar ser vice in 1890. Between 1890 and 1892, the company built new electric streetcar lines to Fort Thomas and the then independent suburban towns of Central Covington, West Covington, Latonia, and Rosedale. Small car-storage facilities in Covington and Dayton (Ky.) were replaced by a new car barn at 20th St. and Madison Ave. in Covington.

The rapid conversion to electric streetcars and the building of new lines put a severe fi nancial strain on the SC&C. As a result the Green Line was purchased, in 1892, by a group of investors from Cleveland and renamed the Cincinnati, Newport, and Covington Railway Company.

With an influx of new capital, the CN&C built a new electric streetcar line to suburban Southgate in Campbell Co. and to Ludlow in Kenton Co. In conjunction with the 1895 completion of the Ludlow line, the company developed an amusement park on the Ludlow-Bromley border that it named the Lagoon.

In 1896 the Green Line Company was sold to a group of local investors headed by future U.S. senator Richard P. Ernst. In 1899 a large brick-andstone streetcar storage facility (90 by 370 feet), along with electrical, woodworking, and painting buildings, was opened in Newport along the Licking River, bordered by 11th, Brighton, and Lowell Sts. Also developed on Lowell St. was a large electric generating plant to supply power for the Green Line’s growing streetcar fleet. Surplus electric power was sold to nearby businesses and homes in Newport and Covington.

Soon the business of supplying electric power overshadowed the Green Line’s significant transit business, and a separate subsidiary, the Union Light, Heat and Power Company (ULH&P), was formed. The Green Line and ULH&P were sold to the North American Company, a power conglom-

erate, in 1902; that entity, in turn, sold them to the Columbia Gas and Electric Company (CG&E) in 1907. James C. Ernst, installed as general manager of the Green Line Company in 1896, was apparently a very able executive, since both the North American Company and CG&E retained his services. Ernst remained at the helm of the Green Line Company until ill health forced his retirement in 1914.

A new office building was built for the Green Line at Third and Court Sts. in Covington in 1903, the same year a new electric streetcar line through Park Hills to the St. John, St. Mary, and Highland cemeteries was opened. A new line was also opened to South Bellevue in 1904. The Green Line extended the cemeteries line out the Dixie Highway as far as Fort Mitchell’s Orphanage Rd. in 1910. With the opening of the Fort Mitchell electric streetcar line, the CN&C reached its zenith, operating about 200 streetcars over some 58 route miles of track in Campbell and Kenton counties.

The Green Line’s streetcars carried, in 1910, more than 15 million passengers.

In fall 1921 the Green Line streetcars began using the Dixie Terminal at Fourth and Walnut Sts. as its downtown Cincinnati terminal. Streetcars from Covington used the John A. Roebling Bridge and a newly constructed ramp to reach the Dixie Terminal’s upper level and thus entirely avoided traveling Cincinnati’s downtown streets.

Cars from Newport used Third St. in Cincinnati to reach the terminal’s lower level. By 1929 the CN&C employed more than 500 persons and was one of Northern Kentucky’s largest employers.

With the advent of paved roads and the maturing of internal-combustion-engine technology, the Green Line faced stiff competition from both private automobiles and numerous upstart bus companies by 1930. Hamstrung also by franchise requirements to charge only a five-cent fare, the Green Line began during the 1930s to replace electric streetcars and their maintenance-intensive tracks with trolleybuses and motor buses. Although trolleybuses needed overhead wires to utilize electricity for power, they ran on regular paved urban streets. Between 1937 and 1939, three major Kenton Co. electric streetcar lines, to Rosedale, Latonia, and Ludlow, were converted to trolleybuses.

Weakened financially by the flood of 1937, six competing motor-bus companies were purchased by the Green Line Company. The company also purchased two suburban bus businesses before World War II. Acquired in 1940 were the Black Diamond Company, which linked Cincinnati with eastern Newport, Fort Thomas, and Ross; and the Dixie Traction Company, connecting Cincinnati with Fort Thomas, Cold Spring, and Alexandria and, west of the Licking River, a whole host of communities along the Dixie Highway from Covington to Florence, Ky. World War II brought a rationing of tires and gasoline and forced many workers to resort to public transit. The Green Line saw its ridership more than double during the war years, enabling the company to earn a profit for the first time in more than a decade. Because motor-bus production was cur-

GREENWAY, ISABELLA SELMES

tailed during the war, plans to convert the company’s one remaining Campbell Co. streetcar line (No. 11–Fort Thomas) and its four remaining Kenton Co. streetcar lines (No. 1–Fort Mitchell, No. 4–Main, No. 5–Holman, and No. 8–Eastern) to motor buses were put on hold.

In 1944 the Columbia Gas and Electric Company sold the Green Line to Allen and Company, a New York City investment house. The sale was prompted by federal legislation mandating that utility companies controlling transit operations must elect to keep either their energy production or their transit operations, but not both. Since the Columbia Gas and Electric Co.’s utility holding in Northern Kentucky, the Union Light, Heat and Power Co., was considerably more profitable than the Green Line Company, the sale of the latter was inevitable.

The peak year for the Green Line was 1946 in terms of ridership: it carried a record 41 million passengers. That year was also significant in that Green Line’s general manager, Phillip G. Vondersmith, and its assistant general manager, David Ringo, entered into an exclusive contract with the board of the new Greater Cincinnati Airport (later Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport) to provide scheduled bus service between the yet-to-be-opened airport in Boone Co. and downtown Cincinnati. In addition, the Green Line was given exclusive rights to the airport’s taxi-for-hire business. The Green Line Company’s scheduled ser vice to downtown Cincinnati (later expanded to serve a number of Cincinnati suburbs as well as Hamilton, Ohio) was marketed under the Airporter trade name. Its taxi-for-hire franchise was operated under the Red Top banner.

Both ser vices continued under the Green Line until 1973.

With World War II at an end, the Green Line began converting its remaining electric streetcar lines to bus ser vice in 1946. The last electric streetcar line in Campbell Co., the No. 11–Fort Thomas route, was converted to motor-bus operation in 1947. The last streetcar line in Kenton Co., the No. 1–Fort Mitchell line, was changed over to a bus operation on July 2, 1950, thus ending 83 years of either horsecar or electric streetcar ser vice in Northern Kentucky.

By 1954 the Green Line’s ridership had been cut in half to 21 million passengers, in just eight years. Statistics compiled by the Covington– Kenton Co. Chamber of Commerce (today’s Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce) revealed that automobile traffic on the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad Bridge and the John A. Roebling Bridge had jumped from 18,000 vehicles a day before World War II to 41,000 vehicles a day in 1953. Therefore the Green Line found it necessary, for the fourth time since the end of World War II, to raise its basic fare, this time to 15 cents.

As an economic move, the company sold its Covington car barn at 20th St. and Madison Ave. and its Covington office building at Third and Court Sts. The old electric streetcar machine shop behind the Newport car barn was converted to house the additional buses moved from Covington, and of-

fice facilities were relocated to the former Newport powerhouse at 11th and Lowell Sts. As a result of these moves, along with limited pruning of some early-morning, late-night, and Sunday ser vices, the company remained a profitable enterprise through the remainder of the decade. With the last streetcars gone, the Green Line updated its corporate name in 1956 to the Cincinnati, Newport, and Covington Transportation Company. Its formerly independent subsidiary the Dixie Traction Company was merged into the Green Line Company. In March 1958 the curtain came down on the Green Line’s last electric trolleybus operation as the No. 3–Ludlow and No. 6–Rosedale routes were converted to motor-bus ser vice. Expressway construction in downtown Cincinnati was cited as the prime reason for substituting the more flexible diesel buses for the trolleybuses and their fi xed-wire power system.

At the end of 1959, the CN&C was still serving 32 cities, towns, and unincorporated communities in Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties. On the 130 diesel transit buses, 12 fancy Airporter coaches, and 16 Red Top taxi cabs that it owned, it carried some 14 million people.

By the mid-1960s, the CN&C was engulfed in a sea of red ink. In 1964 the Green Line’s ridership fell to a record low 10 million, with operating expenses again outstripping revenue. A vicious cycle ensued, wherein, as the Green Line’s vehicles carried fewer passengers, it needed additional revenue through fare increases that resulted in more passenger desertions. In 1965 the basic interstate fare was increased to 25 cents. Further weekend ser vice was eliminated on some routes: No. 4 Main–Park Hills–South Hills, No. 13 South Bellevue, No. 18/21 Newport East–North Fort Thomas, No. 19 Newport West, No. 20 Newport South, and No. 23 Bonnie Leslie. Most other routes saw greatly reduced ser vice after 7:00 p.m. on weekdays and all hours on weekends.

By 1960 it had become clear to many transit managers and other observers that privately owned companies, such as the Green Line, had no longterm future. Although transit companies were the safety net transporting people to work and school if they were financially or physically unable to drive, the companies were not true public utilities because they had no public subsidy to fall back on if revenues did not keep pace with operating costs.

The ongoing mania for building new expressways and feeder roads encouraged people to forsake public transportation in favor of the automobile.

Gridlock, smog alerts, and rising gasoline prices were not yet established factors across the United States.

As part of his Great Society program, President Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–1969) signed the Urban Mass Transportation Act into law on July 9, 1964.

This legislation provided a firm base for the granting of transit subsidies. However, such subsidies were conditioned upon local governments forming transit authorities and upon citizens voting to approve funds for a private-system takeover. In June 1971, by action of the fiscal courts in Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties, the Transit Au-

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thority of Northern Kentucky (TANK) was created.

Deferred maintenance had reduced the Green Line’s available transit fleet. It was made perfectly clear by the Green Line’s owners that the company was not going to throw good money after bad for new equipment, or even improve fleet maintenance, in order to keep public transit alive in Northern Kentucky. In March 1972 the Green Line Company announced that it would terminate all public transit ser vice as of November 4, 1972, ending almost a decade of unprofitable operations.

In June 1972 a bond issue for funding the proposed TANK ser vice was authorized by all three county governments for placement on the November ballot. In October the Cincinnati, Newport, and Covington Transportation Company forfeited its state operating license.

At midnight on Saturday, November 4, 1972, the last Green Line Company transit bus rolled into the Newport garage. There was no ceremony to mark the venerable transportation company’s demise. The employees going off duty simply locked the doors and went home, ending more than 105 years of transit ser vice by the CN&C and predecessor companies for Northern Kentucky.

Lehmann, Terry W., and Earl W. Clark. The Green Line. Chicago: Central Electric Railfans’ Association, 2000.

Terry W. Lehmann

GREENWAY, ISABELLA SELMES (b. March 22, 1886, near Petersburg, Ky.; d. December 18, 1953, Tucson, Ariz.). Isabella Selmes, who became a member of the U.S. Congress, was born at the Dinsmore Homestead to Tilden R. and Martha Flandrau Macomb Selmes. Following her father’s early death, she moved to Wisconsin and then to New York, where she met her first husband, Robert H. Monro Ferguson. They were married in 1905.

After Ferguson became ill, the couple relocated with their two young children to New Mexico. It was there that Isabella fell in love with politics, serving as the chairwoman of the Women’s Land Army of New Mexico in 1918. A year after Ferguson’s death in 1922, she moved to Arizona and married copper baron John C. “Jack” Greenway in November 1923. She served as that state’s Democratic national committeewoman after Greenway died in 1926; to the surprise of the Democratic Party, Isabella worked eight-hour days in that position. Following U.S. Representative Lewis W. Douglas’s resignation in 1933, she was appointed to fi ll out his term, and then she was reelected as a representative in the 74th Congress. She was Arizona’s first woman representative in Congress.

Greenway spent her congressional time tirelessly advocating what she called the “Liberty of Living,” which was undoubtedly influenced by the politics of her close friends Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. Greenway’s plan focused on helping homeowners, the elderly, and persons in economic distress with the intent of improving the quality of life for Depression-era Americans. Greenway also recognized a need for reorga ni zation of the tax system to protect these citizens. She called for

424 GREENWOOD fewer taxes on inexpensive homes and land and higher taxes on incomes, inheritances, profits, and financial transactions. She was not a candidate for renomination after her elected term, so she returned to Arizona to run her two cattle ranches and a hotel, the Arizona Inn in Tucson. She was also involved in the ownership of Gilpin Airlines, a small western regional operation. Greenway was married again in 1939 to Harry Orland King and split her time between New York and her beloved Arizona. Isabella Greenway died in 1953 and was buried at the Dinsmore Homestead in Boone Co. Aikman, Duncan. “Mrs. Greenway Charts Her Own Course,” NYT, April 21, 1935, SM 9.

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.

“Greenway, Isabella Selmes.” http://bioguide.con gress.gov.

Miller, Kristie. Isabella Greenway: An Enterprising Woman. Tucson: Univ. of Arizona Press, 2004.

“Mrs. J. C. Greenway Wed to H. O. King,” NYT, April 24, 1939, 15.

Who Was Who in America. Vol. 3. Chicago: A. N. Marquis, 1960.

Amanda C. Kerley

GREENWOOD. Greenwood is located in Pendleton Co. at the junction of the road from Butler, Ky. Rt. 609, and the road from Falmouth and Grassy Creek, Ky. Rt. 17. The town received its name because of the many trees in the vicinity. During the early 1800s, Greenwood was a prosperous small town with many homes, a blacksmith shop, a school, a general store, a tollgate, and a distillery.

When the Redbrush School, located only a short distance away, closed because it had too few students, its remaining students attended the school in Greenwood.

Several families near Greenwood raised a variety of sorghum. In the fall the cane was cut, stripped of its leaves, and ground to make juice.

The juice was then cooked for about two hours over a fire to make sorghum molasses. This annual activity joined many families in an activity that heightened their sense of community. Once the molasses was ready, the families would get together and have a candy party for the children.

The community project died out after the school at Greenwood was closed in 1931 because of consolidation.

The general store, located on the corner of the Butler Rd., was where the families of the area obtained their supplies of food and other items. The farmers used the second floor of the store as a meeting place. After the general store burned in 1893, people had to go to Butler or elsewhere to shop. Farmers took their horses to the blacksmith shop, which was located across from the general store. Families attended church in Mount Moriah, about three miles away, but every Sunday afternoon, Sunday school was held in the school house at Greenwood. About a half mile from the school was one of Kentucky’s largest whiskey distilleries, which, during the early 1800s, was owned and operated by O. W. Cowles. After the whiskey was made, it was placed in locally made wooden bar-

rels and stored in a warehouse to be aged. Eventually, the whiskey was taken to the saloon (or “the Jigger house”) on the hill behind the school house.

There it was sold in pints, quarts, or by the glass.

Later, the local population voted the distillery out of business, closing down the operation. At Greenwood’s tollgate, on the road to Butler, people paid two or three cents per mile to travel on the road.

Now the tollgate, the store, the blacksmith shop, the distillery, and the school are gone. Like most of the other small villages in Pendleton Co., Greenwood now has a few houses and nothing else.

Belew, Mildred Boden. The First 200 Years of Pendleton County. Falmouth, Ky.: M. B. Belew, n.d. [ca.

1994].

Mildred Belew

GREYHOUND TAVERN. The Greyhound Tavern, originally named the Dixie Tea Room, was opened in 1921 by John Hauer and at first operated as an ice cream parlor, selling candies, ice cream products, soft drinks, cigarettes, and cigars. The tea room was in South Fort Mitchell, near the end of a streetcar line. In the 1930s the business was sold to Al Frisch, who named it the Greyhound Grill after his brother Benny, who was a greyhound trainer. Frisch’s family operated the business, and in addition to homemade ice cream, the Greyhound Tavern became famous for the whole Jack Salmon fish and fried chicken on its menu. The dinners cost 50 cents. Over the years, the ice cream parlor was eliminated, and as the building was expanded, the menu was expanded also, to include homemade soups, onion rings, hamburgers, and double-decker sandwiches.

The tavern has grown into a favorite dining and social spot for local customers and travelers along what has become a very busy section of Dixie Highway (U.S. 25) (see Gourmet Strip). Although all of the tavern’s traditional food favorites are still available, the menu now also includes steaks, chops, seafood, and specialties offered by a friendly staff. The tavern’s original two rooms are still intact and are named the Tavern Room and the Hunt Room. Both have pine paneling; the Hunt Room is decorated with a few paintings of greyhounds, while the Tavern Room houses the bar. At the parking lot entrance, the walls are decorated with photos of Green Line trolleys at or near the end of the line in South Fort Mitchell, and an original photo of the Dixie Tea room is the centerpiece below what appears to be the original wooden signboard. In 1987 the Greyhound Tavern hosted a dinner meeting of local politicians that featured a visit by former U.S. vice president Dan Quayle.

Bida, Craig. “Greyhound Tavern Keeps Drawing Crowds in Fort Mitchell,” Cincinnati City Beat, April 2, 2006.

“Fried Chicken: A Pecking Order,” CE, July 4, 2003, Weekend section, 19.

“Take a Nostalgic Journey Back to Dixie Highway’s ‘Gorumet Strip,’ ” KP, March 27, 1997, Weekend section, 17.

Warner, Tess. “Greyhound Tavern—Historic Spot Serves Up Southern Style Cuisine,” CIN Weekly, December 7, 2005.

John E. Leming Jr.

GRIFFIN INDUSTRIES. Griffin Industries, a multimillion-dollar business with 30 locations in 14 states, got its start when John Lawrence Griffi n moved to Falmouth, bought a 1935 Ford truck, and in 1943 began a trade few others wanted to touch.

He drove a truck that picked up dead farm animals, which he then sold to rendering plants in Ohio. The Griffi n rendering firm, which recycles animal waste products, continues to grow.

When Griffin began in 1943, he had a young wife, Rosellen Van Nest Griffin, an infant son, one truck, and a strong will to work. As the business grew, so did his family, eventually totaling 12 children. In June 1947, Griffin purchased 40 acres, two miles from Ky. Rt. 17 in Pendleton Co., on what is now known as Bryant Griffi n Rd. There he built a processing plant. The Griffin family worked hard to build the company into what it is today. At times it was very difficult, but with Griffin’s dedication and strong work ethic, which he passed on to his children and grandchildren, the company thrived. It began as Falmouth Fertilizer and later went by the name Griffin Fertilizer Company before arriving at its current name, Griffin Industries. Five sons and one son-in-law operate the company today. Several of the grandchildren also work for the firm.

John Griffi n was an avid sports fan. In his earlier years, he sponsored and coached a baseball team on which several of his sons played. During his children’s elementary years at St. Francis Xavier School, he started the school’s basketball program and coached its team. For many seasons, he was a scorekeeper for the basketball team at Pendleton Co. High School (see Pendleton Co. Public Schools). In 1989 Griffi n was inducted into the 10th Region Basketball Hall of Fame. He was also made an honorary coach at Northern Kentucky University. He died April 9, 1995, at age 72, after a long bout of strokes and heart attacks, and was buried at St. Stephen Cemetery in Fort Thomas, next to his wife, who died in 1985.

Dennis Griffi n became president of the company in 1970. In 1973 the corporate headquarters moved to Cold Spring in Campbell Co. Today, Griffi n Industries remains essentially a rendering business; it has grown and adapted, while other companies in the same business have folded. With nearly 900 employees, Griffi n Industries operates a fleet of 400 vehicles and 700 truck-trailers, a ship that plies Caribbean ports in international trade, and a list of 1,000 customers that includes major cosmetics companies, clothing producers, and pharmaceutical firms.

Over the years, Griffi n Industries has provided many residents of Pendleton Co. with jobs. The company has also supported a number of local civic projects. Pendleton Co. High School, for instance, has one of the finest fitness centers in the state, the John L. Griffi n Fitness Center, thanks to construction funds provided by the Griffin family.

GRISTMILLS

In 1993 the company also built the Griffi n Concert Centre at the Pendleton Co. Fairgrounds.

“Opinion: John Griffi n—Model Employer, Citizen,” KP, April 13, 1995, 4K. “Pioneer Recycler Dies—Griffi n Industries Founder Was 72,” KP, April 10, 1995, 1K.

Mildred Belew

GRISTMILLS. Shortly after pioneers arrived in Kentucky, some of them built primitive gristmills to grind corn into meal and wheat into flour.

Gristmill sites were selected along streams with adequate water flow. As counties were developed, it became necessary to secure permission from the county court system, since millponds had the potential for flooding the properties of adjacent landowners. Also, the Kentucky legislature passed laws that regulated milldams, especially those on larger streams, because boat traffic and the movement of fish were considerations.

As time passed, more substantial gristmills were constructed. Many mills were spectacular three- or four-story structures, while others were quite simple buildings. Some of the early mills were constructed from logs; others were of frame, brick, or stone construction. Dams built of logs or stone provided the water supply to power these mills. A millrace or flume (an elevated wooden trough) was constructed to convey the water from the dam to the mill. The mill might be placed immediately below the dam, or it might be built far enough away to require long races or flumes for the water to travel through. The water was converted into power by means of water wheels (overshot, undershot, or breast wheels) or turbines that turned a main shaft. A series of gears, smaller shafts, and belts were used to supply power to various pieces of equipment in the mill.

Of critical importance were the millstones that ground the grain. Small mills had only one pair of stones, while larger ones sometimes had several pairs. Conglomerate millstones from Kentucky or Pennsylvania were often used for grinding corn, but flint millstones from Ohio or Kentucky were also used. For the grinding of wheat, millers preferred imported French burr millstones. Simple grain elevators were installed in some mills to move the grain from floor to floor, and bolters were used to sift flour. By the late 19th century, millstones began to be replaced with steel rollers (known as roller mills). This innovation allowed millers to produce more barrels of flour and meal per day.

Steam engines permitted the construction of mills in small communities far from streams and in urban contexts. By the early 20th century, the water-powered gristmills had nearly disappeared, replaced by larger urban mills that produced enough flour for regional markets. Today, only a few of the original structures have survived; the others lie in ruin or have been obliterated by modern development.

Northern Kentucky once had numerous gristmills, and communities often developed around these mills. The most important mills, historically or in terms of size, are listed in the following paragraphs.

Boone Co. Petersburg, an important manufacturing center in the 19th century, included the mills of the Petersburg Milling Company in 1891; Ben Belden in 1896; Ferris, Brooks & Company also in 1896, and F. M. Morgan in 1906. In Walton, several mills once ground grain: the Rouse Brothers from 1879 to 1906, Abram Stansifer in 1880, M. & R. Rouse in 1896, the Walton Feed Mills from 1927 to 1929, and the Leonard Cook Company in 1929. The Rouse Brothers flour mill at Walton was a twostory frame structure with horizontal siding. Also in Boone Co., A. S. Crisler operated a waterpowered gristmill near Limaburg on Gunpowder Creek; his father, Gabriel Crisler, operated a mill on Long Branch above the forks. Archaeologist Jeannine Kreinbrink has documented the CrislerGulley Mill. According to her, Lewis Crisler established the mill between 1817 and 1828 and sold it to Alfred and Joseph Chambers in 1834. The Crisler-Gulley Mill went through a series of owners before Robert Gulley acquired the property in 1918.

Bracken Co. A steam merchant mill operated in Augusta during 1847. Other mills in Augusta included Darry & Brothers in 1859, J. Cook & Son in 1870, P. S. Blades in 1876, J. R. Powers & Co. in 1876, Stroube & Taylor during 1879 and 1880, B. P. Blades in 1881, N. J. Stroube from 1881 to 1896, William Teagarden from 1883 to 1887, Hanson & Brevard in 1891, Frank Hanson in 1896, G. W. Moneyhon Company in 1896, W. T. Teagarden in 1896, and the Augusta Milling Company in 1906. The Germantown Milling Company operated mills at Germantown in 1929.

Campbell Co. As early as 1802, James Taylor Jr. had built a gristmill on the Licking River. John Gubser operated a mill in the 19th century in the community of Gubser (see Gubser’s Mill). His mill was a two-story frame structure that was later acquired by the Rittinger family.

Many gristmills operated at various times in Newport, a number of them located along Monmouth St. They included the Newport Roller Flour Mills at 1104 Monmouth St. in 1894, the Newport Flour Mills at 1106 Monmouth St. in Newport from 1895 to 1897; the Wehenpohl Milling Company at 1106 Monmouth St. in 1897, and the Newport Milling Company at 1106 Monmouth St. and later at 1110 Monmouth St. from 1898 to 1903.

Carroll Co. The great concentration of gristmills in Carroll Co. was in Carrollton. These included Cameron & Company in the early 20th century and the Hanlins Flour Mill, a two-story brick structure at the southwest corner of Sixth and Sycamore Sts. Gallatin Co. Several mills operated in Warsaw: J. H. McDaniel in 1859; Perry & Gibson from 1879 to 1883; James

425

A. Howard from 1880 to 1890; and George T. Thompson from 1887 to 1896. Only the Thompson Flour Mill structure, a two-story brick building in Warsaw, has survived.

Grant Co. The community of New Eagles Mills had mills owned by John A. Collins from 1876 to 1883, Frank Beard in 1881, James F. Salyers in 1883, and J. P. Pettit & Son in 1891. In Williamstown, mill owners included D. L. Cunningham from 1873 to 1896, O. S. Daugherty in 1880, D. D. Cunningham in 1881, Frank Carder from 1881 to 1883, J. H. Brumbach & Son in 1890, Carter & Vallandingham in 1891, D. C. Points & Company in 1896, Rednour & Company in 1896, and D. S. Cunningham in 1906. At Wilson’s Mills, Wilson & Beck ran a mill in 1880.

Kenton Co. At Banklick, James Bird operated a mill from 1879 to 1881, and Michael Morris ran a mill at Erlanger in 1896. Many mills have operated in Covington, including D. & G. Cree at 703 Madison Ave. from 1869 to 1874, D. Cree & Company during 1872 and 1873, Deglow & Bausch at 411 Pike St. from 1872 to 1880, Graves & Cree in 1876, Graves & Bramlage at Pike St. and Russell Ave. from 1878 to 1881, Deglow & Bramlage from 1881 to 1883, J. H. Fedders & Sons from as early as 1883; Covington City Mills at 708 Washington St. from 1894 to 1901; and the mill of Henry Heile & Company located at 517 Pike St. in the late 19th century.

Mason Co. A primitive horse-powered gristmill was built at Limestone (Maysville) in 1785. Pioneer Simon Kenton operated a mill located below the forks of Lawrence Creek. Maysville newspapers contain advertisements for some of the late-18th- and early19th-century mills in the area. An advertisement in the July 17, 1799, edition of the Mirror in Maysville mentioned the desire to purchase a few hundred bushels of wheat to be delivered to Orr’s Mill on Lawrence’s Creek. In the September 15, 1824, and August 28, 1829, issues of the Maysville Eagle, N & N Hixson advised the public that they were paying 40 cents (in 1824) and 50 cents (in 1829) per bushel for wheat at their steam mill in Maysville. The February 7, 1833, edition of the paper advertised the sale of Hixson’s Frame Steam Mill in Maysville.

Owen Co. Three individuals operated mills in Lusby’s Mill, including Jacob Anspaw in 1876, D. R. Kinman from 1881 to 1883, and W. R. Kinman from 1887 to 1891. In Owenton, mills were run by M. A. Redman in 1870; the Roland Brothers from 1876 to 1883; Owenton Mills in 1883; H. F. Swope in 1890; and W. E. Arnold, Duke & Son, and C. W. Kenney in 1906. Poplar Grove was home to the following mills: R. N. Hatters in 1876, J. J. G. Brock in 1879, Crouch & Brock in 1883, and Hamilton & Applegate in 1883.

426 GROTE MANUFACTURING COMPANY Pendleton Co. Among the gristmills in the county seat of Falmouth were these: G. P. Gaulding in 1865; J. Woodhead in 1873; A. J. McNeis in 1880; J. E. Thompson in 1880; A. J. McNees in 1881; W. B. Woodhead from 1881 to 1883; J. W. Ashbrook in 1883; B. Bishop in 1883; King, Hamilton & Johnson in 1883; G. W. Galloway during 1883 and 1884; Champion Roller Mills (Applegate & Hamilton) in 1884; Bidge in 1887; Pendleton Flour Mills in 1887; Mary E. Hamilton in 1890; Falmouth Milling Company in 1891; R. B. McDonald in 1891; George Myers in 1891; Farmers’ Co-operative Milling Company in 1896; J. W. Galloway in 1896; R. R. Wilson in 1896; Champion Mills in 1906; and Ideal Mills in 1906.

Robertson Co. The county seat of Mount Olivet had several mills, including J. H. Sabin in 1881, Morrison & Son in 1887, F. P. Bland from 1887 to 1891, Morrison Brothers in 1890, the Robertson County Milling Company in 1890, Morrison & Sons in 1891, Morrison & Sparks in 1891, and Morrison & Company in 1896.

Cawker, E. Harrison. Cawker’s American Flour Mill and Elevator Directory for 1890–1891. Milwaukee, Wis.: Riverside, 1891.

———. Directory of the Flour Mill Owners and Millwrights of the United States of America and Canada, 1880. Milwaukee, Wis.: Grand Opera House, 1880.

Clift, G. Glenn. History of Maysville and Mason County. Lexington, Ky.: Transylvania, 1936.

Hawes, George W. George Hawes’ Kentucky State Gazetteer and Business Directory for 1859 and 1860. Louisville, Ky.: George W. Hawes, 1859.

Hockensmith, Charles D, Kenneth C. Carstens, Charles Stout, and Sara J. Rivers. Current Archaeological Research in Kentucky. Vol. 5. Frankfort: Kentucky Heritage Council, 1998.

Hodgman, George H. Hodgman and Company’s Kentucky State Gazetteer, Shippers’ Guide, and Business Directory, for 1865 and 1866. Louisville, Ky.: Hodgman, 1865.

———. Kentucky State Directory, Travelers and Shippers’ Guide, for 1870–1871. Louisville, Ky.: John P. Morton, 1871.

O’Malley, Nancy. A New Village Called Washington. Maysville, Ky.: McClanahan, 1987.

Seiller, Edward F. Kentucky Natural Resources, Industrial Statistics, Industrial Directory Descriptions by Counties. Bureau of Agriculture, Labor and Statistics, Bulletin 34. Frankfort, Ky.: State Journal, 1929.

Tenkotte, Paul A. “Rival Cities to Suburbs: Covington and Newport, Kentucky, 1790–1890,” PhD diss., Univ. of Cincinnati, 1989.

Young and Company. Business Professional Directory of the Cities and Towns of Kentucky. Atlanta, Ga.: Young, 1906.

Charles D. Hockensmith

GROTE MANUFACTURING COMPANY. In 1926 William D. Grote, a pharmacy graduate of the University of Cincinnati, purchased the National Color Type Company, 421 Grandview Ave., Bellevue, which manufactured reflective street

signs. In 1930 construction began on a physical plant that eventually was three stories high and contained more than 140,000 square feet. Before buying the company, Grote had owned and operated two chemical companies (the American Chemical Company and the Missouri Chemical Company) and an oxygen company. With the acquisition of National Color Type, he began to make items for the automotive industry, including spotlights and reflectors. As sales increased, Grote was able to sell his chemical and oxygen interests and concentrate more on automotive sales. During the Great Depression, when auto-part sales were not sufficient to sustain the company, he shifted production to the manufacture of street signs. During World War II, Grote converted his plant and equipment to the making of blackout lights, devices that cut underwater cable, and other warrelated products. After World War II, to capitalize on the dramatic increase in new home construction, Grote converted his war time equipment to the manufacture of bathroom medicine cabinets and metal mirrors; he also resumed the production of parts for cars and trucks, primarily reflectors and lights. During the 1950s, the Bellevue plant, surrounded by residential housing, lacked room for expansion. Grote had another facility in Seymour, Ind., and the decision was made to build a new plant in Madison, Ind. All production was relocated to the new plant in 1960. The company continues to be known as Grote Industries. Headquartered in Madison, the firm has plants in both Mexico and Canada, where lights, reflectors, mirrors, and electronics, primarily for trucks, off-road vehicles, and cars are made. After Grote Industries moved away from Bellevue, its building was sold to Kent Manufacturing, which continued to build medicine cabinets. The building was later sold to the Henry Hosea Company, an office-furniture firm. At its height in Bellevue, the Grote Manufacturing Company employed 300 to 400 people and for some time was the largest employer in the town.

The company was the first in the United States to use plastic injection molding (in the 1920s), it introduced the first repairable long-life lamps for trucks (in 1977), and it brought LED lighting to trucking (in 1990). Today, Grote Industries has 1,200 employees and revenues of $114 million. It is led by the founder’s grandson William “Bill” Grote and is still privately held by a family that has been in business for 100 years.

Grote. www.grote.com/ (accessed June 1, 2005).

Peter Grote

GROVER, ASA PORTER (b. February 18, 1819, Ontario Co., N.Y.; d. July 20, 1887, Georgetown, Ky.). Born in upstate New York, legislator Asa Porter Grover was educated in the schools of that area. He moved to Kentucky in 1837 to attended Centre College, from which he graduated. Grover then taught school in Woodford and Franklin counties. Like many other teachers of his day, he took up the study of law, and he was admitted to the bar in 1843. He opened his law office in Owen-

ton in Owen Co. and practiced there until 1881.

Entering politics, Grover became a member of the Kentucky state Senate (1857–1865) representing Owen Co.; he was the only Democrat to serve in the Kentucky Senate during the Civil War. He attended the Democratic state convention in 1863, and he was elected to the 40th U.S. Congress (1867– 1869). He was well respected in Owen Co. Grover moved his law practice to Georgetown in Scott Co. in 1881 and founded the First National Bank of Georgetown, which opened in May 1883. Grover died in 1887 and was buried at the Georgetown Cemetery.

Apple, Lindsey, Frederick A. Johnston, and Ann Bolton Bevins. Scott County Kentucky: A History.

Georgetown, Ky.: Scott Co. Historical Society, 1993.

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.

“Asa Porter Grover.” www.bioguide.congress.gov (accessed June 20, 2007).

GUBSER’S MILL / TWELVE MILE. The community of Gubser’s Mill, or Twelve Mile, located in rural south central Campbell Co., has long been associated with its sawmill and gristmill. John Gubser arrived from Switzerland after the area had been settled in the 1860s by English-speaking immigrants. He bought an established sawmill in 1865, and from then on, the name Gubser’s Mill has been applied to the village. The other name, Twelve Mile, is a reference to Twelve Mile Creek, which has its source there and flows to the Ohio River. The local 1883 Lake atlas shows a mill, Seiter’s Blacksmith Shop, a wagon shop, a post office, and a café. The mill burned twice and was rebuilt but eventually fell into disrepair. It was torn down in 1983. The mill and the adjacent shops were the hub of the community. The mill’s steam whistle used to blow each noon to signal local farmers that it was time to stop for lunch.

Besides the mill and its surrounding buildings, the other important element of the community was the St. Peter and Paul Catholic Church. Established in 1853, the church was the religious center for the German Catholics who had settled in the area in the late 1840s. The church began in a log cabin; later a brick church was built, which had to be torn down due to structural flaws. Today, the parish has its present church building, a school, and a cemetery.

In order to raise money for its school, the parish sponsors two summer picnics that bring together the entire community. The picnic grounds, called Hickory Grove, have been in operation for more than 100 years. Although public one-room schoolhouses existed in Gubser’s Mill/Twelve Mile—some of them named Hickory Grove, Sugar Grove, Kohler, and Old Gubser Mill—the vast majority of children attended the Catholic elementary school associated with the church.

Today, the AA Highway allows the residents of this community to travel to workplaces elsewhere while living in the farming community. It is expected that more new homes will be built in the area by people desiring this lifestyle as the county solves sanitary sewer issues around Gubser’s Mill.

GYPSIES An Atlas of Boone, Kenton, and Campbell Counties, Kentucky. Philadelphia: D. J. Lake, 1883.

Campbell Co. Historical Society. Campbell County, Kentucky, 200 Years, 1794–1994. Alexandria, Ky.: Campbell Co. Historical Society, 1994.

“Only One in County,” KP, August 2, 1975, 6K. “Twelve Mile Baptist Church Observes 135th Year,” KP, September 24, 1934, 2.

Kenneth A. Reis

GUM LICK BAPTIST CHURCH. The Gum Lick Baptist Church was constituted in December 1882, with 21 charter members. G. B. and Josephine Dance deeded to the church’s trustees the lot in southwestern Pendleton Co. on which the church and the cemetery were situated. The first pastor was J. W. Clark, and the first list of deacons appeared in 1895. Church business meetings in the early years began on Saturday evenings and were sometimes resumed after Sunday morning services. Committees were assigned for each job to be done at the church. The church had very strict rules in those years: if members showed bad conduct, they were brought before the church to confess their wrongs, and only then were they allowed back into the fellowship. Failure to confess led to exclusion from membership.

Early baptisms took place in farm ponds and streams. People traveled to church by foot, on horseback, or by horse and buggy. The church was heated at first by a wood stove and later by coal.

Kerosene lamps hanging from the ceiling provided lighting. Later, carbide lights were used. Electricity first came in 1948.

In May 1982, lightning struck the church steeple, damaging it severely and also damaging part of the roof. Frankie Jones and other church members erected a new steeple. The church bell, which was repaired, has now been rung in the community for more than 100 years.

Belew, Mildred Boden. The First 200 Years of Pendleton County. Falmouth, Ky.: M. B. Belew, n.d. [ca.

1994].

“Eye Catcher of the Week,” KP, November 15, 1989, 4K.

Mildred Belew

GUNPOWDER (SUGARTIT). The village of Gunpowder in Boone Co., located along Gunpowder Creek at the intersection of Pleasant Valley Rd. and the Florence Union Turnpike (U.S. 42), was also known as Sugartit. In the early 1900s it was home to a blacksmith shop, a general store, a post office, and a sawmill. The Hopeful Lutheran Church and the Gunpowder Baptist Church were nearby. The Pleasant Ridge School stood on a nearby hill, just to the east of Gunpowder.

There are several theories regarding how the village received the name Sugartit. (A sugartit was a pacifier for babies, made by tying a piece of sugar into a square of muslin.) In a letter to his grandchildren, Shelly Aylor, the last owner of the town’s general store, tells this story: His father, L. P. Aylor, and his uncle John Surface were farmers who lived in the Gunpowder neighborhood. During the winter, when farm chores were not very demanding,

the two men would walk to the general store to pick up their mail and exchange news, or in Shelly Aylor’s words, to “loaf.” Often they would arrive home late for dinner. Their wives, exasperated, said the reason the men were late was that they had to have a sugartit at the store.

Cabot, Susan M., and Michael Rouse. Boone County.

Charleston, S.C.: Arcadia, 1998.

Michael D. Rouse

GYPSIES. Many of the Gypsies who have come to Northern Kentucky, for short or long periods, have acted in accord with the Gypsy stereotype. Sometimes referred to as a nation within a nation, Gypsies as a group seek no permanent home, preferring to wander about continuously. They call themselves the Roma and live by a strict religious and legal code known as Romany. Their mother tongue is Romany and is derived from Sanskrit, revealing their Indian origins, but Gypsy is derived from Egyptian. Gypsies are often confused with, or grouped with, Hungarians, Romanians, or Serbs, since they immigrated to the United States just behind those groups in the 1880s. Gypsies are mostly associated with the dark-clothed, high-cheekboned people, speaking with an accent, who stroll into town for a few days; often they depart on their own, just before being asked to leave. In the old days, they arrived via caravans of horses and wagons; today they come in expensive cars and trucks.

While in town they perform sundry casual jobs for cash payments: as tinkers, they repair things, from pots and pans to roof gutters; as contractors, they seal driveways with a black concoction that frequently washes away during the next hard rain.

Gypsy women, made famous by song and by their specialty trades—palm-reading and fortunetelling—generally stay in camp on the outskirts of town. Their men can sometimes be found siphoning fuel out of the underground storage tanks of closed gasoline stations. Of course, not all Gypsies fit this stereotypical image, and some became respectable members of the community.

One Gypsy family in Newport was the Boswell family, a well-known member of which was Madam Sheba, Irene G. Boswell (Mrs. Frederick C. Boswell), who resided for a long time at 11 E. Third St. Just around the corner was Madam Lena (Mamie Rose Lovell), who lived at 309 York St. Both were “palmists” (according to their signs) whose fortune-telling parlors were positioned just off the end of the old Central Bridge. Their scam was part of the notorious business scene in Newport during the 1950s. In their parlors, at all hours of the day and night, customers could pay to have their palms read and learn what the length of their “love line” portended. For a larger fee, and with prior arrangements, a group could schedule a séance at the palm-reader’s parlor. However, both Madam Sheba and Madam Lena had to be given enough advance notice to hide assistants in the walls and basement, providing the necessary voices from beyond. The candles, the thick dark drapes, their large earrings, and the large tables were all

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part of the scene. They seemed to have known many of the customers’ deceased relatives but seldom any living ones. Meanwhile, the palm-readers’ husbands would be busy hauling things in their trucks, blacktopping, painting driveways, or “honey-dipping,” a term for the ser vice of sucking the muck out of septic systems. The modern sanitation district has taken the long, thick, black hose from the hands of people like Bosmac. A member of the Boswell clan, he was Campbell Co.’s longtime honey-dipper; he operated out of his Dayton, Ky., business location well into the 1980s, referring to himself as “a privately employed sanitation worker.” Later, there were other Gypsy palmists in Campbell Co.: for example, Sister Mohawk in Dayton and a group of palm readers working out of Cold Spring. In 1978, when Madam Lena died, her funeral in Newport at the Vonderhaar-Stetter-Betz Funeral Home on E. Third St. was one of the largest in that city’s history. It was attended by mourners from across the nation. Madam Lena, the so-called “mayor of York St.,” was carried in grand splendor by a white, horse-drawn hearse to nearby Evergreen Cemetery in Southgate.

In Fort Thomas, in March 1977, 20 to 25 Gypsies appeared at the IGA Highlander food store, distracting employees with requests for help. Almost as quickly as they arrived, they were gone, as was a large amount of cash from the safe in the store’s office. They were last seen headed south on U.S. 27. Later that year, Gypsies in Campbell Co. posed as city building inspectors, asking homeowners for identification and demanding cash for their ser vices.

Across the Licking River in Kenton Co., attorney Bill Hagedorn became the negotiator of choice for the Gypsies. He was invited to their parties and gatherings, often large galas held in hotels in Cincinnati; the tab for these Gypsy galas was seldom paid. When in the region, the migratory Gypsies often camped on the outskirts of town, where no permit was required. Madison Pike (Ky. Rt. 17), south of Covington, was one such place. If trouble broke out, Hagedorn was summoned. In February 1977 it was Hagedorn who saved Sister Mohawk from jail after she bilked a widow in Fort Mitchell out of more than $11,000.

In adjoining Boone Co., in May 1974, about 10 Gypsies, described as wearing old clothes and “looking like tramps,” entered a convenience store in Florence, and one of the women proceeded to discuss a coupon for a wrinkle cream with the checkout lady and eventually the manager. When the Gypsies left after 15 minutes, the manager discovered that almost $4,000 was missing from that day’s bank deposit. The group had driven off in two late-model Cadillacs with red and white license plates.

The migratory Gypsies habitually arrive in Northern Kentucky during the early spring, having worked their way back north from wintering in the Deep South. Perhaps the Williamson family is the best known group of these. During each annual visit, the Williamsons schedule a morning at Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati, formally burying their members who died during the previous year.

428 GYPSIES Bodies are sent in advance to the vault at the cemetery to await the mass burial ceremony.

Rightly or wrongly, performers in circuses are frequently thought to be Gypsies. The image of the Gypsy has entered into the language of childrearing, much to the chagrin of modern child psychologists. Mothers in the region have often exhorted their children, “If you don’t behave right, we’re going to give you to the Gypsies.”

DeCamp, Graydon. “Those Unbelievable Gypsies.”

CE Magazine, March 14, 1982, 18–23.

Grossman, James R., Ann Durkin Keating, and Janice L. Reiff, eds. The Encyclopedia of Chicago. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 2004.

Hicks, Jack. “NKU Official, Student of Gypsies, Tells of Myths,” KE, April 6, 1979, A1.

Loftus, Tom. “ ‘Gypsies’ Bilk Pair of $137,” KP, September 6. 1977, 7.

———. “Mourners Flock to Madam(e) Lena’s Funeral,” KP, June 15, 1978, 5.

Remlinger, Connie. “ ‘Gypsies’ Swipe $3,887,” KP, May 7, 1974, 9K. Workum, Bert. “Gypsy Bands Raiding Homes,” KP, August 31, 1977, 17.

———. “Widow Gave Gypsy $11,250,” KP, February 18, 1977, 1.

Michael R. Sweeney