586 MASON CO. COURT HOUSES from 1824 to 1828, had his home and plantation. Sardis was also the location of a raid by Confederate general John Hunt Morgan. Minerva, incorporated in 1844, was the site of Lewis Craig’s traveling Baptist church. He was buried nearby. Minerva also was the home of Justice Stanley Reed, solicitorgeneral in the administration of President Franklin Roosevelt (1933–1945) and an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1938 to 1957. Minerva College served the community from 1856 until 1909 and counted among its graduates Herman Donovan, who became the president of the University of Kentucky at Lexington. In Mayslick the first consolidated grade and high school south of the Ohio River that provided transportation for its students was organized in 1909. Other communities of note in the county are Lewisburg and Orangeburg. Mason Co.’s growth after the Civil War did not match its early development. Railroads were the new engine of growth in the United States, and Mason Co. did not complete its rail connections to Lexington and Cincinnati until late in the 19th century. Significant floods in the 1880s and 1890s also negatively affected the towns along the river. The county clung to its agrarian, small-town identity while the rest of the nation moved toward urbanization and industrialization. As the 19th century closed, some industry came to the county. The Ohio Valley Pulley Works (see Browning Manufacturing/Ohio Valley Pulley Works) began in 1886 and has remained in operation for more than a century in different incarnations. Mule-drawn streetcars began making runs in 1896 in Maysville. The Farmers and Tuckahoe tobacco warehouses were established in 1909 and 1910. These were auction warehouses, the second and third ones in the state, and established Mason Co. as the secondlargest loose-leaf tobacco auction market in the world for most of the 20th century. Important names in state and national history continued to be linked to the county. Charles Young, born and educated in the Mayslick area, became only the third African American to graduate from West Point Military Academy in New York in 1889. Two Maysville residents, Augustus Willson and William Cox, served as Kentucky governor and lieutenant governor, respectively, from 1907 until 1911. Alice Lloyd of Maysville lobbied the Kentucky legislature on the issues of prohibition, women’s suff rage, and protection of tobacco farmers against the tobacco trust. The 1920s were a time of severe hardship for farmers. For Mason Co. this period initiated a continuing downturn in numbers of farms, tenants, and African American farmers. In the 1930s the tobacco program established following the Agricultural Adjustment Act stabilized prices for that important commodity. Until the 1980s, tobacco was the linchpin of the county’s economy, from farming to the various enterprises that served tobacco farmers to the warehouses and tobacco processing. Parker Tobacco Company, which processed tobacco for later sale, was the largest employer in Mason Co. for some years during the 1970s and 1980s. But farming declined in the last two decades of the 20th century with the falling
fortunes of tobacco. Remaining farm operations concentrated on beef cattle, dairy, forage crops, and various attempts to diversify. The flood of 1937 was devastating for Maysville, Dover, and residents along the Ohio River. River and rail traffic declined in the post–World War II period and major roads bypassed the city. In the 1950s, Mason Co. took great pride in native daughter Rosemary Clooney, who honored her hometown by premiering the movie The Stars Are Singing in Maysville in 1953. The smaller communities lost their schools to consolidation in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, and the decline in farming hastened the towns’ decline in population and importance. Meanwhile, as roads were improved and new roads built, Maysville became a regional center for education, employment, medical care, and shopping. The hills that had restricted travel to the river town were finally breached. The change began with the building of the Maysville Community and Technical College in 1969 in Washington. Retail establishments followed, and after the AA Highway was built in 1983, the hospital (see Meadowview Regional Medical Center) and the retail hub of the city moved to the “top of the hill.” New industry also located there. Along the Ohio River, where Mason Co.’s second incorporated town, Charlestown, was planned in 1787 but never developed, East Kentucky Power built an electric generating facility in 1977 (see Power Plants). That plant has continually expanded and provided stable employment for residents. It also attracted a neighboring business, Inland Container, which uses the steam generated by the power plant to recycle cardboard. The need for coal by that plant and by nearby electric producers helped rejuvenate the rail line from Lexington, which had been abandoned but now transports coal from Eastern Kentucky to Mason Co. River traffic, especially barges and pleasure boats, has increased since the 1970s. The communities throughout the county, which at one point seemed distant from the county seat, are now less than fifteen minutes away from most of the county’s entertainment, health care, and retail sites. Maysville expanded its borders greatly, even annexing its old county-seat rival, Washington, in 1990. In the 1980s, Mexicans were brought into the county to work in the tobacco fields. Many stayed, moved their families, and have become permanent residents. Mennonites, who moved into the area after 1995, brought their language and customs, so that German is the primary language of around 300 Mason Co. residents and horses and buggies have become familiar sights on county roads. Mason Co. celebrates its historical role with numerous festivals, several museums, and several restored buildings in Washington open to the public. Its diversified economy and role as a regional hub have created a county with excellent homes, low unemployment, and a tax base that supports impressive schools, parks, and cultural institutions. Calvert, Jean, and John Klee. Maysville, Kentucky: From Past to Present in Pictures. Maysville: Mason Co. Museum, 1983.
Clift, G. Glenn, History of Maysville and Mason County. Lexington, Ky.: Transylvania, 1956. Collins, Richard H. History of Kentucky. Vol. 1. Covington, Ky.: Collins, 1882.
John Klee
MASON CO. COURTHOUSES. Mason Co.’s first courthouse was at Washington, which served as the county seat from 1794 until 1848. An imposing two-story Federal structure built by the pastor Lewis Craig, it was the site of court proceedings, slave auctions, court days, and public meetings concerning religion and slavery. After the move of the county seat to Maysville, it served as a school and the town hall. The structure burned in 1909. In 1848 the Mason Co. seat moved to Maysville. The court house there was a Greek Revival building, constructed in 1845 as the Maysville City Hall. At the time of its construction, plans were already being made to move the county seat from Washington to Maysville. In 1844 a building committee, consisting of Richard Collins, A. M. January, H. McCullough, and F. T. Hord, had been appointed to supervise construction. Ignatius and Stanislaus Mitchell provided and laid the brick for the building, at three dollars per 1,000 bricks. Lenin Purnell and Christopher Russell are believed to have been the carpenters who created the cherry staircases that spiral up three floors. Other woodwork around the doors and windows and in the main courtroom is also original. The old court house in Maysville faces Th ird St. running south to north toward the Ohio River and has four imposing Doric columns. In 1957 the street on the side of the court house was renamed Stanley Reed Ct. to honor the U.S. Supreme Court justice from Mason Co., and an explanatory plaque was attached to the court house. The courtroom in the building looks today the same as over a century ago, with a raised seating area facing the judge’s bench and spittoons available for the lawyers and the jury; it is still used on special occasions. The county-judge executive offices are on the first floor of the court house. In 2000 Mason Co. opened a new courthouse on the south side of Third St. It, like the 1845 courthouse, has Doric columns; a cupola and other features are also reminiscent of the Greek Revival style. Calvert, Jean, and John Klee. Maysville, Kentucky: From Past to Present in Pictures. Maysville, Ky.: Mason Co. Museum, 1983.
John Klee
MASON CO. HIGH SCHOOL. Mason Co. High School, the only public high school in Mason Co., opened in fall 1960. It is located at the “top of the hill” on U.S. 68 in the city of Maysville, approximately midway between the Ohio River and Washington, Ky. The 25-acre site for the school, formerly the Chenault farm, was purchased for $27,500. Ground was broken for the new high school in July 1959, and classes began on September 6, 1960. Mason Co. High School consolidated the high schools at May’s Lick, Minerva, and Orangeburg,