Pet Haven

For one of the creepiest - and depressing - places in the entire state of Kentucky, look no further than Shepherdsville, KY. That's where you'll find Pet Haven Cemetery, a gloriously gaudy pet cemetery guaranteed to bum you out for days if you're an animal lover. (And if you're not an animal lover, get the heck off my porch.)


While researching the Weird Kentucky book, I tried to interview some locals about whether the area was haunted by the wandering spirits of all these sad dead pets. All affirmed that they indeed believed it to be, but nobody wanted to go on the record. As one guy succintly put it, "Something about a dog ghost scares me ten times more'n a person".



More about Pet Haven on page 225 of the book.

Uncle Josh

A now-lost meme of a century ago, the concept of "Uncle Josh" is one that may take considerable unwinding to retroactively understand, rather like untangling a mass of spaghetti strand by strand.

Some of those strands are presented here in piecemeal fashion:

The above image is from the Mount Vernon Signal newspaper, January 14, 1910. A "Brown's Comedy Company" put on a three-act play called "Uncle Josh". Of this theatrical troupe and this play, we know precious little. But we do know that this show was concurrent with another Uncle Josh, a character played by famous vaudeville comedian Cal Stewart, who had a successful string of comedy records in this persona. Says the Wikipedia:

He is best remembered for his comic monologues in which he played "Uncle Josh" Weathersby, a resident of a mythical New England farming town called "Punkin Center."

Born in Charlotte County, Virginia in 1856, Stewart spent his early life working in circuses, medicine shows and vaudeville to great acclaim as "Uncle Josh Weathersby from Way Down East". It was on the road that he befriended Mark Twain and later Will Rogers, two men who shared similar wit in comedy.

Around 1897, Thomas Edison's studios hired him to cut several cylinder recordings of his famous speeches and songs. They were well received by the public, and launched an entire series of recordings based on the Uncle Josh character. Stewart's trademark on these recordings are the easily recognizable laugh that precedes his speeches.

Best-selling recordings included “Uncle Josh’s Arrival in New York” (1898), “I’m Old But I’m Awfully Tough (Laughing Song)” (1898), “Jim Lawson’s Horse Trade With Deacon Witherspoon” (1901), “Uncle Josh’s Huskin’ Bee Dance” (1901) and “Uncle Josh Buys an Automobile” (1903).

However, it's not that simple: although Cal Stewart supposedly developed the character (though most Vaudeville characters were pinched from even earlier, antiquated sources) of Uncle Josh, there were at least two other performers that recorded for Edison as Uncle Josh Weathersby. Someone named Dan Quinn recorded "Uncle Josh At The Midway" in 1987, and Andrew Keefe recorded three "Uncle Josh" cylinders ("I'm Old But I'm Awfully Tough", "Uncle Josh In A Department Store", and "Uncle Josh In A Chinese Laundry") in 1905. Decrepit-music scholars still argue to this day about whether some other Uncle Josh records are Stewart, Quinn, Keefe, or someone else entirely.

And then there were the "Uncle Josh" movies, which although created by Edison and feature a rural rube, don't seem to be the same character. Charles Manley played this variant of Uncle Josh in "Uncle Josh's Nightmare" (1900), "Uncle Josh in a Spooky Hotel" (1902), and "Uncle Josh at the Moving Picture Show" (1902). (Manley, incidentally, was one of the actors onstage at Ford's Theatre when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated.)


Then there's "Uncle Josh" Graves, bluegrass dobroist who was born in the 1920s, and the century-old Uncle Josh Bait Company which, despite its name, was founded by a man named Alan P. Jones.



What does it all mean? Where will it all lead? And why must I know?

Hillbilly Hijack!

Hey, speaking of My Old Kentucky Dinner Train, now here's my kind of entertainment. For a mere hundred dollar bill, you can witness Hillbilly Hijack, a dinner-theatre murder mystery play held on a moving train in glorious Bardstown.

My Old Kentucky Dinner Train

My Old Kentucky Dinner Train got its start as part of the old Bardstown railroad branch, originally constructed by The Bardstown and Louisville Railroad in 1860. Over the next century, the line would change hands from B&L to L&N to CSX to R.J. Corman, its current owner. The Corman company developed the dinner-train idea in 1988, and it's been a huge success. I wish more railroad lines would take a cue from My Old Kentucky Dinner Train's lead.


The Dinner Train consists of three dining cars and a kitchen car. All the meals served on the train are prepared on board by the train's Executive Chef and his staff while you're sent on a journey through some of Kentucky's loveliest scenery, including passes by the antique Jackson Hollow Trestle, the Nazareth religious community, and the Bernheim Research Forest.

The Sleepwalker

Another example of Cave Hill Cemetery's seemingly endless supply of fascinating grave statuary.

I've always called this one "The Sleepwalker" because of its peculiar pose, with arms outstretched stiffly straight ahead, just like sleepwalkers and zombies do in 1,001 old B-movies.

Charles Manson

Charles Manson's name is often invoked as one of the most horrendous serial killers of all time, right up there with Bundy, Gein, Kemper, Starkweather, Nixon, etc. Problem is, as far as is known, Manson didn't actually kill anybody.

It's been stated that Charlie ordered his acid-addled flunkies to do it, a claim Manson denies. Had Manson presented a cogent defense for himself, he theoretically should have been acquitted. But carving an X on his forehead, declaring himself to be both Christ and Satan incarnate, and yelling in court that the judge's head should be cut off didn't exactly endear him to the jury.


Not many people realize that Charlie was a Kentuckian. Although many biographies list him as being from Cincinnati, Ohio, he was in fact raised by his mother in Ashland, Kentucky and simply happened to have been born in a hospital in nearby Cincinnati.

Trivia: James Willett, another victim of Manson's friends, was also a Kentuckian. In November 1972, three Manson associates - Nancy Pitman, Priscilla Cooper and Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, were charged with Willett's murder. His headless body, buried in a shallow grave, was not found for several months. His wife Lauren was found dead soon after Willett's body was discovered.

Abraham Lincoln's Grandfather

The grave of President Lincoln's paternal grandfather, Abraham Linkhorn, is just down the road a piece from me, in the great Long Run Cemetery.

The idiosyncratic spellings of the family surname can be a bit confusing. Many relatives of Abraham Lincoln chose to spell the name "Linkhorn" or "Linkhern", drifting from the Lincoln surname which originated in England and literally means "lake colony" (Welsh lynn meaning "lake or pool" and Latin colonia meaning "colony."

Thomas Lincoln, President Lincoln's father, re-adopted the Lincoln name, although some Linkhorns persisted on the family tree.

Reportedly, Mr. Linkhorn isn't actually buried under this stone. He was killed near this spot in 1786 by Shawnee indians, and buried somewhere in this cemetery, but no one's quite sure where now. This stone was erected many years later and arbitrarily placed.

Derby Pie

What is Derby Pie?

No really. What IS it? Well, it's basically a chocolate and walnut pie. Or sometimes pecans. Or sometimes other stuff, depending on whose recipe you use.

Sounds like nothing to write home about, right? And yet, this pie is often the center of raging legal controversies that continue to this very day.

Let's go back to the beginning. Here's what Wikipedia says:

The Derby Pie was created in 1950 by the Melrose Inn in Prospect, Kentucky as a specialty pastry. The restaurant's owners and Derby Pie creators were Walter and Leaudra Kern, who constantly researched the optimal recipe for their creation. They were assisted by their son George Kern. The name "Derby Pie" was chosen because the various family members each had a different name for the creation, so to resolve the naming quandary they put the various names in a hat, and pulled out the paper which said "Derby Pie".

Even after selling the Melrose Inn in 1960, the Kern family continued to make Derby Pie for select customers. In 1969 they trademarked the name Derby Pie to both the state government of Kentucky and the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Now, that may indeed be so, but in all promotional materials related to the pie, the nomenclature is actually "DERBY-PIE®" with a hyphen. Also note that the alleged creators spawned Derby Pie in 1950 but didn't trademark it until 1969, well after it had already become a huge success and generally passed into the common vernacular. Back in the day, everyone made "Derby Pies". Some were similar to the Kern family's and some were not. The grounds for belatedly trademarking the pie - which really is not a rocket-science recipe to begin with - could be said by some to be shaky, since it had huge popularity throughout the 50s and 60s as an independent meme unto itself. An open-source pie, if you will.

Who cares? Well, some folks sure seem to. Read this:

http://www.state-journal.com/news/article/3648621

According to this article, Rick Paul's White Light Diner, who'd already been in trouble with the Derby Pie people's lawyers once before, was selling something of Mr.Paul's own creation called "Kentucky Bourbon Pie". It's hard to make heads or tails of what Derby Pie's specific legal arguments were, but it seems to stem from a sort of "bait and switch" game Rick was allegedly playing, by offering Derby Pie on a sign but then serving his own "Kentucky Bourbon Pie" instead when you get inside. Is it sneaky? Yes. Is it devious? Yes. Is it ethical? That's debatable. But is it illegal? I would say certainly not.

The judge didn't see it that way, though. Behold:

http://www.state-journal.com/news/article/3784842

Rick Paul, owner of Rick's White Light Diner, was found in contempt of court Monday and must pay $1,000 to a charity of his choice, for again infringing on the Derby-Pie trademark.

Before U.S. District Judge Joseph Hood in a Lexington courtroom, Paul was found in contempt of court for violating a 1997 permanent injunction signed by Hood, ordering Paul not to infringe on Kern's Kitchen Inc.'s trademark Derby-Pie.

Paul also must pay Kern's Kitchen's attorney fees and costs.

"I am disappointed with the judge's ruling and I accept it," Paul said today. "Our proof was considerably different than Derby Pie's. The judge's ruling was, in part, based on me keeping the Derby Pie in the freezer. I failed because I did not tell the judge that I keep other pies in the freezer and then warm in a microwave prior to service."

I think if Mr. Paul had a better legal team, he could have fought this and won, and he still could if he'd chosen to appeal to a higher court or filed a suit of his own.

And for the record, I don't get the appeal of Derby Pie anyway. Blah. Give me my grandma's apple do-lollies any day.

Pisgah

Pisgah is a very small spot on the map on Highway 60 between Versailles and Lexington, but there’s a lot of Kentuckiana of note here:

Happy Chandler is buried at the local Pisgah cemetery, William Shatner’s horse farm is nearby, and one of my favorite donut places in the entire universe - Doughdaddy’s - is located right next door. (Shatner donut-run sightings are rampant, not surprisingly).


But what most people are drawn here for is the famous castle overlooking Versailles Road. Known for years as “The Martin Castle,” it sat abandoned for decades and was long the subject of myth and speculation regarding its purpose and its reclusive creator, who died a few years back. Although temporarily set back by a fire, the new owner is renovating it and hopefully soon we’ll be able to do more than just peer at it through the majestic front gates and wonder.

And hey, if you find yourselves underwhelmed by all this excitement, don’t forget Keeneland racetrack is just minutes away from here as well.

Dinosaur World

This Cave City attraction consists of a large wooded area in which someone has placed dinosaur statues of various sizes.

And that’s it. They don’t talk, they don’t move, they don’t light up or explode, lasers don’t project futuristic light shows on their abdomens, and you can’t ride them.

I have to admire the old-fashioned simplicity of such an attraction, and in this modern age where attention spans are dulled by video games and the Internet, I wish there were more places like Dinosaur World. For some of us, just gawking at a fiberglass allosaur is vacation enough.

Joe's One-Antlered Moose

I have yet to actually eat at Joe's "Older Than Dirt" Diner in Lyndon, KY, but I often drive by it and marvel at its decorative moose in the yard with only half a rack.


Bonus: in addition to Thidwick the lopsided moose, Joe's diner also comes with two pigs in the yard. The astute UnK reader will note that they are identical to the pig that stands sentry out in front of Ole Hickory Pit Barbecue House.

Somewhere there must be some kinda "Roadhouse Restaurant Supply" store where people are getting these pigs. Or, perhaps more likely, as BBQ joints come and go, the same concrete critters get traded around, auctioned off, lent out, etc.... just like the Pigs of Vernon Lanes.

Pennyroyal Area Museum

The Pennyroyal Area Museum in Hopkinsville has many different exhibits and goodies, but it's their Edgar Cayce section that interests us most. Among the many curious items there, they keep Cayce's desk on display along with his typewriter, as if awaiting his return....


Other attractions at the Pennyroyal Area Museum include exhibits on the Night Riders, the Trail of Tears, and Jefferson Davis. Find it at 217 E 9th Street in Hopkinsville.