Elvis and Meatloaf

Several years ago, I happened to see a van proudly proclaiming ELVIS AND MEATLOAF in big red letters, hawking an act claiming to be the world's first and only combination Elvis and Meatloaf impersonators. And of that, I had little doubt.

I always wondered whatever happened to them, and just now, I inadventently stumbled onto their website, elvisandmeatloaf.com. Turns out Kentucky's Ersatz Elvis and Make-believe Meatloaf are still plying a good trade in the doppelganger business. In fact, the men, known as the Perkins Brothers, have expanded their operation to include Buddy Holly, Dean Martin, Roy Orbison, Rod Stewart, Hank Williams, John Lennon, George Jones, Neal Diamond and more. (Can imitations of Alice Cooper, Tiny Tim, Jerry Lewis, and Ferlin Husky be far behind?)

Check out their website to hear mp3 samples of the Perkins Brothers in each of their various incarnations!

"Truth and Justice" Statue

"Truth & Justice", a statue by Kentucky sculptor Barney Bright, will soon be on permanent display in a new outdoor space near the Miller Information Technology Center in Louisville. Broken Sidewalk is reporting that the statue has been restored by Barney's son Jeb, and has been in storage at his Butchertown foundry.

The Legend of the Little People

Kyle Lovern's new book Appalachian Case Study: UFO Sightings, Alien Encounters & Unexplained Phenomena, Volume 2 is hot off the presses! While Volume 1 focused entirely on UFO incidents in Lovern's home state of West Virginia, Volume 2 goes outside that state's borders to examine cases related to the Appalachian region of bordering states, including Kentucky.

The Appalachian region was once the ancient homeland of the Cherokee civilization (as well as other tribes) for thousands of years before Scottish and Irish immigrants settled into its mountains in the 1700s.

The book's recounting of Kentucky UFO lore is well done, but what really piqued my curiosity was Lovern's analysis of the Yunwi Tsunsdi legends passed down in Cherokee culture since antiquity.

The Yunwi Tsunsdi are miniature beings described in ancient Cherokee lore as sometimes being spirits and sometimes being diminutive humanoids about two feet tall. According to the legends, Lovern says, these beings may have different types of appearances and may be of three or four different types. Descriptions of them range from kindly but mischievous to somewhat more malicious tricksters. They reportedly have the power to confuse humans' minds, and to turn invisible at will.


Lovern wonders aloud, "Were the "little people" known to the Cherokee related to UFOs, inter-dimensional mysteries or some other unusual phenomena?" and points out that many Indian tribes throughout North America have legends of beings from other planets or from other dimensions.

I also find it interesting that my own Irish ancestors who came to Kentucky had "little people" legends of their own - the Leprechaun, the Clurichaun, and the Faerie. Not to mention Sprites, Hobs, Korrigans, Pixies, Elves, Imps, Brownies, Goblins, Gremlins, Boggarts, and Lubber Fiends.

PETA's "Crippled Chicken" Statue

Those anti-carnivore extremists PETA - who criticized President Obama for swatting a fly this year - are launching yet another volley in their neverending campaign against the Louisville-based Kentucky Fried Chicken chain. They've applied for a permit to erect a statue of a cartoon chicken covered in blood and walking on crutches, bearing the words "KFC Cripples Chickens".

Read more about it on my Louisville Mojo column!

Abandoned Railroad Bridge Returns

The long-abandoned Big Four Railroad Bridge has been slated to be repurposed as a pedestrian walkway/bikeway, making travel between Louisville and Indiana fun.


When I first moved to Louisville several years ago, everyone was saying the pedestrian bridge in Butchertown was coming "any day now". After a couple of years I gave up on it, so it pleases me to see that they're finally making some progress on the construction of the on-ramp that will enable feet, bikes, and wheelchairs to make the trek across the Ohio River.

However, the trajectory of the on-ramp is such a wide one that simply getting to the bridge looks almost as long a journey as crossing the bridge itself. I was rather hoping for an elevator or something.

Ghost with a Bindi?

Interesting graffiti seen in Old Louisville, with a spooky ghost/alien-looking face bearing a Bindi or a Tilaka.

Vaccination Scare at Shelby Elementary

Growing evidence mounts about the potential dangers of the H1N1 vaccine, which reportedly contains such yummy items as mercury, formalydehyde, industrial fertilizers, Vero cells of the African Green Monkey, diploid cells from fetal tissue, and wackiest of all, Nonoxynol-9 and MSG. (Why??)

Some kids from Shelby Elementary were rushed to the hospital yesterday, feeling ill effects immediately after being vaccinated. More details on my Louisville Mojo column.

Tattoo Charlie's Unfairly Cited

Tattoo Charlie's, which has been a Kentucky icon for 34 years with multiple locations in Jefferson and Fayette Counties, has been arbitrarily slapped with a citation by Louisville's zoning-code cops at their Okolona location. Read more about it in my Louisville Mojo column.

Somerset Serial Killer?

On November 9, the pickup truck of Jeffrey Kevin Price was found burning on West Racetrack Road, outside the hardwood lumber plant where he worked. But Price was missing.

Then last Saturday, Price's corpse was discovered in a remote area near Pitman Creek. Someone had attempted to set the body on fire. Police said Price's badly burned remains were found about 9 miles from where his pickup truck had been left and torched.

Now, this morning, Pulaski County Coroner Richard New has announced the discovery of burned bones from a second person near where Price was found.

The FBI has been called in to assist with the Pulaski County investigation.

The Tan Man of Pike County

William Lynwood Montell, in his Haunted houses and family ghosts of Kentucky, tells of a strange "Tan Man" haunting in Harmons Branch, KY.

Montell interviewed two different women reporting firsthand sightings of the "Tan Man". One of them, just 13 at the time, was riding a trail bike in the middle of nowhere and suddenly saw him - an ordinary, nondescript-looking man dressed in khaki or tan shirt and pants. But as she got closer to him, he disappeared. This Tan Man, so the family believed, began following them, and anything weird that ever happened after that was seemingly ascribed to him.

I'm not a skeptic by any means, but I find it interesting that almost every form of paranormal phenomena has been attributed to the Tan Man: physical manifestations, disappearing, seeing mist, feeling cold spots, hearing a flute playing by itself, hearing a piano playing by itself, feeling air in a room get "heavier", hearing unexplained footsteps, doors opening and closing by themselves, smelling sweet rose-like scents, feeling caresses of invisible hands, seeing movements from the corner of one's eye, seeing a "smoke-like blob", a locked screen door becoming unlocked, a bed shaking violently, candles going out, mystery lights projected from nowhere against a wall spinning in a circle, television and stereo volumes going up and down by themselves, missing and reappearing keys, an accosted child, a terrified dog, and lightbulbs burning out inexplicably fast. There's even an anecdote about contacting the Tan Man with a Ouija Board, and getting a barrage of obscenities!

Every myth contains a kernel of truth at its center, though, and I'd be very interested in learning more about the actual eyewitness sightings of the man in tan, even if everything else said about him was lily-gilding.

"Dis Memorial Get Memorialized"

A nice pocket of graffiti in an alley off Payne Street in Louisville. The phrase "Dis Memorial Get Memorialized" produced nothing in a Google search. Anyone?

"Set Ragen Free"

Spotted this graffiti in an alley in the Highlands of Louisville. But who's Ragen? And was he ever freed?