Bluegrass Renaissance

Bluegrass Renaissance
Author: James C. Klotter
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 378
Release: 2012-08-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813140439

Originally established in 1775 the town of Lexington, Kentucky grew quickly into a national cultural center amongst the rolling green hills of the Bluegrass Region. Nicknamed the "Athens of the West," Lexington and the surrounding area became a leader in higher education, visual arts, architecture, and music, and the center of the horse breeding and racing industries. The national impact of the Bluegrass was further confirmed by prominent Kentucky figures such as Henry Clay and John C. Breckinridge. Bluegrass Renaissance: The History and Culture of Central Kentucky, 1792-1852, chronicles Lexington's development as one of the most important educational and cultural centers in America during the first half of the nineteenth century. Editors Daniel Rowland and James C. Klotter gather leading scholars to examine the successes and failures of Central Kentuckians from statehood to the death of Henry Clay, in an investigation of the area's cultural and economic development and national influence. Bluegrass Renaissance is an interdisciplinary study of the evolution of Lexington's status as antebellum Kentucky's cultural metropolis.

The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia

The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia
Author: Gerald L. Smith
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 1467
Release: 2015-08-28
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 0813160677

The story of African Americans in Kentucky is as diverse and vibrant as the state's general history. The work of more than 150 writers, The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia is an essential guide to the black experience in the Commonwealth. The encyclopedia includes biographical sketches of politicians and community leaders as well as pioneers in art, science, and industry. Kentucky's impact on the national scene is registered in an array of notable figures, such as writers William Wells Brown and bell hooks, reformers Bessie Lucas Allen and Shelby Lanier Jr., sports icons Muhammad Ali and Isaac Murphy, civil rights leaders Whitney Young Jr. and Georgia Powers, and entertainers Ernest Hogan, Helen Humes, and the Nappy Roots. Featuring entries on the individuals, events, places, organizations, movements, and institutions that have shaped the state's history since its origins, the volume also includes topical essays on the civil rights movement, Eastern Kentucky coalfields, business, education, and women. For researchers, students, and all who cherish local history, The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia is an indispensable reference that highlights the diversity of the state's culture and history.

Madam Belle

Madam Belle
Author: Maryjean Wall
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2014-10-14
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0813147085

Belle Brezing made a major career move when she stepped off the streets of Lexington, Kentucky, and into Jennie Hill's bawdy house -- an upscale brothel run out of a former residence of Mary Todd Lincoln. At nineteen, Brezing was already infamous as a youth steeped in death, sex, drugs, and scandal. But it was in Miss Hill's "respectable" establishment that she began to acquire the skills, manners, and business contacts that allowed her to ascend to power and influence as an internationally known madam. In this revealing book, Maryjean Wall offers a tantalizing true story of vice and power in the Gilded Age South, as told through the life and times of the notorious Miss Belle. After years on the streets and working for Hill, Belle Brezing borrowed enough money to set up her own establishment -- her wealth and fame growing alongside the booming popularity of horse racing. Soon, her houses were known internationally, and powerful patrons from the industrial cities of the Northeast courted her in the lavish parlors of her gilt-and-mirror mansion. Secrecy was a moral code in the sequestered demimonde of prostitution in Victorian America, so little has been written about the Southern madam credited with inspiring the character Belle Watling in Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind. Following Brezing from her birth amid the ruins of the Civil War to the height of her scarlet fame and beyond, Wall uses her story to explore a wider world of sex, business, politics, and power. The result is a scintillating tale that is as enthralling as any fiction.

A New History of Kentucky

A New History of Kentucky
Author: Lowell H. Harrison
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 1119
Release: 1997-03-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 081313708X

The first comprehensive history of the state since the publication of Thomas D. Clark's landmark History of Kentucky over sixty years ago. A New History of Kentucky brings the Commonwealth to life, from Pikeville to the Purchase, from Covington to Corbin, this account reveals Kentucky's many faces and deep traditions. Lowell Harrison, professor emeritus of history at Western Kentucky University, is the author of many books, including George Rogers Clark and the War in the West, The Civil War in Kentucky, Kentucky's Road to Statehood, Lincoln of Kentucky, and Kentucky's Governors.

The Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky

The Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky
Author: Paul A. Tenkotte
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 1070
Release: 2014-10-17
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 0813159962

The Encyclopedia of Northern Kentucky is the authoritative reference on the people, places, history, and rich heritage of the Northern Kentucky region. The encyclopedia defines an overlooked region of more than 450,000 residents and celebrates its contributions to agriculture, art, architecture, commerce, education, entertainment, literature, medicine, military, science, and sports. Often referred to as one of the points of the "Golden Triangle" because of its proximity to Lexington and Louisville, Northern Kentucky is made up of eleven counties along the Ohio River: Boone, Bracken, Campbell, Carroll, Gallatin, Grant, Kenton, Mason, Owen, Pendleton, and Robertson. With more than 2,000 entries, 170 images, and 13 maps, this encyclopedia will help readers appreciate the region's unique history and culture, as well as the role of Northern Kentucky in the larger history of the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the nation. • Describes the "Golden Triangle" of Kentucky, an economically prosperous area with high employment, investment, and job-creation rates • Contains entries on institutions of higher learning, including Northern Kentucky University, Thomas More College, and three community and technical colleges • Details the historic cities of Covington, Newport, Bellevue, Dayton, and Ludlow and their renaissance along the shore of the Ohio River • Illustrates the importance of the Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky International Airport as well as major corporations such as Ashland, Fidelity Investments, Omnicare, Toyota North America, and United States Playing Card

Daniel Boone

Daniel Boone
Author: Michael Lofaro
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2010-09-12
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0813128862

" The embodiment of the American hero, the man of action, the pathfinder, Daniel Boone represents the great adventure of his age—the westward movement of the American people. Daniel Boone: An American Life brings together over thirty years of research in an extraordinary biography of the quintessential pioneer. Based on primary sources, the book depicts Boone through the eyes of those who knew him and within the historical contexts of his eighty-six years. The story of Daniel Boone offers new insights into the turbulent birth and growth of the nation and demonstrates why the frontier forms such a significant part of the American experience.