History Commons^™

Leap Year: Chance, Chase, Or Curse?, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Based on a popularized legend in which St. Patrick granted to St. Bridget the right for all single women to propose marriage during leap years, the custom has produced ephemera as evidence of stereotypical old maids and bachelors and created vinegar valentines, ball invitations, dance cards, sheet music and calling cards. Between 1904 and 1916, at least 54 publishing houses created Leap Year postcards illustrated by more than 17 of the most talented artists of the day. Despite possible good intentions, the majority of the ephemera stereotypes single women as so desperate to marry that even unsuitable spouses, including alcoholics, …

Wku Libraries: Using Pastperfect To Open Hidden Collections, Nancy Richey

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Traditionally, access records for the Department of Special Collections were produced in analog forms which limited their use to in-house researchers.

The author chronicles the library/museum decision to purchase, PastPerfect, collection management software and reviews the product from a librarian’s point of view

Preserving Our Cemeteries_ Action Steps To Making It Happen.Jpg, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

This article resulted from attending Preservation Kentucky's "Our History Rests Here: Preservation and Restoration of Historic Cemeteries" workshop. As a member of the Warren County Cemetery Board, the author gives 15 practical steps for cemetery enthusiasts, property owners and family members. It informs its readers how to get in touch with the author and encourages local citizens to get involved.

The Du Ponts In Kentucky: Louisville’S Central Park, The Southern Exposition, And An Entrepreneurial Spirit*, Timothy J. Mullin

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

* The du Pont family is large, and recurring names and nicknames often make it difficult to follow who’s who. The Lammot family is woven together with the du Pont family in a complicated thread, especially since Margaretta was a favorite name. Adding the Coleman/Moxham family only makes the complicated spider’s web of family relationships that much more difficult. For this purpose selected family trees are included as appendices.

Now He Belong To The Ages: Memorializing Abraham Lincoln, Jonathan Jeffrey

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Reviled by many of his fellow Kentuckians while he was president, Abraham Lincoln became Kentucky’s, and America’s, idol during the 20th century. The Commonwealth is home to a growing list of notable Lincoln memorials. This article examines the history and folklore surrounding a number of these monuments.

We Shared In Its History: 1123 State Street, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Author writes of her personal experiences growing up in an historic house in downtown Bowling Green, Ky. Built in 1844, this house served as a private residence, an overnight guest house, the headquarters for Johnnie Massey Clay, President of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church's Women's Missionary Society, and apartments for senior adults, small families and young professionals. Over the years, what was originally a two room over two room Greek-revival townhouse built in the popular Flemish bond brick pattern had at least four additions and was renovated for creative reuses.

“We Have Raffeled For The Elephant & Won!”: The Wool Industry At South Union, Kentucky, Donna C. Parker, Jonathan J. Jeffrey

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Wool, next to cotton, is perhaps the most important of all textile fibers. Like most of their contemporaries, the Shakers of South Union, Kentucky, recognized the ease with which wool fibers were spun into yarn and the advantages of sturdy wool clothing. South Union’s textile industry grew from a simple carding mill to a full-fledged woolen factory with a 240-spindle spinning jack and 4 power looms. From its genesis in 1815 to its abrupt demised in 1868, the sect’s woolen industry provides a paradigm for the study of the United States’ textile industrialization.

A Thread Of Evidence: Shaker Textiles At South Union, Kentucky, Jonathan Jeffrey, Donna C. Parker

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Textile production was one of the many routine tasks performed in the early American home. Those who joined communal groups, like the Shaker converts at South Union, Kentucky, brought to the colony knowledge of these activities. Shakers manufactured fabric – linen, silk, and woolens – in about the same manner as most of their contemporaries, only on a larger scale. Though few of their contemporaries left documentation regarding the tedious tasks involved in textile production, the South Union Shaker community, located in Logan County, kept intimate accounts of daily activities through journals, diaries, day books, and correspondence which included records …

Fannie’S Flirtations: Etiquette, Reality, And The Age Of Choice, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

The 1890s were, for bright young females, an age of choice. Despite admonitions that flirting would ruin their reputations, many south central Kentucky adolescents enjoyed courtship rituals and remained highly respected in their communities. For every Charlotte Perkins Gilman with a mission set on advancing the status of women within our society, numerous females existed simply to enjoy life’s fullness and frivolity. Fannie Morton Bryan’s life story, as told through her diaries and newspaper accounts, gives readers a glimpse of the many rather than the few, the fun-loving rather than the serious-minded, and the old maid flirt in the largest …

"Ho! For Drakes Creek': Something Ventured, Nothing Gained, Donna C. Parker

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

On a January day in 1817 three men rode from South Union, Kentucky to a place in nearby Warren County called "the point." From the bluff above the creek, they could see the meandering waterway, fertile bottomlands, abundant timber, and the promise of a prosperous new enterprise. Seventeen days later they purchased the site and 300 surrounding acres. They represented the religious society known as the Shakers. With the Drakes Creek procurement, the main community’s South Union leaders planned to establish an outlying farm and operate a gristmill and a sawmill in Warren County.

Sericulture, Silk And South Union Shakers, Donna C. Parker, Jonathan J. Jeffrey

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Kentucky Shakers were particularly adept at the process of producing silk. Kentucky's temperate climate was conducive to mulberry tree cultivation and sericulture, the raising of silkworms. South Union Sisters hatched and grew silkworms to harvest the delicate silk fibers they used in the manufacture of kerchiefs, neckwear, hat bands, bonnets, and sewing silk. Occasionally entire garments such as dresses were made from the luxurious silk.

"Parting Friends": Southeastern Kentucky Funeral Customs. 1880-1915, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel (Mcguire)

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

At the turn of the twentieth century, southeastern Kentucky remained a sparsely settled region where traditional values abounded. Throughout society, funeral rites and changes in them evince values of family, community, and religion. Visitors to the area, whether settlement-school teachers, preachers, or researchers, vividly described deathbeds, burials, and funeral occasions which illuminate local values.

Reflecting the writers' urban prejudices, these Journals and publications along with contemporary newspaper accounts provide insight into southeastern Kentucky mourning customs during the years 1880 to 1915. Although the turn of the twentieth century brought change in the way urban dwellers dealt with mourning, their mountain …

The Little Colonel: A Phenomenon In Popular Literary Culture, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

Written by Annie Fellows Johnston (1863-1931), a set of twelve novels published between 1895 and 1912, influenced thousands of readers to emulate the main character, Lloyd Sherman, and her chums. As the rise of the “New Woman” found multi¬tudes of southern women fearful that such change would threaten the stability of the home, impressionable young readers idealized the Old South and accepted the selfless values which Johnston taught through the Little Colonel series. Drawing upon both her own experiences and those of her devoted audience, Johnston recorded life as she knew it and provides modern read¬ers with insight into the …

‘Blessed Are They That Mourn’: Expressions Of Grief In South Central Kentucky, 1870-1910, Sue Lynn Mcdaniel (Stone)

SCL Faculty and Staff Publications

During the nineteenth century, Americans were gradually changing their funeral and burial practices in an effort to soften death's harshness. In large northern communities, the professionalization of undertaking services and the opening of community cemeteries on the outskirts of population centers occurred prior to the Civil War.1 But in rural areas such as south central Kentucky, changes in burial customs transpired primarily between 1870 and 1910. While adapting the etiquette described in period literature, south central Kentuckians sought to establish expressions of grief which would testify to their traditional values of family, community, and religion