A Short History of Carroll County by Anna V. Parker

Parker, Anna V.

English

Morehead State University

·• ' -. '!'-- - -· ·-. :J 7 .J v ' -·-·..- .... ---r-... ... __ ... - .. ··-· .. REPRODUCED FOR OFVICERS AND OOARD MEMBrn.5 OF THE PORT WILLIAM HISTORICAL SOCIETY, OF CARROLLTON, KENTUCKY- MIRCH 9,1959 (FROM JANUARY, 1959 ISSUE OF " THE REGISTER" - QUARTER.LY OF THE KENTUCKY STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY,FRANKFORT,KY.) A SHORT HISTORY OF CARROLL COUNTY A~'1A V PARKER, GHENT, KY. In the year 1&'38, the eighty-sC'wnth county was formed in Kentucky. The largest part of this new county wa~ taken from Gallatin, which had been organizPd into a county in 1799 In order to straighten the line:; of the new county. a comer was cut from Henry and a slice taken from Trimble. The new comity was named in honor of Charles Carmll of ~Iary-land. "ho hacl het n one of the signers of the Declaration of Indepc•nclencc. The town of Port William. tlw «'arlif'st sf'ttlement in this :wetion had been •/ t~ie county s~at of ~allat1!!_ Cmintv Tl~~ n~1m..£.._ was now chan~,tl ~oCai-rolT::.__ ton and the town was macl<' the c:ouut\ seat of Carroll Coun 1 -carro11 Couuty is situated in a V(';Y delightful part of Ke~~t11Ck). The nurtliem boundary is form"d hy tlH' he,rntiful Ohio Hiver, aml much of the farm land un<ln culti\'ation is in tht> fertile valleys of the Ohio and Kentucky rivers. Tlw hill, in the hackgrouncl form a most interesting contrast. In the spring of th1• yc,ar when the wild plum, dogwoocl, redbud an.i_ other flowt'ring tT<'<'S arc in bloom, a drive through the <'ountry is most deJjghtfnl. In the fall when th<' trees on the hills are a mass of col0r, 1t is equally hcautiful and interesting \fan\' Jov<'ly views of the Ohio and Kentuckv rivers <'an b(' seen wht>n 01w is rfriving along the ri\'C·r roa(ls. Pnhaps · the most lasting mPmory is the n flcction · of the sun on the water lwfore it st'ts behind the lncli'.llla hills C.nroll County is als\l well locatf'd, in that it is mi<lwav hd\\t'f'n I.ouis\'ille and Cin°cinn.1ti and 1H'arl:· the same distance from· Lexington as it is frnm Tndfr,napolis Jt h,t\ alw.w, <·njPwd the a,,h·antage of river transportation on both the Ohio and tlw Kentuc-k:·· Now ,1S 1!)59 hef!ins , traffic on th<> Ohio is still «·xtrenwl:· active, thnugh it will prohahlv never .1_gain ht' so import.mt to K<>ntul·kians as it was dming tht> <la:·s nf the f'arlv ,f'ttlcmf'nts. Tlwn. thf'ir V<'f: lives clqwnde<l on tra\·el bv watf·r. Tn l ~67 the Louisville & '."fas}l\ ilk Hailroacl built a line from LaGrangc to Covington known as the ',hn,t I ,in«• which passes through thP southern part of thP conntv. Earl:,· in tht· 19:30\. r\·tleral Highwa~· 4:2. \\as run through tht• countv. lving paraJl,,J tn the Ohio for :,('\«'ral miles a11d giving tht• tourist man:,• Joye}v Yit'\\'s of the nn·r Tt has be,·11 of in('stimahle help to tlw countv in a commercial wa,. <'\"C!I as it has afforded res1d1°nt, and , isitors m11ch pk,b1ir«'. (\1rrollton was sdth•d . n I i~J§ ~o 1w st ven \"P,H, hdorl' C,tllati11 Cl>~mt\ "s or.~:lllization ht>canw dfn·ti\t', a11d w"1s tlll' CtHtnty seat ,,f th,1t L"1)11nt\· until Carroll Cnnnl\· "a, f1irnw(l. \:, ~-1id 1t \\,IS k11own ,lt first 35 fl. -<-:f. -VO I .s 7 .:T ,,_,...,, I q .1'°'7 ~) "(' '1 .a-- y ~ ' ~ .. A Short History of Carroll County 37 Across the river from Carrollton was Prestonville, named for General Preston or Rc,olutionary War farmfT _!_n thecarly days, e~en_when Carroll was a part o!_ G~llatin County,_ it was the most important settlement. Re-cause the town was at thE.' mouth of th<' Kentucky River and also on the Ohio, much of the freight sent to Central Kentucky passed through it. One of the earliest roads led to Nt>w Castle m Henry County This was the main way of gt'tting needed supplies in and farm products to the market. As early as 1795, Elijah Craig, Jr., placed a notice in the Cincinnati 5entinel of the North-Westem Territory stating that he would make trips up the Kentucky Ri,er on tht' first day of February with sufficient number of boats to transport all goods left with him, and adding that he had a storehouse large enough to take care of all shipments waiting delivery. His charge per hundred to Frankfort was 50¢ and to Dick's River, $1.25.8 The first dam on the Kentucky River was built in 18:39 about two miles from its mouth.11 The contract was awarded to A. W. Darling and Brothers. After its completion Darling made Carrollton his home and built a large flour mill and distillery m PrPstonville He owne<l a general store there and was quite successful in all of his business undertakings. He is sa.id to have shipped many harrels ot flour to New Orleans by flat-boat. When he retired in 1880 he sold his distillery to a corporation called the Whiskey Trust, and, as his product had become so famous over a very large territory, he is said to have rect•ived quite a large sum of money for the name of his brand, "Old Darlmg. Busine~ in Pr~stonville beg~ to decline aftt>r the Kentuckv Central Rail oall was built in 1854. At the present time, only a skeleton of-thf' original settlement remains. Among the early industriPs in Carrollton was a distillC'ry started by Richard Jett in 1845 or 1846. Jett harl moved to Kentucky from Virgmia with his family. After his death in HIBL his sons, James and his three brothers, built a much larger distillery with a capacity of 326 bushels of com a day. They manufactured a sour-mash whiskey which was sold mainly in Cincinnati. Estimates have placed their sales at 2000 barrels a year.10 In 1863, John Glaub.-·r. a ret·ent arrival from Germany, started the G1auber Shoe Company. He employed fh c workers, for at that time all shoes were made by hand. The husiness is now owned by his grandson, John Glaubcr III, and is operating ill th<' original huildiug. Another old business that remained m the same family for three generations was suld only recently. It is the City Meat Market, founded by Herman St>ppenfelt in 1866. He was the fin,t Carrollton mercha11t +o deliver purchases to the homes of his customers. The fint dry goods stor(' was on the (.'Orner of Main and Fifth streets, owned by Hamilton Lathrope. His wife was • ' . . ·, ! .. ·,. .. "'  A Short History of Carroll County 39 nually, it t'mploys soml' 11i1wty men .rncl women. residents of tht' county or of Carrollton. Another important plant. that of the \ietal and Thennit Corporation, was dedicated as recently as April, 19.58. It is on Highway 42 about two miles east of Carrollton Here w,• haw a plant built at a cost of $3,500,000. said to be one of the most modem organic chemical plants m the world, and belonging to an industry that promises to give Pmployment to twenty-five local workers. 12 There are many smaller businesses, each engaging a sizable group oi employees. Among these are tht. Rich Ladder Comp .. ,1y, the Kraft Cheese Company, the Coca-Cola Bottling Compauv, the ~vhrtin Nursery, and three modern motels on Highway 42 c.ist of Carrollton. The Carroll ton Canning Company employs around eigl1tv-five persons during the canning sc:asou. The two eounty papt'r~ were combined around 1930 aml are uow published wet.:kly JS th'• ?l,t U:S· Democrat It is owned by the estate of tht• late John N. Perry, N. A. Perry, Jr., is its publisher. Carroll is principally an agricultural county. In 1957 there were 1,689.77 acres of tobacco raised in the county an<l around 5,000 al!res of corn 13 Other crops are wheat, oats barley sorghum, and several typrs of grasses for hay. :\fany acres oi tomatoes an• grown, and for the past ft:"w years a large acreage has bct't: d, :Jtt I to ,trawberrit·s, whi,J, thrive 111 the sarKly soil along the rivers. Recf•ntly s<'veral farmers ha,e supplemented their income hy add mg raspberries to their small f mit crop In addition to tob,tcco, the dail) herds hold a most important place in the farmers' 'ncomc Tht•re are several herds of registered Jerseys that arC' nationally known. having won ribbons and trophies at exhibiticms in a number of st. .tes '1 ht·re art' also ,me \heC"p in the county, which haw been a good sourc1! of income to their owners over the years. Many more farmers arc raising shct>p since the important dog l.tw was passed in 1956. Although the season lasts on!v a short tiine, perhaps the large~t in- / dustrv in the count\ is the Carrollton Loose Leaf Tobarco Market. It has often' ranked as 1:hi> thirt1 l.irgest tuhace<) market in the world and has never been lower t 1•1 fourth There arc nine warehouses with a. floor 5pace of approximately se\'enteeo acrf:'s. During the 1957-58 season, 20,870,754 pounds of Burley Wt're sold on the C ... rrollton floor, at an avnage pnce of $61.9i a11d totaling i1. sales $12,93(),192,58.14 It goes without saying that many men an<l women are given work during the marketing season Carrollton has also a large rt'drying plant with some three hundretl employees. t ~~ • I A Short HJstor:r ot Carroll County •1 tum in a westwanlly dm•ction to a miueral spring ,it Drernl()n, in Hen!) County. The Big Bone Spring 111 Boone• Count)', east of Carroll, was a favorite haunt of the buffalo and all kind~ of wtld life. So roads ran from Carroll in all directions, a great advantage to the first settlers. As early as 1823, plans were laid for establishing a road from Ghent to Lexington. Then in 1833 George N. S:mders wrote to Joseph LeCompt in regard to improving the road to New Liberty and re-working the road on to Lcxington. 17 It was not until 1872 that several private road com-panies were organized to lay down the main roads through the county known as t11mpilc1:s. Toll houses were built, usually a mile or so from a town, where the tollkecp<'r lived. Herc he collected a small fee for the use of the road, usually three cents per mile for a one-horse vehicle, more for two horses or for wagons. These roads sen•ed more than one good purp<>sc. They paid thP sto<.'kholder a very accq)tablc interest on his investment, and thry were a great help to the residents of the county. In 1898 the local go\'emment began to buy the roads and make them toll free. hrt of the purchast• pn('e was paid in cash, the rest in bonds bearing 6% interest 18 By 1900, bridges had been built over Eagle Creek at Sanders, Eagle Stat10n, and Worthville All tlm~e were the oid-type covered bridge, Lut in recent years they have been replaced with concrete spans. :\fost of the dirt roads of the early dap have bePn made into modern roads, and bridge.s of sturdier constrnction have taken the place of the original wooden ones. The first bridge O\'t'r the Kentucky River b<~twecn Carrollton and Prestonville was built in 1898 At that tune a project wns in the "talking stage" of extending an intenirban :me from Covington to Lou1sville, and this bridge had ~ufficient r<' t•nforcenw11t to rarry the load Like many worth-while prnjccts, "tlic inkrurhan" only n.•ache<l the planning stage. The present hridgl', a n'ry ht•autif11l and graceful span, was Opt'UOO to traffic in 1952. As travel on Highway 42 has grown at a startling rate during the past ten years, this largl'r brillge 1s nee<le<l to care for it. The first few public sC'hools were started in Carroll County around 16.'38, as soon as the law was p.issed by the Kentucky Legislature to estab-lish pubhc schools in the state for a three-mouth term and to levy a tax of five cents pt:r hundred to pay for the c:ost of them.1'1 There had been private schools m the county, and they continued uuttl the War Between the Statt~s. wht•n public.: and private' sc.hools alike ha<l to close. In 1870, after another bill had paltsed tht: Legislature extending the term to five rnonth!i and raismg the tax to tw<'nty cents per hundred dollars, new schools were established throughout the county J J Orr w&s 1D charge •, l .-~ ... ~ • · . ...-:-:.-~..._--· • £!¥$,G+-:r:'T:--w.1 ¥1::1rrtt C +tie;...: ft A Short History of Carroll Counly 43 students. It was well known throughout northern Kentucky and southern Indiana as Ghent Collegc,2 () and at its height is said to have ranked with the college at Georgetown. Bt>sides the regular curriculum, it had a very fine music department. Some of the well-known educators who served as president of the colleg1' Wt're Professor Crowe, Professor Reubelt, and Dr. Barbee. The building was takMl over as part of the county school system around J 890, and was me<l until it hurned in January, 1941. 111 the early thirties the high school students ,,·crt' moved to Carrollton High School due to the small number in attendance. A new modem school building was dt•dicate<l on the site of the college in 1945. Four years later, a consolidatf'cl school was built in Ghent for all the Negro children m the county, except those rn Carrollton proper. The children arc furnished fn·c tra11s1x>rtation to the school. At the tum of the century, there were twenty-five rural schools.21 These have now hecn consohdatec.l into flVe: Sanders, Ghent, \Vorthville, Locust, and English. All high sl'hool children in tl1e county are sel1t to Carrollton, except the Negro studt•nts, who attend Lincoln lnstitute. The early settlers m the county were churchgoing people. Many of them had left Virginia because of religious difficulties. Some of these had entered Kentucky with the Tra\'t•ling Church in 1781. Before 1&10 the Metho<lists and naptists in the county held services together, but finall), after a day of prayer and fa!.iiu~. the Baptists decided to organi;,e thell" own church. Th<'ir first meetinghouse was built of logs near the mouth of \kC..ools Cre,•k, and a frw years later another was built near the first one for $173. This was lnown as the Port William Baptist Church, and Heverend Joshua Morris wa,; its first pastor. -rogiit years latt-r the name was changed to McCool~ Creek Church, and in a ) car or so, owing to a disagreement, part of the memht•rship withdrew and built a Baptist church at the mouth of Four \1ile Creek, some two miles closer to Carroll-ton. In 1815 Samuel Sanders gave the Baptists a tract of land across the road from the Chen~~<;~mf1e.._ry, where they built a brick church for $700. The present structure was startt-cl in 184.5 and, at a cost of $1.250, was completed the fo)k, ing year. The money was made up among the members. Tiw greatest amount was paid in cash, but various commodities, such as hn v .~heepskins, wool, and several barrels of whiskey. constitnted the rem.undPr. The church was huilt at the iower end of an apple orchard which belouged to Reverend John Sc.'Ott, a natin• of Ireland. He was pastor for many years The present Baptist Church i11 Carrollton was built in 1845. Seveial additions have been made over the years. Besides the Baptist churches ! yr- : '~ ~ • .. , ' . , A Short History of Carroll COIUlty "5 After a few years, he made the race for county judge and was elected. A Carrollton man overheard a Republican friend asking him one day how he happened to make the race on the Democratic ticket. The Judge answered: "I have found it does not pay to be a Republican in Carroll County." An interest in palitics runs deep and strong in the county. In a local paper published August 12, 1876, the following item appeared: ~Only one man was killed in Carroll County last Saturday, election day." George Washington Sanders of Sanders was quite a palitician, and it is ~id that, owing to the huge burgoo and barbecue gatherings he sponsored, he was well known over a large part of the state. In 18.56 be entertained a very large crowd, and the guest of honor was John C. Breckinridge. After the feast, the crowd gathered beneath a large elm tree for the speak-ing. James Tandy Ellis wrote a delightful poem describing this meeting, which he entitled "Whar John C. Spoke." Two very interesting palitical meetings wete held in Ghent, in the same building, a tailor shop. One of these had an important effect on the history of our nation. In November, 1843, a mt>eting was called by George N. Sanders for the purpose of considering the annexation of Texas. It was attended by thirteen men. As it was many years before their names were made known to the public, they were commonly referred to as the "Mystic Thirteen." Texas had recently become independent of Mexico. With her five million acres of cotton and countless herds of cattle, she was a most desirable acquisition to the United States. A resolution was offered and adopted by acclamation, recommending the annexation of Texas to the United States. It was also voted that letters containing the resolution be sent to each of the prospective candidates for the Presidency. There were several prominent candidates: Henry Clay, Martin Van Buren, James IC. Polk, Lewis Cass, and W. 0. Butler, a citizen of Carroll County. Polk is said to have been the only one of the prospective candidates who an-swered the letter. He favored the annexation of Texas and campaigned on that issue. Although he was little known out of his home state of Tennessee, his views in favor of the annexation helped to win him public favor and the White House. The other meeting was held on No,ember 5, 1859. George N. Sanden called a mass meeting to take measures to prepare for the conflict that he saw was gathering and to assert the principle of state rights. W. B Lindsay was appointed chairman, and the meeting was addressed by Dr. S. S. Scott, Captain Jack Leathers, and Lewis Sanders. Resolutions asserting the principles of state rights, free trade, low taxes, and hard money were adopted and published. This became known as the "New Mississippi \. l '?:!. ~ .. i"<' .. ,, ~ .. ':.. ~ .. v A Short Hlstory of Carroll County 47 There are many lovely homes in the county. Owini! to limited space, it will be impossible to mention more than a few of the oldest One of the most attractive is the home of the late Perry Gaines, overlooking tht> Ohio River. It was built by Benjamin Craig in 180.5. He was the son of the Benjamin Craig who gave the land for the Carroll County courthouse and for the Carrollton school. What is said to have been the first brick house along the river from Cincmnati to Louisville was the home of Benjamin Craig, Sr. When it was necessary to take it down some years ago, a small house was built from these same brick in the side yard of Rebel's Landing, the beautiful residence of Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Grobmyer. Among the many other interesting houses in Carrollton, two are out-standing. One was the home of General W. 0. Butler of Mexican War fame. The other, the home of the late Miss Jenn Winslow Howe, was built by Montgomery Blair around 1800. At one time it was the home of the John Van Pelt family. It was bought by Miss Howe's great-grandfather, William Winslow, in 1828 and has been in the Winslow and Howe fami-lies ever since. The Butler mansion in the park is another interesting old home. The best example of an early log house is on Grass Hills, the farm now owned by Curtis Montgomery. The house was built by Lewis Sanders between 1819 and 1821. It is two stories in height, with very large rooms. It had, when built, some fourteen rooms, besides a basement under the entire house that contained the kitchen and wine cellars. The house is still in good condition. Such are the highlights of Carroll County, its beginnings, its growth, and its pleasant prospects. Space will not permit a further discussion at this time of its story. A subject which deserves special recognition, though not explored in this paper, is th,-.t of the famous personages of Carroll County, but no history is ever complete Their treatment must await another time. ·,. t ' 

Carroll County - Short History

https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1169&amp;context=kentucky_county_histories

Carroll County - Short History

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Morehead State University