Lexington’s African American Heritage Walking Tour
Join us for an on-demand walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s African American heritage sites.
Join us for an on-demand walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s African American heritage sites.
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Join us for a walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s historic sites. The full tour is available as a single MP3, or you can download individual tracks. For the single MP3, music will play between the stops. You can pause the track while you walk between stops.
This tour covers a walking distance of 1.1 miles.
The music clips used in this tour are from “Walking Barefoot on Grass” by Kai Engel, and are used with a CCBY license. It is available here: http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Kai_Engel/
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Wonderful podcasts and walking tours have been created by our staff. Please enjoy!
The Kentucky Gazette was the first paper established west of the Allegheny Mountains, founded by John and Fielding Bradford. The frontier paper focused on East Coast and International news, though some local announcements can be found. Later, the paper focused on disseminating opinions on politics and issues of concern on the frontier. When political parties emerged, the paper developed a Democratic (conservative at the time) bent. John Bradford handed the reins of the paper over to his son, Daniel Bradford, in 1802.
While still owned and occasionally edited by the Bradford family, the paper had several editors and publishers through the mid-1830s, when Daniel Bradford returned to the paper’s byline as editor. Daniel Bradford edited the paper until 1840, when he sold it to Jim Cunningham. The paper shuttered in 1848, due to Cunningham’s failing health, but was revived in 1866 and published until 1910 by different publishers.
The years 1841-1910 are not digitized as of January 2020, but are viewable on microfilm and in print in the Kentucky Room at Central Library. Selected articles are indexed in the Library’s Local History Index.
These tours are guided audio walking tours with a variety of topics focused on Downtown Lexington, KY. Music will play in between each stop, and the listener can pause the track while walking between stops.
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Join us for a walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s African American Heritage Sites. The full tour is available as a single MP3, or you can download individual tracks. For the single MP3, music will play between the stops. You can pause the track while you walk between stops.
This tour covers a walking distance of 1.7 miles.
The music clips used in this tour are from “Walking Barefoot on Grass” by Kai Engel, and are used with a CCBY license. It is available here: http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Kai_Engel/
Yajaira Aich West is a Vice President at PNC Bank and serves as the Director of Client and Community Relations for central and southeast Kentucky. In this role she manages the philanthropic investments in the thirteen counties where PNC has a presence, coordinates the client events produced by the bank and leads employee initiatives around health and wellness. Yajaira graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from Transylvania University in 2004 and earned a Master of Business Administration from the University of Kentucky's Gatton College of Business and Economics in 2011. Yajaira is an active member of the community via volunteerism and board service. She is currently is a Lexington Public Library Trustee, an Executive Committee member of the board of directors for the Urban League of Lexington-Fayette County and LexArts, on the Policy Council for Bluegrass Community Action Partnership, the Kentucky Chamber Foundation’s Leadership Institute for School Principals advisory committee and the Fayette County Public School's First 5 Lex Committee. She is a graduate of the Commerce Lexington’s Leadership Lexington and Leadership Central Kentucky and the Leadership Kentucky programs.
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The United States Army Armor School began in 1940 as the Armored Force School and Replacement Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. It spent a few years post World War II as inactive, until the 3rd Armored Division was reactivated in 1947, and became the US Army Training Center, Armor (USATCA), in 1956. Both Army and Marines soldiers received training on a variety of subjects and equipment.
Fort Knox hosted the school until it moved to Fort Benning, Georgia, in 2010, as the US Army Armor School. The yearbooks in the collection contain the names and photographs of the officers, NCOs, and graduates of the 8 week basic combat training at Fort Knox. There are also many photographs of the various buildings, training, and activities.
The Daily Lexington Atlas ran from December 11, 1847 through November 20, 1848 and was Lexington’s first daily paper, and the first to publish information from the telegraph lines. It was supportive of the Whig Party, which counted Henry Clay among its members. The Daily Lexington Atlas is described by William Perrin in his 1882 History of Fayette County Kentucky as a “red-hot Whig and fiery southern” publication.
Though short-lived, the paper covered many significant events including: the final year of the Mexican-American War, The Irish Rising of 1848, the debate surrounding emancipation of enslaved Kentuckians, the 1848 presidential election and the local election for Kentucky Governor. It also includes a few marriage and death notices from Lexington and surrounding counties. There are occasional notices of outbreaks of disease in other parts of the country, most commonly dysentery, which they called a “mysterious new disease.” They note an outbreak of cholera in Europe in October 1848; Lexington would see a second outbreak of cholera in 1849.
Perrin claims the paper had an extensive subscriber list, but had to “give up the ghost after several months disastrous experience” due to the expense of the paper. After his wife’s death on September 27, J.B. Cochran put his shares of the paper up for sale, and beginning in October, notices appear asking subscribers to pay on time.
This collection was digitized from microfilm by the University of Kentucky for Lexington Public Library. Toward the end of the run of the paper, there is significant bleed through on the pages, and in some cases the OCR (optical character recognition) quality is poor.
While the paper was considered a daily paper, it did not publish on Sundays. The library’s collection covers December 11, 1847 (first issue) through November 20, 1848, the final issue with J. B. Cochran as editor and proprietor. The paper continued through sometime in 1849 with N. L. Finnell as sole editor.
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The Kentucky Progress Commission was formed in 1928 in order to draw tourism and business to Kentucky. It was formed by the Kentucky Legislature, and was a 12 person board. The “Kentucky Progress Magazine” was used by the board to promote Kentucky, and features local interest stories, photographs of people, places, and activities. It also features ads placed by various cities around the state.
Some issues contain material that is under copyright, but qualifies for display by libraries under Section 108(h) of US Copyright Law. It is the user's responsibility to determine the copyright status of the material they want to use. If a section is hidden, please contact us to view it.
Fayette County, Kentucky, has changed enormously since it was created in 1792. This collection contains government documents for the city of Lexington, for Fayette County, and for the merged Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, as well as funeral notices, club directories, scrapbooks, image collections and a history of Lexington Public Library.
Join us for Kentucky Legends: a series of programs exploring Kentucky culture, history, and lore. Programs include author visits, Chautauqua performances, live music, activities and crafts, and more.
Discover unique resources in our Digital Archives that tell the story of Fayette County. Visit cemeteries throughout Central Kentucky using our cemetery maps. Contact our resident experts in the Central Library's Kentucky Room with questions.
Have a question? Ask us! You can contact us via email, phone, chat, or text. Book a librarian for one-on-one help. Suggest a purchase to help us improve our collection.
The Kentucky Images collection contains postcards, photographs and slides of people, architecture, and locations in Kentucky and Appalachia.
Craig Cammack is a graduate of Hanover College, where he studied political science and social movements. He has been a vocal advocate for legislation promoting equality and fairness. Craig was Chairman of Lexington Fairness in 2010, 2011, and 2012. While Craig served on the board, Lexington Fairness grew dramatically with a focus on outreach to Ally support groups, organizations and businesses.
Craig is a recipient of the Michael Thompson Community Service Award, Henry Faulkner Community Service Award, Jose Julio Sarria Equality Award, Ernesto Scorsone Political Leadership Award and induction into the Fairness Hall of Fame from Lexington Fairness.
He and his husband, Joseph, served as state foster parents, beginning in 2012, and adopted their two sons, Gabriel and Conner in 2014. Craig served as Legislative Aide to Councilmember Susan Lamb and is currently Community Outreach Liaison and Deputy Director of Communications in the office of Mayor Linda Gorton. He is the city government’s point person for LGBTQ initiatives, veterans affairs, school outreach, and neighborhood associations.
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