Kentucky Trivia & Tidbits - Page 8

Looking for Kentucky trivia? Try our list Kentucky little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

Amateur astronomer Jay McNeil of Paducah (pop. 26,307) made a rare discovery in January 2004 of a nebula, a cloud of gas and dust lit by what is believed to be a newborn star.

first appeared: 6/20/2004

John Cannon, born in 1820 in Hawesville (pop. 971), built the Robert E. Lee steamboat, which defeated the Natchez in a famous 1870 race.

first appeared: 6/13/2004

The Coldstream Research Campus of the University of Kentucky in Lexington was a former horse farm and home of Aristides, the first winner of the Kentucky Derby in 1875.

first appeared: 6/6/2004

Morganfield (pop. 3,494) was the site of Abraham Lincoln’s only political speech in his native state. Lincoln campaigned there in 1840 for presidential candidate William Henry Harrison.

first appeared: 5/30/2004

Sgt. Willie Sandlin was the only Kentuckian to win a Congressional Medal of Honor during World War I, awarded for putting three machine-gun nests out of action at Bois de Forges, France. Sandlin lived in Leslie County (pop. 12,401).

first appeared: 5/23/2004

Jane Lampton Clemens, mother of Samuel Clemens (also known as Mark Twain), was born in 1803 in Columbia (pop. 4,014).

first appeared: 5/16/2004

Founded in 1902, Hindman Settlement School in Hindman (pop. 787) was the nation’s first rural settlement school. It provided housing and meals, along with education.

first appeared: 5/9/2004

David Lloyd George, former prime minister of England, was the first registered guest at the elegant Brown Hotel in 1923 in Louisville.

first appeared: 5/2/2004

Col. George Washington Miller, who founded the 101 Ranch and Wild West Show in 1879 in Oklahoma, was born in 1841 in Crab Orchard (pop. 842).

first appeared: 4/25/2004

Daniel Boone, whose parents were English Quakers, helped blaze a trail through Cumberland Gap, a notch in the Appalachian Mountains near the juncture of Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky. He had little formal schooling but learned to read and write.

first appeared: 4/18/2004

Women were first admitted to the University of Kentucky in 1880, but only earned certificates. In 1888, Belle Gunn became the first woman to graduate with a degree.

first appeared: 4/11/2004

Columbus-Belmont State Park on the banks of the Mississippi River once was a strategic Civil War location. Confederates used a giant anchor and chain, which is on display, to block the passage of Union gunboats.

first appeared: 4/4/2004

John James Audubon ran a store and gristmill in Henderson (pop. 27,373) for several years, but went bankrupt in 1819 due to his preoccupation with painting birds.

first appeared: 3/28/2004

Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill describes itself as the largest and most completely restored Shaker community in America.

first appeared: 3/21/2004

Stephen Foster, who wrote My Old Kentucky Home, never lived in the state. He was a Pennsylvania native and lived most of his life in Pittsburgh.

first appeared: 3/14/2004

Frederick Vinson (1890-1953), who was born in Louisa (pop. 1,990), is the only chief justice of the United States known to have been born in jail. However, nothing criminal was going on; his father was the jailer.

first appeared: 3/7/2004

In 1981, a former air-conditioner factory in Bowling Green (pop. 40,641) was renovated and expanded to become the sole manufacturing facility for one of America’s favorite automobiles, the Chevrolet Corvette.

first appeared: 2/29/2004

Native son Henry Clay was known for saying, among other things, “I would rather be right than President.”

first appeared: 2/22/2004

The great racehorse of 1919-20, Man O’ War, spent most of his life in the state but never raced there. He won all of his races except one, which he lost to a horse named Upset.

first appeared: 2/15/2004

Thunder Over Louisville, the opening ceremony for the annual Kentucky Derby Festival, is said to be North America’s largest fireworks display.

first appeared: 2/8/2004

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