Berea College in Kentucky

While we were in town, we walked all over the Berea College Campus.  Here are several photos of buildings that were special to me for one reason or another.

There are a few classroom buildings, the gym, the theater....  etc.

I lived in 3 different dorms during my stay, and two of them have been forever altered.

I didn't know this until I saw the construction work going on...  but my old dorm of Danforth is gone.  It looks like they are rebuilding it, but it is now gone.  I lived here the longest, and I was the monitor and assistant head resident here at different times.  I spent a summer painting, patching holes, and cleaning suites at the dorm.

The building was two towers of six suites each, connected by a commons/lounge area in the middle.

During the summers, all the male students would move to one tower, and we would repair the suites in the other tower, and sometimes rent out suites to high school groups doing stuff on campus.  I remember one summer, I was checking a high school kid into the dorm.  His whole family was with him....  mom, dad, aunts, uncles, cousins (this is not a criticism....  my whole clan came with me my first day on campus too).  Anyway, the kids mom pulled me aside at one point and asked me if I could help the young man get a room with his own bathroom.  I didn't mean to be rude, but I started laughing.  I explained to her that such a room didn't exist.  I was the assistant head resident, and I shared a toilet and shower with about a dozen other guys.

I also had one of my few possible supernatural experiences here.  I was up very late one evening, having trouble sleeping, so I went in to an empty suite to do some cleaning.  As I worked, I thought I could here my my name, VERY audibly.  I left that suite and from then on only cleaned during the daytime.

New Purdy's Coffee Shop in Richmond KY

Hey!  We FINALLY got around to checking out the NEW 2nd location of Purdy's Coffee Shop in Richmond!

Its not exactly as cozy as the original downtown location (few coffee shops are as nice at the downtown Richmond Purdy's) but we still like it a lot!  Where the original is in a beautiful old building the newer one is, well, a bit more open and modern.  They still have all of the great menu items, and the friendly staff.

Here are some photos!

"50 States 5000 Ideas" by Joe Yogerst

"50 States 5000 Ideas" by Joe Yogerst was given to me as a gift recently and I have REALLY enjoyed it!  In fact, I have simply spent a lot of time with this book....  reading through and writing stuff down.

I started reading through and quickly realized I needed to be taking notes.  Then it hit me that I didn't need to take notes; I would have to violate one of my personal rules about books and I would have to underline and make notes right in the book!

"50 States" is organized alphabetically by state, with each of the 50 states getting a few pages of things you will want to see in each state.  I know, this has been done before, but this book has a certain completeness to it.  The author comes off as enthusiastic about EVERY state as he tells you about what you will want to see in each one.  I felt like he hit all of the main attractions, and included several other lesser known places.

Side boxes included info on state capitals, little known facts, and other bits of trivia.  I LOVED reading about art inspired by the states (songs, movies, etc.).

AND info on the Canadian Provinces is included!

As you know, I do keep a list of all of the states, noting places I hope to visit one day.  This book REALLY brought a lot of places to my attention that were not on my radar!

"Myths and Mysteries of Kentucky" by Mimi O'Malley and Susan Sawyer

I definitely wanted to give "Myths and Mysteries of Kentucky" by Mimi O'Malley and Susan Sawyer a huge thumbs up.  This book has actually been out for a few years but I just got around to reading it recently.

This is one of my more favorite books on strangeness in the state...  there have been some hits and misses but this one is very well done.  I felt that the authors covered some of the few standards in the state (the ghosts of Waverly Hills and White Hall), but they also hit some of the lesser known stories.  AND, they really went in some odd directions, at times tying Madoc and Welsh Indians to the area!

The book is easy to follow and I really enjoyed the treatment they gave to the whole issue of Daniel Boone's burial in Frankfort (this is probably the most easy to understand write up on the whole issue I have ever read).  Similarly, they did a fine job of clearly covering the John Bell Hood/Anne Mitchell story.

There is something O'Malley and Sawyer did with this book that makes it superior to other ghost/mysterious type books- they include a skeptical argument in most chapters.  They don't go overboard on this...  and this is far from a skeptical book...  but the counter point is there with the legends.  I really appreciated this.  I have read other works that have omitted this information to a huge fault.  One book I read recently covered a legend that has been thoroughly debunked....  but they left out the well known debunking.

Anyway, this one gets my highest possible recommendation.  This is a solid collection.

"Inside the Beverly Hills Supper Club Fire" by Ron Elliott

I had SOME familiarity with the Beverly Hills Supper Club fire, but not much.  It really happened before my time, but I have spent a lot of days roughly in the area where it occurred.

I was pretty excited to pick up the book, "Inside the Beverly Hills Supper Club Fire" by Ron Elliott.  Most of the volume seems to be the story of Wayne Dammert, who worked there for years before the fire AND he was there the night of the actual burning.  The fire took the lives of 167 people.

Wayne's story is interesting even before the club's most notable moment, as he rubs elbows with various celebrities and interesting characters who stop by the club.  He meets his future wife there as she works as a dancer.

Of course, the heart of the book involves hearing Wayne's first hand account of what he was doing before, during and after the club burned.

Author Ron Elliott also includes the stories of others at the end of the book.  Various Beverly Hills workers, patrons, and family members tell about their involvement, and how the fire affected them.

I am WAY late on getting around to reading this one...  It came out in the mid 90s....  But I am glad that I got around to it!

Red River Gorge Getaway Giveaway

HEY!  I just wanted to take a moment to mention a cool giveaway that I heard about recently.  Cliffview Resort in the Red River Gorge area is giving away a pretty nice 2 night getaway to the area that includes some zip-lining!

Go HERE for more details......  the 2 night lodge stay looks pretty sweet!

Cairn Coffee in Winchester KY

When we walked in to Cairn Coffee House in Winchester the other day we immediately knew we loved the place.  My wife started comparing Cairn to Purdy's in Richmond.  That's very high praise.

This is a very beautiful coffee shop in a great old building.  The shop is clean, spacious and warm.  In fact, we spent a good amount of time reading by their fireplace on a cold day before the seasons changed.

AND, it seems that I keep finding coffee shops that are drive thru, small kiosks, or only have a few seats inside.  This shop is the opposite of that.  Cairn is easily one of the most inviting places to stay and relax.

They have even opened up the store front window areas for seating, which looked cozy too, and it is just a great use of space!

I was looking at their website, and it seems they are a non-profit business ran by Calvary Christian Church.  Check out their site for more info on this, but I really like the spirit of that sort of thing.

They have some very nice items for lunch too!  We had a great strawberry chicken salad and some other items.  They do have an interesting sandwich with beer cheese on it, and they are on the Beer Cheese Trail!

Winchester, KY

I have found myself in Winchester a lot lately.  It is a very photogenic area.  Here are a few pics.

Caproni's Restaurant, Maysville, KY

We ended a very nice, long day in Maysville with dinner at Caproni's Restaurant.  Its right on the river, offering great views of the water, and of trains going by.

Caproni's is not exactly an economical place to stop, but it has some great food.  I had a very nice piece of steak, carrots, salad and bread.

We shared a piece of butterfingers cheesecake that was all that too!

Chandler's Restaurant in Maysville, KY

 We had some really nice and affordable lunches at Chandler's in Maysville as we explored the great little town!

For a beautiful sit down place, Chandler's is very reasonable.  They had some nice half sandwich and soup deals for under $10!

The staff was friendly and helpful and we had a really nice time here!

Maysville KY Dollhouse Museum

Our main goal for visiting Maysville on our recent trip was to visit the Kentucky Gateway Museum Center to see the Kathleen Savage Browning Miniatures Collection.

In fact, there is a lot more to the museum here, but we ended up spending several hours looking at the miniatures collection, and not even making it through the rest of the museum!

We have been to several other museums where impressive replicas of famous houses are (there is the other Kentucky Dollhouse Museum in Danville, and the President's Hall of Fame in Clermont Florida housing a 1/12th scale White House) so we really love this sort of thing.

I took a ton of photos.  In fact, I had a hard time narrowing down which ones to post here, but here are some that I really liked.

EVERYTHING here would be a cool piece in any other museum.  There are a couple of absolutely AMAZING things here to see that are over the top.

There is the replica Spencer House, the ancestral home of Princess Diana.  You see it pretty much at the start of the tour.

The other amazing dollhouse is the Catherine Palace.  Inside is the miniature replica of the Amber Room.  A very enthusiastic volunteer at the museum told us all about this dollhouse, and how it was used in the filming of a "Mysteries at the Museum" episode!

We were told that the 1/12th scale items were all made accurately, and are very literally replicas.

The small instruments work, small books are actually books that can be opened and read.  Gold and diamonds are used in the homes too.


This is a really amazing place and I am sure we will be back!