PAST LECTURES

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Jessica Dalton (formerly Jessica Stavros), Executive Director 

Liberty Hall Historic Site

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gbjfzJrYWQ&t=1869s

In the late 19th century, famed American artist and poet Robert Burns Wilson made Frankfort his adoptive home. During his time here, Wilson had a deep friendship with fellow artist Paul Sawyier and Mary Mason Scott, the last member of the Brown family to live in Liberty Hall. This discussion will not only focus on the connection between Wilson and Frankfort’s most famous house, but it will also highlight the art & poetry he left behind that is now a part of Liberty Hall’s permanent collection.

Jessica Stavros has been a museum professional and local historian for nearly 20 years. She received a Bachelor’s degree in History from the University of Louisville and a Master’s degree in Business Communication from Spalding University, both of which were fully funded by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation in Washington DC. She is also a graduate of the History Leadership Institute, class of 2016.

Her passion lies in 19th century Ohio Valley history, and this focus brought her to work within historic house & community museums in the Louisville area. As the Southeast Regional Director for the Indiana State Museum & Historic Sites, she directed 3 historic sites located in Southern Indiana – Culbertson Mansion in New Albany, Corydon Capitol in Corydon, and Lanier Mansion in Madison. Most recently, she served as Deputy Director of the Kentucky Historical Society in Frankfort, Kentucky.

Howard W. Cox, retired Assistant Inspector General for Investigations 

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJJKhf7A1MA

 A fresh examination of the life and crimes of the highest-ranking federal official ever tried for treason and espionage, American Traitor examines the career of the notorious Gen. James Wilkinson, whose corruption and espionage exposed the United States to grave dangers during the early years of the republic. Wilkinson is largely forgotten today, which is unfortunate because his sordid story is a cautionary tale about unscrupulous actors who would take advantage of gaps in the law, oversight, and accountability for self-dealing.

Wilkinson's military career began during the Revolutionary War and continued through the War of 1812. As he rose to the rank of commanding general of the US Army, Wilkinson betrayed virtually everyone he worked with to advance his career and finances. He was a spy for Spain, plotted to have western territories split from the United States, and accepted kickbacks from contractors. His negligence and greed also caused the largest peacetime disaster in the history of the US Army. Howard W. Cox picks apart Wilkinson's misdeeds with the eye of an experienced investigator.

American Traitor offers the most in-depth analysis of Wilkinson's court-martial trials and how he evaded efforts to hold him accountable. This astounding history of villainy in the early republic will fascinate anyone with an interest in the period as well as readers of espionage history. 

Howard W. Cox is a retired member of the Senior Intelligence Service of the Central Intelligence Agency. During his 40-year career as a federal government employee, Howard served as a cyber crimes prosecutor with the Department of Justice, and as an attorney and criminal investigator with the Department of Defense, the General Services Administration, and the US Postal Service. He also served as staff counsel to the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Prior to his civilian service, he was a trial attorney with the US Army Judge Advocate General's Corps. He is a graduate of Georgetown University Law Center and Seton Hall University. 

American Traitor: General James Wilkinson's Betrayal and Escape From Justice is his first book. 

Roda Ferarro, Director

Keeneland Library

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfGEKB1SNkU&t=21s

Keeneland Library's traveling exhibit, The Heart of the Turf: Racing's Black Pioneers, highlights the lives and careers of 80 African American horsemen and women from the mid-1800s to today. Lexington’s East End, home to the Kentucky Association track from the late 1820s through 1933, also was home to many Black horsemen and their families. By the late 1800s, four future Racing Hall of Famers lived in Lexington’s East End: jockeys Isaac Burns Murphy and Jimmy Winkfield, trainer Ansel Williamson, and trainer/owner Edward Dudley Brown. Hundreds of others bought their homes, built their businesses, and raised their families in neighborhoods around the Kentucky Association track and in surrounding counties. 

The economy of the Bluegrass and viability of the Thoroughbred industry as a whole are rooted in their skill, hard work, knowledge, and tenacity. From race track superstars to behind-the-scenes caretakers, The Heart of the Turf: Racing’s Black Pioneers showcases select stories of the countless African Americans who forged their way in Kentucky and beyond from the era of slavery to the present, making the racing industry what it is today. 

Roda Ferraro, Incoming Director of the Keeneland Library, pursued her undergraduate studies at Emory University and graduate studies at Indiana University before her years in teaching and research oversight at Vanderbilt University and the University of Kentucky. She holds a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science from the University of Kentucky.

Roda has more than twenty years of experience leading, assessing, and promoting library, museum, research, and educational services, including her work with the Keeneland Library and National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame since 2014.

Through her focus on creating responsive systems of access for researchers and racing fans around the world, Keeneland Library’s research services volume doubled during Roda’s tenure as Head Librarian. Additionally, the library’s outreach programs tripled their reach under her management, while her focus on digitizing collections grew the library’s digital assets by more than 500 percent in six years.

Roda’s industry educational initiatives include launching research fundamentals workshops for university equine students, curating Keeneland Library’s physical and virtual exhibits, expanding the Keeneland Library Lecture Series, and piloting the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame’s fifth and final season of Foal Patrol to an unprecedented global reach of four million users in 2022.

Roda returned to Keeneland Library in fall 2022 to curate the library’s newest exhibit, The Heart of the Turf: Racing’s Black Pioneers, and its associated educational programs and materials. The exhibit’s programs for youth and adults have reached record-breaking audiences for the library, and Roda will continue to work with industry and community partners to provide educational programs and travel the exhibit across the country after it closes at Keeneland Library on December 8, 2023.

Roda’s service work in the community includes her roles on the Board of Directors for the Lexington Public Library Foundation and the Lexington History Museum, refugee and immigrant health and social services task forces, school-based decision making councils, and providing best practices consultation for international libraries and museums. 

Richard Lawrence Taylor, Ph.D., Author 

The Great Crossing: A Historic Journey to Buffalo Trace Distillery (2002)

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXKLfeJAP4o

Bourbon enthusiasts worldwide are familiar with Col. E. H. Taylor, Jr. for his reputation as the founding father of the modern bourbon industry. However, the Taylor family's influence on Frankfort can trace its roots back to the earliest pioneer days of Kentucky. This presentation will discuss the lives, influence, and legacies of select early members of this prominent Kentucky family, including surveyor Hancock Taylor, Commodore Richard Taylor, Reuben Taylor, half-brothers "Black Dick" and "Hopping Dick" Taylor, and their relation to the founders of Leestown for whom the town was named.

Dr. Richard Lawrence Taylor is the author of numerous collections of poetry, two historical novels, and several books relating to Kentucky history, including Elkhorn: Evolution of a Kentucky Landscape (2018). A former Kentucky Poet Laureate, he has received two creative writing fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as an Al Smith Award from the Kentucky Arts Council. Educated at the University of Kentucky (bachelors and Ph.D. in English), he also holds a masters degree (English) and a J.D. from the University of Louisville. Practicing law for a few months, he gave up legal practice, a leave-taking he regards as his gift to the Commonwealth of Kentucky. During graduate school he taught in high schools across Kentucky with the Poetry-in-the-Schools Program through the Kentucky Arts Council, editing an anthology of student writing called Cloud Bumping. 

Embarking on a career in education, he taught at Kentucky State University in Frankfort until retiring in 2008. During that time he taught in the Governor's School for the Arts as well as serving as director of the Governor's Scholars Program on two campuses. He also spent a year in Denmark as a scholar-teacher in the Fulbright Program, also teaching a graduate course at Kangwon University in South Korea as well as short periods teaching abroad in England and Ireland in a studies-abroad program. He has received publication awards from the Kentucky Historical Society and the Thomas D. Clark Medallion for his Elkhorn book as well as receiving a Distinguished Professor Award at KSU. Recently retired after fourteen years from Transylvania University as Keenan Visiting Writer, he is co-owner of Poor Richard's Books and lives on a small farm outside Frankfort, Kentucky. 

Mack Cox, researcher and collector of early Kentucky-made furniture 

“The Kentucky Collection of Sharon and Mack Cox”

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCjeE-wD_e8&t=38s

The first of two short lectures will explore early Frankfort furniture dating from about 1795 to 1820. The second documents decorative inlay in early Kentucky furniture from the same period. The first will be developed for this presentation and the latter was developed for a conference organized by Winterthur Museum in Delaware and the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Art titled “The Wonder of Wood: Decorative Inlay and Marquetry in Europe and America, 1600-1900” that occurred in April of 2022. Both will be fast-paced, graphics-rich introductions to Kentucky furniture made before the steamboat era when the Commonwealth was commercially isolated from the east coast by a vast wilderness and was part of the early American West.

Mack Cox is a researcher and collector of early Kentucky-made furniture. A Kentucky native, Mack received BS and MS degrees in geology from Eastern Kentucky University and pursued an oil and gas career from which he retired in 2017. He and his wife Sharon began collecting early Kentucky material about 2005, and their collection was covered in the July/August 2011 issue of The Magazine ANTIQUES (“The Kentucky Collection of Sharon and Mack Cox” by Daniel Kurt Ackermann). In 2013, their collection covered 34 pages, and was described as “one of the finest assemblages of antebellum Kentucky material” in the book Collecting Kentucky 1790-1860 by Lacer & Howard.

Mack currently serves on the executive committee and board of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation. He also serves on advisory boards for the Colonial Williamsburg Art Museums in Virginia, the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts (MESDA) in North Carolina, and The Magazine ANTIQUES in New York City. He, along with his wife, Sharon are regional representatives for MESDA’s Object Database and have submitted over 100 surveys of Kentucky material. He has lectured at numerous Kentucky locations and for the Decorative Arts Trust in Philadelphia, the Washington, D.C. Decorative Arts Forum, Winterthur Museum (Delaware) and the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts, the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, Colonial Williamsburg, and Historic Deerfield in Massachusetts.

Kentucky furniture is not well documented and the connections to Kentucky are being lost at an alarming rate. Mack’s primary mission in retirement is to discover and document Kentucky furniture groups to guide future studies and he is considered a leading authority on Kentucky furniture. 

Christopher T. Hall, archaeologist and researcher

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22GB5qIn32U

Audiences are in for a treat, as they sit back and listen to a candid discussion about the discipline of archaeology and what it tells us about our own history. Drawing on more than 20 years of experience conducting archaeological research, Chris explains the goals of archaeology and then interactively walks the audience through the process by which archaeological sites are created, taking time to point out the discipline’s weaknesses and difficulties archaeologists have interpreting what they find. He then turns the spotlight on archaeology’s strengths and discusses what those strengths have allowed us to learn about human’s seven-million-year history that no other discipline can begin to explain. 

Christopher T. Hall is a Kentucky native whose fascination with prehistory took him out West at an early age. He began by volunteering on any archaeological project that would take him, but his increasing interest in prehistoric peoples whose survival depended on their ability to hunt animals and gather plants eventually led him to focus on the High Plains and Rocky Mountains of Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado, where Native peoples continued their hunting-gathering lifestyle well after European contact. 

Chris is primarily interested in understanding the factors that drive technological change among these societies, and his case study for this endeavor is the first appearance of bow-and-arrow technology on the High Plains around 100 A.D. 

Chris holds a B.A. and M.A. in anthropology from the University of Louisville and University of Wyoming, respectively. He has also completed the coursework for a Ph.D., A.B.D. and taught lower- and upper-levels of anthropology courses at Washington State University. Having previously worked as a staff archaeologist for Cultural Resources Analysts, Inc., Chris now works as a non-partisan analyst for Kentucky government, but is still actively involved in archaeology and will be participating in the excavation of a 13,000-year-old Mammoth kill site in Wyoming this summer. 

William “Drew” M. Andrews, Ph.D., P.G., Acting Director and State Geologist

Kentucky Geological Survey, University of Kentucky

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ3xnljM4bI

The rocks under our landscape play a critical role in defining the shape and the characteristics of the land we live on. Landforms, streams, resources, and natural hazards are all related to the geology of an area. This presentation will explore the ancient geologic environments and processes responsible for the rocks and landforms around Frankfort, and discuss how rocks are important to our history, transportation, recreation, and economy.

Dr. Drew Andrews is the Acting Director of the Kentucky Geological Survey (KGS), where he has worked since 1996. Most recently, he was the Head of the Geologic Mapping Section of KGS. With expertise in geographic information systems (GIS), geomorphology, and geologic mapping, Drew is also an adjunct assistant professor of geology at the University of Kentucky's Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences.

A life-long Kentuckian born in Frankfort, Drew received his Ph.D. in Geological Sciences from the University of Kentucky, is a member of the Geological Society of America and the Kentucky Society of Professional Geologists, and is licensed as a professional geologist in Kentucky. 

Tressa Brown, Historic Preservation Coordinator

Kentucky Native American Heritage Commission, Kentucky Heritage Council

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZLV4fOigpc&t=19s

American Indian communities have been in Kentucky for more than 11,000 years. When Euro-Americans settled here, Shawnee, Cherokee, and Chickasaw, among others, already lived here. Myths and misconceptions about American Indian people permeate many sources of information. We all dispel some of the myths about native people that persist, discuss Kentucky's native heritage, and briefly review its long history.

Tressa Brown received her B.A. in Biology and Anthropology at Transylvania University and her M.A. in Anthropology and Museum Studies from Arizona State University. She is currently the coordinator for the Kentucky Native American Heritage Commission, the Kentucky African American Heritage Commission, and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Commission. She has worked for the past 25 years providing Native American educational programming for schools and the public.

Her primary focus has been to identify the stereotypes and myths about Native Americans in general and Kentucky's Native people in particular. Her position at KHC is to provide accurate information to educators and the public about Kentucky's American Indian history, the diversity of Native cultures, as well as the issues affecting Native people in contemporary society. 

Robbie D. Jones, Project Manager & Principal Senior Architectural Historian 

Sydney Schoof, Senior Architectural Historian 

Richard Grubb & Associates 

Carolyn Brackett, Senior Historian 

Cultural Heritage Works 

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MZv4QyHf1k&list=PLyjxvR9XE_A61l24N17uLkzLtwJdmXctC&index=9

In 2023, the City of Frankfort received a Certified Local Government grant from the Kentucky Heritage Council to complete a National Register nomination for the Green Hill Cemetery.  The consultant chosen to carry out the project was Richard Grubb & Associates in Nashville, TN, using the same team that completed the earlier African American Historic Context Report for the City of Frankfort, Kentucky in 2022.  The cemetery was designated as eligible for the National Register as part of that earlier project. 

The Green Hill Cemetery has long been important to Frankfort's community.  It was established as an interracial pauper's cemetery in 1865 and evolved to become a principal component of Frankfort’s Black community by the turn-of-the-twentieth century. As the predominantly Black community of Green Hill grew up around the cemetery, it became a cultural focal point in Green Hill, along with a nearby school and church. In 1924, the Colored Soldiers Monument was erected at the cemetery. This is the only monument in Kentucky dedicated to the U.S. Colored Troops who fought for the Union Army in the Civil War. It is also the burial place of many of those soldiers and continued to be the gathering place of Black citizens for events such as Decoration and Memorial Day celebrations. The cemetery was used for pauper burials even after the city divested itself of the cemetery and its maintenance in 1957. At that time, the Black community formed a nonprofit organization to take over ownership and maintenance of the cemetery. This combination of uses is an unusual representation of the intersection of class and race in Frankfort, Kentucky. The cemetery and its associated monuments and support structures retain a high degree of integrity from the period of significance (1865–1974). 

NOTE: This project was funded in part with Federal funds from the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, and administered by the Kentucky Heritage Council. The contents and opinions do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Department of the Interior, nor does the mention of trade names or commercial products constitute endorsement or recommendation by the Department of the Interior. The U.S. Department of the Interior prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability or age. Any person who believes that he or she has been discriminated against should contact the Office of Equal Opportunity, National Park Service, 1849 C Street NW, Washington, DC 20240. 

Richard Grubb & Associates (RGA) is a woman-owned small business founded in 1988 as a full-service cultural resource management firm. RGA is headquartered in Cranbury, New Jersey, and maintains regional offices in Philadelphia, Raleigh, and Nashville. RGA and its architectural historians have completed over 7,500 projects throughout the U.S., including 80 National Register of Historic Places and National Historic Landmark nominations.  

In 2022, RGA assisted Cultural Heritage Works (CHW), a consulting firm based in Nashville, with the completion of the “African American Historic Context Report” for the City of Frankfort. Prepared by Carolyn Brackett of CHW and Robbie D. Jones of RGA, this report recommended the Green Hill Cemetery as eligible for listing in the National Register. In 2023, the City of Frankfort retained RGA to prepare a National Register nomination for the Green Hill Cemetery. The team that prepared the nomination included: 

Robbie D. Jones served as the Principal Senior Architectural Historian and Project Manager for this project. With over 32 years of experience, Mr. Jones holds a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and an M.A. in Public History and Historic Preservation from Middle Tennessee State University. He manages the RGA Tennessee Branch Office in Nashville, which currently has six full-time staff members. Mr. Jones has worked on projects in 21 states for local, state, and federal agencies, as well as private clients. He documented over 110 resources for the Nashville Civil Rights Movement Documentation Project and coauthored the National Register Multiple Property Documentation Form. Additionally, he has prepared numerous publications and is a former president of the Southeast Chapter of the Society of Architectural Historians. 

Sydney Schoof served as a Senior Architectural Historian for this project. Based in RGA’s Nashville office, Ms. Schoof holds a B.S. in the History of Art and Architecture and an M.S in Historic Preservation, both from Roger Williams University in Rhode Island. With 12 years of experience, she has worked on projects in 13 states, including Kentucky. She is coauthor of the National Register nomination for the Clark United Methodist Church Complex, an important African American landmark in Nashville associated with the Civil Rights Movement. Ms. Schoof documented over 4,000 resources in Indiana and Rhode Island as part of local and state surveys. 

Carolyn Brackett served as a Senior Historian for this project. Ms. Brackett is principal of Cultural Heritage Works and joined the RGA team for this project. She holds a B.S. in Historic Preservation from Middle Tennessee State University. Ms. Brackett has over 30 years of experience in documenting resource histories, preservation plans, heritage development, interpretation, and marketing. She was a Senior Field Officer for 17 years with the National Trust for Historic Preservation as part of the Heritage Tourism and National Treasures programs. With experience in 29 states, she has worked on numerous project that focus on African American heritage and preservation. Ms. Brackett coauthored the National Register Multiple Property Documentation Form for Nashville’s Civil Rights Movement. 

Gwynn Henderson, Ph.D., Director of Education

Kentucky Archaeological Survey, Western Kentucky University

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSrydY63ImY&t=4510s

After laying to rest the myths that continue to circulate about Kentucky’s ancient Native Peoples, this presentation will discuss Native history prior to the arrival of non-Native people, paying particular attention to information collected from Franklin County’s archaeological sites. Aspects of Native American lifeways that will be considered include subsistence and technology, exchange, and domestic and ritual activities, and how they changed through time. Frankfort County’s Native history is the story of adaptive, resilient, and creative peoples whose descendants still live among us in our state.

Dr. Gwynn Henderson, a native of southern Delaware, has been interested in old things, dinosaurs, and in being an archaeologist since she was young. She received her B.A. (1975) in Anthropology from the University of Delaware, and her M.A. (1982) and Ph.D. (1998) in Anthropology from the University of Kentucky (UK). She is the Education Director for the Kentucky Archaeological Survey, a program of Western Kentucky University's Department of Folk Studies and Anthropology.

An archaeologist who researches ancient Native people, Gwynn has carried out field research in Kentucky, the Ohio Valley, Tennessee, and Mexico. She is interested in researching the lifeways of Indigenous farming cultures of the Ohio Valley and the history of mid-18th century Native groups in that region. She has written, presented, and published many professional reports and papers describing the results of her research, and with David Pollack, directed the University of Kentucky undergraduate field school in archaeology for four years. With David Pollack, she received the Ida Lee Willis Memorial Award in 2014 for lifetime achievement in research, education, and preservation. She is a member of the Kentucky Native American Heritage Commission.

As an archaeology educator and public archaeologist, she works with archaeologists, teachers, and museum educators to develop content, lessons, booklets, video programs, radio spots, exhibits, and workshops that make information about Kentucky’s rich archaeological heritage accessible to a wide audience. She and colleagues have researched the effectiveness of Kentucky public archaeology programs and published on how archaeology can best be used to help school children learn about the past. In 2023, she received the Society for American Archaeology’s Distinguished Achievement in Public Archaeology award. She is a member of the Living Archaeology Weekend Steering Committee, and serves as a facilitator for Project Archaeology, the Kentucky Master Naturalist program, and PrimeTime Family Reading.

Gwynn earned diplomas in writing for children from the Institute of Children’s Literature in 2009 and 2020. Her book for adult literacy students, Kentuckians Before Boone, has been used in Kentucky’s elementary school classrooms. A freelance writer of children’s nonfiction, her articles have been published in dig Magazine, Dig Into History, ASK, Cobblestone, Kentucky Humanities for Kids, and with Schoolwide, Inc. 

Daniel J. Phelps, Founder and President

Kentucky Paleontological Society

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2sfqhPodQQ

This presentation will be an overview of the various types of fossils found in Kentucky, discussing specimens from the Late Ordovician (450 million years ago) to the Pleistocene (ending about 12,000 years ago). There will be numerous fossil specimens on display before and after the talk. The public is encouraged to bring in local fossils for identification.

Daniel J. Phelps is a native of Lexington and a retired environmental geologist with degrees from the University of Kentucky. Besides his environmental work, he has been employed as a petroleum and coal geologist. Additionally, Dan has taught part-time in Kentucky’s Community College system. 

In 2021, the Paleontological Society – the world’s leading scientific organization devoted to studying invertebrate and vertebrate paleontology, micropaleontology, and paleobotany – awarded Phelps the prestigious Strimple Award, which recognizes outstanding achievement in paleontology by someone who does not make a full-time living from paleontology. In 2017, the National Center for Science Education awarded Phelps the Friend of Darwin Award, conferred annually to those whose outstanding contributions support the goals of NCSE. Phelps is founder and president of the Kentucky Paleontological Society.

Freddie Johnson, Distillery VIP Visitor Lead

Buffalo Trace Distillery

WATCH HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6a5dQ8gg338

Freddie Johnson shares the life history of a young boy growing up in an environment surrounded by legends in the world of bourbon. Join us as he creates a narrative allowing you to enjoy this journey while Leaving Footprints In Bourbon History!

Freddie Johnson  is a third generation employee at Buffalo Trace Distillery and serves as its Distillery VIP Visitor Lead.  Born in Paris, KY (Bourbon County), he spent some of his early childhood summers in the mountains of Breathitt County with his maternal grandfather who was a coal miner and friend to the moonshiners.  The family moved to Frankfort, KY when he was five.  Freddie enjoyed hunting, fishing and hanging out with his paternal grandfather, Jimmy Johnson Sr., and father, Jimmy Johnson Jr., at what is now known as Buffalo Trace Distillery.

Freddie was in the middle of a successful career as a network/operations engineer in Atlanta, GA when he put all of it aside to fulfill a promise made to his father, Jimmy, more than 20 years earlier.  He had promised his father that he would work at the Distillery during his lifetime so they could say they had three generations of the Johnson family that worked at Buffalo Trace.  Freddie took early retirement and moved back to care for his father and brother.  Jimmy got him a job as a tour guide at the Distillery in 2002 but Freddie has been in and around the Distillery since he was five years old.

Freddie weaves together his childhood memories with the Distillery’s rich history as his entertains thousands each year in various tours around Buffalo Trace.  One of the Distillery’s most popular and highly sought after tour guides, Freddie is the recipient of the 2015 ROSE (Recognition of Service Excellence) Award, the 2017 Lexington (Ky) Hospitality Award and was inducted into the Kentucky Bourbon Hall of Fame in 2018.

James M. Prichard, author and retired archivist

Embattled Capital: Frankfort During the Civil War (2014) 

WATCH HERE: 

Frankfort occupies a unique place in the annals of the Civil War. In 1862 it became the only loyal state capital to be occupied by Confederate forces during the war. In 1864 the capital was attacked by elements of Morgan's raiders in a sharp action in which Governor Thomas E. Bramlette and other state officials took an active part. This talk will cover the major events and colorful episodes that occurred in Frankfort during the great conflict.

James M. Prichard is a historian and public speaker who resides in Louisville. He received his B.A. and M.A. in History at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. Following his tenure as Research Room Supervisor at the Kentucky Department of Libraries and Archives (1985-2008) he worked in the Special Collections Department at the Filson Historical Society in Louisville from 2013 to 2022. In addition to writing the Frankfort Heritage Press book Embattled Capital: Frankfort During the Civil War (2014), he has contributed essays to the following scholarly works: Virginia at War: 1863, Confederate Generals in the Western Theater volumes 2 and 4, Kentuckians in Gray, Kentucky Encyclopedia, The Encyclopedia of Louisville, Biographical Dictionary of the Union, Heidler’s Encyclopedia of the American Civil War, The World Encyclopedia of Slaver, and Confederate Generals in the Western Theater, as well as Civil War Times, North and South, and True West magazines. 

James M. Prichard, author and retired archivist

Embattled Capital: Frankfort During the Civil War (2014) 

WATCH HERE: 

Sylvia Sousa Coffey, president

Kentucky Women's History Alliance 

One of the most dramatic but little-known episodes in our state history – a seventy-year battle fought nationwide and in every state, finally won with nary a shot fired. Come and enjoy learning about the strong, determined Kentucky women who did their part to attain the vote for one-half the population.

Sylvia Coffey is the co-founder of the Kentucky Women’s History Alliance – the nation’s first state chapter affiliate of the National Women’s History Alliance, the founder of the Woman Suffrage Centennial Celebration and co-founder of the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Chorus with Nancy Atcher. A folk/dance teacher originally, Sylvia also worked for Kentucky State Government for nearly twenty years, played stand-up bass with a band that played Celtic and Anglo-American tunes regionally, and has participated in the development of two week-long dance schools, the Capital City Historical Dancers and Musicians, The Pridefull Ball (Without Prejudice), and the local dance troupe – The Glitterbugs.