Did you know?

Middlesboro once had a brewery.  Originally the Overbeck Brewing, it was a brewery, cold storage, and ice manufacturing plant. It was later the New South Brewery before being used by the Schneider Packing Plant in Cumberland Gap. The land was then absorbed into the Cumberland Gap National Park. The building was five stories and served by railroads on both the east and west sides. It was located at the base of the Gap and was a local landmark for many years before being destroyed by fire.

Did you know?

Dominating what was then the section between North 22^nd and 24th Streets on Cumberland Avenue in Middlesboro was the Middlesborough Hotel. It is surrounded by other examples of the social living practiced by the town’s elite in the early 1890’s. At the right of the picture is the Casino. In the background between it and the hotel is the Ocoonita Club,  a social gathering place for hotel visitors. In the front left is the Middlesborough Town Company’s office, now the site of the First Baptist Church.

Bob Vaughn

Learn more about a Great Kentuckian with Bell County connections below:

 Remembering Journalist Rich Whitt

Wednesday, January 28th, 2009 by Brian Seidman

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Richard Whitt died Monday, January 26, at his home in Marietta, Georgia, of a heart attack; he was 64. Rich was the author of Behind the Hedges: Big Money and Power Politics at the University of Georgia, forthcoming from NewSouth Books.

As reported by the Associated Press, Rich received a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of a fire at the Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate, Kentucky, in 1977; his reporting led to criminal charges and changes to fire-safety laws. Rich graduated from the University of Kentucky School of Journalism and worked at the Louisville Courier-Journal and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution before retiring in 2006. He was an inductee into the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame.

In the Courier-Journal, colleague Stephen Ford called Rich “a pit bull of a reporter. Once he got hold of a good story, he wouldn’t let it go. He’ll be remembered in Kentucky journalistic history chiefly, of course, as the reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Beverly Hills Supper Club tragedy, but he went on to compile an impressive body of important work.”

In Behind the Hedges, Rich focused his investigative lens on recent events at the University of Georgia, and in so doing examined the bigger story of “a sea change in how America supports its institutions of higher education.” Through interviews with many key figures in a struggle for power at UGA over the last decade, Rich examines the controversial tenure of Michael Adams as UGA president, and how this controversy led to the unprecedented split between the Board of Regents and the UGA Foundation, with implications for the landscape of higher education funding nationwide.

Read more about Rich from the Associated Press and the Courier-Journal.

This year will be 85th year for the festival.

The festival was established as  a way of honoring Dr. Thomas Walker (a pioneer explorer) by Mrs. Annie Walker Burns, her famous ancestor.

The festival features many events including a Queen’s Coronation, during which each Queen will curtsy to the Governor of Kentucky–in turn he crowns the winning Queen.

For more information contact the KMLF office at (606) 337-6103.

Bell County, at first was known as Josh Bell for whom it was named, was established by an act of the Legislature on September 8, 1867 from portions of Knox and Harlan Counties. It was the one hundred twelfth county formed in the state of Kentucky. In 1873 the Mud Creek section was cut from Clay County and added to Josh Bell and District No. 9 was cut from Whitley County and added to Josh Bell. Some time later “Josh” was dropped from the name and it became Bell County. Josh Bell was a grandson of Thomas Walker and was not a native of the area of Kentucky which bears his name. He was born in Danville, Kentucky, November 16, 1811, and died there August 17, 1870. The first Josh Bell County fiscal court meeting was held on September 9, 1867, in the home of C.B. Brittan with Lewis F. Payne, county judge, James H. Lee, county clerk, C.B.Brittan, deputy clerk. Members of the first fiscal court were William H. Baughman, Joshua B. Cox, William M. Bingham, Herod Hendrickson, Stephen Rice, Sampson Miracle, James R. Fuson, William L. Evans and John Burns.

For this and further information check out the book, History and Families Bell County, Kentucky. A great book filled with information and families of early Bell County, Kentucky.