Collins historical sketches of Kentucky. History of Kentucky: Vol. II, Part 26

Author: Collins, Lewis, 1797-1870. cn; Collins, Richard H., 1824-1889. cn
Publication date: 1874
Publisher: Covington, Ky., Collins & Co.
Number of Pages: 1654

USA > Kentucky > Collins historical sketches of Kentucky. History of Kentucky: Vol. II > Part 26

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Lexington, the county seat, is a remarkably neat and beautiful city, situated on the Town fork of Elkhorn creek, 25 miles s. E. of Frankfort, 64 miles s. w. of Maysville, 77 miles s. E. of Louis- ville, 85 miles s. of Cincinnati, 18 miles from Paris, and 517 from Washington city. Its streets are laid out at right angles, and are well paved. Few towns are so delightfully situated. Many of the private residences, and several of the public edifices, are fine specimens of architectural tastes. It contains, in the line which once gave it the familiar name of the " Athens of the West," a public library (established 1795) ; Kentucky (formerly Transylvania) University, with its College of Arts, College of the Bible, Law College, and Agricultural and Mechanical College ; with 5 literary societies, and a monthly magazine, The Collegian; 20 schools, public and private ; 18 churches and 26 clergymen ; 5 printing offices, publishing 8 newspapers, and with 14 editors ;

170

FAYETTE COUNTY.

46 lawyers ; 29 physicians ; 4 bookstores and 1 book bindery ; 4 architects, 1 sculptor, 2 portrait painters and 3 photograph gal- leries ; while one large element of that ancient glory was con- sumed in the fire that destroyed the Transylvania Medical Hall. In the mercantile line of trading, buying, and selling, it has stores as follows : S banks or banking houses ; 22 dry goods, 10 drug, 119 grocery, 16 millinery, 15 confectionary, 21 boot and shoe, 10 clothing, 5 furniture, 5 hardware, 4 agricultural imple- ment, 7 jewelry, besides 8 merchant tailor, S sewing-machine, 15 dress-making ; 10 coal yards, 4 lumber yards, etc. Of factories, large and small-1 woolen, 4 flour, and 4 planing mills ; 1 foundry and 2 machine shops; 1 agricultural implement, 9 car- riage, 4 wagon, 5 hemp and bagging, 1 mustard, 1 soap and candle, 2 broom, 2 pump, 4 mattress, and several other factories. It has 10 hotels, 8 restaurants, 37 drinking saloons, and any reasonable number of boarding-houses. Besides these, are more than a hundred other business houses, mechanics' shops, or offices or stores of some kind. The city is lighted with gas, and has 4 public halls and a theatre.

Athens is a small village, 10 miles s. E. of Lexington, on the Boonesborough road, and in sight of Boone's station, surrounded by a rich and fertile country, with an intelligent, industrious and moral community ; population about 300.

STATISTICS OF FAYETTE COUNTY.

When formed. See page 26 Hemp, hay, corn, wheat ...... pages 266, 268

Population, from 1790 to 1870 .. p. 258

Horses, mules, cattle, hogs. .page 268

whites and colored. .p. 260 Taxable property, in 1846 and 1870 ... p. 270

towns .p. 262 Land-No. of acres, and value of .... p. 270

white males over 21 .. .p. 266 Latitude and longitude .. .... p. 257

children bet. 6 and 20 yrs. p. 266

Distinguished citizens. .see Index.

MEMBERS OF THE LEGISLATURE FROM FAYETTE COUNTY.

Senate .- Robert Todd and Peyton Short, 1792-96: James Campbell, 1796-1800; Jas. Trotter, 1800-05 ; Edmund_Bullock, 1805-17 ; Wm. T. Barry, 1817-21 ; Matthews Flournoy, 1821-25 ; Robert Wickliffe, 1825-33 ; Richard H. Chinn, 1833-37 ; Aaron K. Woolley, 1835-41 ; Wm. Rodes, 1841-45 ; Robert S. Todd, 1845-49 ; Oliver Ander- son, 1849 ; Elihu Hogan, 1850 ; Wm. A. Dudley, 1865-69.

House of Representatives .- Col. Robert Patterson, 1792, '98 ; Col. Wm. Russell, 1792, '96-1800, '02-07, '23; John Hawkins, Thos. Lewis, Hubbard Taylor, 1792 ; Jas. Trot- ter, 1792, 1822 ; Jos. Crockett, 1792-95 ; Jas. McMillan, 1792; John McDowell, 1792, '94-98 ; David Walker, 1793-96 ; Jas. Hughes, 1793-96, 1801-03 ; Edmund Bullock, 1793-98 ; John South, 1793-1804, 1799 ; Thos. January, Robert Frier, Reuben Searcy, 1793 ; John Parker, 1795-98, 1800, '08, '16-17, '19; Walter Carr, 1796, '98-99 ; John Bradford, 1797, 1802; Thos. Caldwell, 1797-98; Jas. Morrison, 1797; C. Beatty, J. H. Stewart, -. McGregor, 1799 : John Breckinridge, Hezekiah Harrison, 1798-1800 ; John Bell, 1799, 1801; Benj. Graves, 1801, '04; Benj. Howard, 1801-02; Jas. True, 1803, '15-16, '23-26; Henry Clay, 1803-09; Gwyn R. Tompkins, 1805, 33-34; John Pope, 1806-07 ; James Fishback, 1808: Win. T. Barry, 1809, '14, '17 ; Alfred Wm. Grayson, 1809; Geo. Trotter, 1809, '11; David Todd, 1810-13 ; John H. Morton, 1810 ; Jos. H. Hawkins, 1810-13; Jesse Bledsoe, 1812; Robert Russell, 1813 ; Henry Payne, 1814-15, '19-20 ; Thos. T. Crittenden, 1814, '18; Levi L. Todd, 1815 ; Jos. Cabell Breckinridge, 1816-18; Thos. T. Barr, 1817; Robert Wickliffe, 1819, '23-24; Percival Butler, 1820 ; Geo. Shannon, 1820, '22 ; Jas. E. Davis; 1821 ; John R. Wither- spoon, 1821-22 ; Matthews Flournoy, 1821, '26 ; Henry C. Payne, 1824-25 ; Robert J. Breckinridge, 1825-28 ; Leslie Combs, 1827-29. '33, '45-47, '57-59 : Jas. True, Jr., 1827-30; Edward J. Wilson, 1829-30 ; John Curd, 1830, '35, '40 ; Henry E. Innis, 1831-32; Chas. Carr, Richard H. Chinn, 1831 ; Aaron K. Woolley, 1832. '34; John R. Dunlap, 1832-34 : Jacob Hughes, 1835, '39; Robert Wickliffe, Jr., 1835-37, '41; Henry Daniel, 1836 ; Wm. Rodes, 1836-38 ; Henry Clay, Jr., 1837-38; Larkin B. Smith, 1833; Richard Pindell, James G. Mckinney, 1839; Cassius M. Clay, Clayton

171

FAYETTE COUNTY.

Curle, 1840; Neal MeCann, 1841; Robert S. Todd, 1841-42, '44; Edward A. Dudley, Owen D. Winn, 1842 ; Thos S. Redd, Elihu Hogan, Clifton R. Thomson, 1843 ; Thos. A. Russell, 1844 ; George W. Darnaby, 1845; Richard Spurr, 1846 ; Dr. Richard J. Spurr, 1848, '55-57, '63-65 ; Dr. Douglass L. Price, 1847, '69-71 ; Geo. Robertson, 1848, 1851-53; Ilenry C. Pindell, John C. Breekinridge, 1849 ; Robert A. Athey, Christopher C. Rogers, 1850-51; John G. James, 1851-53; Madison C. Johnson, 1853-55. '57-59 ; Francis K. Hunt, 1853-55; Roger W. Hanson, 1855-57; Thos. H. Clay, 1859-61; Richard A. Buckner, Jr., 1859-63; Isaac C. Vanmeter, 1865-67 ; . Robert C. Rogers, 1867-69, resigned 1868, and succeeded by Wm. Preston, 1868-69 ; Win. Cassius Goodloe, 1871-73; John A. Prall, 1873-75.

Speakers of the Senate .- Edmund Bullock, 1816; Wm. T. Barry, as lieutenant-gor- ernor, 1820-24. Total, 5 years.

Speakers of the House .- Edmund Bullock, 1796-97-98 ; John Breckinridge, 1799, 1800 ; Henry Clay, 1807 ; Jos. H. Hawkins, 1812-13; Win. T. Barry, 1814 ; Jos. Cabell Breckinridge, 1817-18 ; Leslie Combs, 1846 ; Geo. Robertson, 1851-53 ; Richard A. Buckner, Jr., 1861-63. Total, 16 years.

Railroads .- The Kentucky Central runs north 99 miles to Cincinnati and south 12 miles to Nicholasville. . The Louisville, Cincinnati, and Lexington connects to Louisville direct, and, via Lagrange Junction, to Cincinnati. The Elizabethtown, Lexington, and Big Sandy was finished in 1872 to Mountster- ling, and the work of extending it to Huntington, West Virginia, is progress- ing steadily ; it will cross the Big Sandy river about 13 miles from its mouth, at Catlettsburg.

Race Horses and Horse Racing .- Fayette county is probably the most famous spot in America, if not in the world, for fine and fast blooded horses. It is empathically the home of " winning" horses, remarkable for speed and endurance on the turf of the United States, and known and appreciated in England. The first recorded public race in Lexington was in August, 1789. Races have been kept up, with rare, if any, intermissions, ever since-now 83 years. The first organized association, the Lexington Jockey Club, was formed in 1809 and prospered until 1823. On July 29, 1826, the turfmen again combined " to improve the breed of horses by encouraging the sports of the turf," and organized the present Kentucky Association. Over the Lexington course, the following is the fastest time made, in 1827 and at various later dates :

THREE QUARTERS OF A MILE .- The fastest time over this course, in the only 4 races ever run prior to Sept. 15, 1871, was 1:182. [In June, 1872, in a dash at Saratoga, a Kentucky horse, Alarm, won easily in 1:16-the fastest three quarters of a mile on record. ] .

ONE MILE .- In 1827, the best mile was by Mariah in 1:51. Within the next 21 years up to 1848, 32 one-mile races were run-only 3 of them in better time than 1:50, and a majority of them much slower. Subsequently, a mile was run, in 1841, by Jim Bell in 1:46; in 1848, by Spencer Graves' Trustee colt in 1:473; in 1852, by John M. Clay's Star Davis in 1:463; in 1853, by John M. Clay's Charles Ball in 1:452; in 1857, by Bradley's Nannie Clark in 1:453 ; in 1861, by Idlewild in 1:45; in 1862, by MeGrath's Mam- mona in 1.44}; in 1871, by Fadladeen and Salina, who each ran a mile in 1:43-the fastest time over this course, and then the fastest on record. In 1872, Alarm beat Fadladeen, in 1:422. [On July 14, 1871, at Saratoga, in a race of 21 miles in 4:024, Longfellow ran one mile of it in 1:40, " but it is not a record for him."]

ONE MILE AND A QUARTER .- The fastest of the only two races, before Sept. 1871, was 2:143. In 1872, Frogtown made 1} miles in 2:09}. [The fastest 1} miles ever made was in the great race, June 16, 1872, between Longfellow and Harry Bassett, in 2.08}.]

ONE MILE AND A HALF .- The fastest time over this course, in the only 3 races before Sept. 1871, was in 1871 by Exchange in 2:38. [In 187], in a 2}-mile race at Saratoga in 4:023, Longfellow made 1} miles of it in 2:33 ; " but it is not a record for him." Enquirer had previously made 13 miles in 2:352 ; and Longfellow and Harry Bassett made the same time, June 16, 1872. ]

ONE MILE AND THREE QUARTERS .- In 1872, Frogtown made the fastest time, in 3:07. [Previous to that, in Aug., 1869, over another course, Corsican made 12 miles in 3:073.1

172

FAYETTE COUNTY.

Of Two MILE races, 141 had been run over this course before Sept., 1871. In 1827, a two-mile race was run in 4:15; Oct. 17 1837, one by Jas. Lind- sey's bay filley in 3:35 ; Sept. 12, 1869, two heats by Lancaster in 3:35}, 3:383 ; May 23, 1871, one by Lyttleton in 3:343. [ In the last great race between Longfellow and Harry Bassett, at Saratoga, June 16, 1872, they made two miles in 3:30, the fastest ever run. ]

No Two MILES AND A QUARTER races were run over this course, up to Sept., 1871. July 14, 1871, Longfellow, a Kentucky norse, at Saratoga, made 2} miles in 4:022; in Aug., 1865, Kentucky made it, at Saratoga, in 4:013.

Of Two MILE AND A HALF races, only two were made over this course, earlier than Sept., 1871. In the race at Long Branch, July 2, 1871, Long- fellow beat Harry Bassett (both Kentucky horses) 23 miles in 4:34; but at the last great race between them, at Saratoga, June 16, 1872, Bassett beat Longfellow about six feet, in 3:59.

Of THREE MILE races, 49 were run, prior to Sept., 1871, over the Associa- tion course at Lexington. In 1827, Limber made two heats in 6:09, 6:07; in 1840, nine stallions started in a race, Blacknose winning the first heat in 5:40, and Red Bill the second and third heats, in 5:48, 5:40; before. 1850, Brown Kitty reduced this to 5:38; in 1853, Berry's time was 5:36} ; Vandal's, in 1855, 5:33; and Red Oak's, in 1859, 5:322. Frogtown, in 1872, ran three miles in 5:292, with Hollywood close to his nose. [Norfolk ran it, in Cali- fornia, Sept. 23, 1865, in 5:273, 5:29}.]

Of FOUR MILE races, 23 only were run over the Lexington course prior to Sept., 1871, and only one of those after 1861. The time was: In 1827, Old Court 8:17; none was run inside of eight minutes until, in 1850, Charmer made it in 7:51; in 1851, Monte in 7:43}; in 1853, Dick Doty in 7:373; in 1858, Waterloo in 7:37; in 1861, Lightning in 7:35; and in 1870, Morgan Scout in 7:323. [The fastest four miles on record was made "against time," April 2, 1855, at New Orleans, in 7:192, by Lexington-who, also, April 24, 1855, over the same course, beat Lecompte in 7:232. April 8, 1854, Le- compte had beaten Lexington in 7:26, 7:384-which "time" Lexington ran against, for $20,000. Idlewild, a Kentucky horse, over the Long Island course, June 25, 1863, made 4 miles in 7:26}-claimed to be the best four-mile on record, because he carried " full weight."]

The First Lot-Holders of Lexington, on Dec. 26, 1781-when the plan of the town was adopted and the lots disposed of-were :

Nicholas Brobston, James McBride,

James Morrow,

< John Clark,

Alex. McClain,

John Niblick,

Elisha Collins,

Daniel MeClain, Wm. Niblick,

Josiah Collins,

Alex. McConnell,

Timothy Peyton, - -

Stephen Collins,

Francis McConnell,

Charles Seaman,

Thornton Farrow,

James McConnell,

Robert Stanhope,

Wm. Haydon,

Wm. McConnell,

Hugh Thompson,

Win. Henderson,

Rev. Wm. McConnell,

Jane Thompson, Robert Thompson,

James January,

Francis McDonald,

John Todd,

Peter January,

Henry McDonald, Hugh MeDonald,

John Torrence,

Samuel Kelly,

James Lindsey,

James McDonald, John McDonald, John M. McDonald, Wm. McDonald, James McGinty,

Matthew Walker,

Hugh Martin,

Michael Warnock,

Samuel Martin,

James Wason,

Win. Martin, Sen.,

Samuel McMullins, David Mitchell,

John Williams,

Caleb Masterson,

Win. Mitchell,

John Wymore.

James Masterson,

John Morrison,

In 1783 the trustees reserved for public use three lots " where the garrison stands," and sold other lots to the following:

Wm. Anderson, Amor Batterton,

David Blanchard, 1

Christopher Kistner, Widow Kistner, Humphrey Marshall,

Mathew Patterson, John Sharp, George Shepherd,

Ephraim January,

Francis McDermid,

Levi Todd,

Samuel Johnson,

Joseph Turner, David Vance, Joseph Waller,

Joseph Lindsey, John Martin,

173

FAYETTE COUNTY.

John Brooke,

Thomas Marshall,

Andrew Steele,

John Carty,

Widow McDonald,

Wm. Steele,

Archibald Dickinson,

John MeDowell,

Jane Todd,

Martin Dickinson,

John Mikins,

Robert Todd,

Valentine Dickinson,

James Mitchell,

Caleb Williams,

Wm. Galloway,

Benjamin Netherland,

Adam Zunwalt,

Christopher Greenup,

Patrick Owens,

Jacob Zunwalt,

Benjamin Haydon,

Robert Parker,

Stoffre Zunwalt.

Samuel January,

The Court House at Lexington is a relic of the early civilization of interior Kentucky. It was up with the times when it was built. In 1806 it was a noticeable finger-board of advancing architecture. In 1814 it indicated another advance. The outlook bespoke pride, intelligence, comfort. Within, it resounded with eloquence such as the Old World never heard, and to which the New World, except Virginia, was a stranger. There were giants in those days! but their voices wake the echoes no more, and their forms bave mingled with the dust. With a veneration that would do honor to say- ages, and a lordly scorn of modern innovations because unbecoming a great and noble people, the average Lexingtonian of 1873 is thankful that his court house is not like other court houses. And verily he has his reward! Since somne sacrilegious hand, only a few months ago, sent up toward heaven, in curling flames, the ancient stone structure where the neighboring Bourbons sought and did justice, the memory of the golden days when the gods of elo- quence dwelt among Lexington men is sweeter, and more beautiful, and holier. The public acknowledgment that those days are gone, never to re- turn, must live on-in walls that heard, and halls that witnessed what can not be again ! No inconsiderable portion of the people, and a controlling portion of those elected to manage the business interests of the people, are unwilling to give up the substantial clumsiness of the dead past and its proud and comforting associations-part of the very birthright and inheritance of every citizen of Fayette, be he white or be he black-for the expensive archi- tecture of the present or the uncertain fancy of the near future. The old court house is unique-unlike any thing in the heavens above, or in the earth beneath, or in the waters under the earth. It could scarcely be ex- pected that a new one would be so exceptional and distinguished, or resound with the eloquence of such and so great men. The old edifice has indeed a glorious history. Embalmed in memory and in tears, it must never be for- gotten. Requiescat in pace.

This venerable court house is of brick, was built in 1806, and remodeled in 1814 and improved by the addition of a town clock. In 1872 a persistent but unsuccessful effort to again remodel it was made, immediately after a sig- nal failure to raze it to the ground and build upon its hallowed ruins a costly modern court house-such as not one of the long procession of dead Lexing- tonians, if suddenly resurrected to the "witness stand," would be familiar with or recognize.

" Woodman, spare that tree ! Touch not a single bough ! In youth it sheltered me, And I'll protect it now !"

The first sessions of the court were held in a log cabin in the station for about two years; then transferred to the log court house, on the corner of Main and Broadway, now called Yeiser's corner; and about 178S, to a small stone court house in the public square, upon the very site of the present brick court house.j On the night of Jan. 31, 1803, the building containing the records of the county was, with most of the records, destroyed by fire. It is curious to observe with what exceeding care the commissioners appointed by Gov. Garrard-Thomas Lewis, Robert Todd, John Bradford, Henry Payne, Thomas Bodley, James Trotter, John A. Seitz, Walker Baylor, and John Richardson-had the fragments of the partially-burned books copied, in their patient efforts to restore the records.

# Ranck's Lexington, page 73. t Same, page 72.

174

FAYETTE COUNTY.

Inventions .- Kentucky was the home and burial-place of at least three of the earliest inventors of steamboats-John Fitch, James Rumsey, and ED- WARD WEST. The latter was born in 1757 in Virginia, and removed in 1788 (one account says in 1785) to Lexington, where he died Aug. 23, 1827. He was the first watchmaker there, was a gunsmith by trade, and a man of great inventive genius. He constructed a steamboat on a small sealc- which, in 1794, in the presence of hundreds of citizens, he had the proud sat- isfaction to see move through the water with great velocity, in an experi- mental trial on the Town fork of Elkhorn, previously dammed up near the center of Lexington for the purpose. This miniature steamboat had no fly- wheels; but to overcome the dead point, the piston-rod was made to strike metallic springs at every return motion given by the steam. The identical engine-or rather the cylinder, piston-rod, frame work, supply and escape pipe-were preserved for more than fifty years in the museum of the Adel- phi Society of Transylvania University, and have sinee been transferred to the museum of the Eastern Lunatic Asylum. On July 6, 1802, Mr. West received a U. S. patent for his steamboat invention. Why he delayed until then obtaining a patent, we have not learned. On the same day, he was awarded three other patents-for a gun-lock, for a nail cutting machine, and for a nail cutting and heading machine *- the first ever invented, and which the celebrated English traveler, F. A. Michaux, in 1805, said cut, in 12 hours, 5,320 pounds of nails, and the patent of which "he sold at once for $10,000." Lexington, shortly after, actually exported nails of her own manufacture to Louisville, to Cincinnati, and even to Pittsburgh-which is now the most extensive nail manufacturing point in the United States, if not in the world. April 28, 1816 (only four and a half years after the first steamboat in the West), a steamboat, made by Bosworth & West, on Mr. West's model, left the mouth of Hickman creck, on the Kentucky river, in Jessamine county, for New Orleans. This boat, an editorial notice in the Kentucky Gazette says, was upon a plan distinct from any other steamboat then in use, and on a trial against the current of the Kentucky river, at a high stage, more than an- swered the sanguine expectations of her owners (a company of Lexington gentlemen), and left no doubt that she could stem the current of the Mis- sissippi with rapidity and ease. She did not return.

In 1796, NATHAN BURROWS (who had settled in Lexington four years before, and died in 1846) introduced into Kentucky the manufacture of hemp-being the pioneer in that branch of manufactures; but through the unworthiness of agents, he never reaped from it any advantage, although he invented a machine for eleaning hemp. He afterwards introduced the man- ufacture of mustard, and manufactured an article which has been famous for fifty years-even taking the premium in England, at the World's Fair, in 1851, where it was shown by his relative and successor, Capt. Samuel Davics Mccullough, who was still manufacturing it, when he died, Jan. 11, 1873.

Dr. Joseph Buchanan, while studying medicine in Lexington, in 1805, in- vented a musical instrument produeing its music from glasses of different chemical composition, and originated the conception of the Music of Light- to be executed by means of harmonific colors luminously displayed. The invention was never put in operation.

About 1803, John Jonest (who died in Lexington in 1849, aged 90) in- vented a speeder spindle ; and also a machine for sawing stone.

THOMAS HARRIS BARLOW-born Aug. 5, 1789, in Nicholas county, Ky., and died June 22, 1865 in Cincinnati, Ohio-was the most ingenious and celebrated of Lexington inventors. His education was limited. He was a soldier of the war of 1812, in Col. Richard M. Johnson's regiment. He built a steam- boat at Augusta, Bracken county. After his removal to Lexington, he built, in the winter of 1826-7, a steam locomotive, with car attached, for two pas- sengers, and with power to aseend an elevation of 80 fect to the mile. In May, 1827, it was opened to the public for exhibition, in a large room over Jos. Bruen's machine shop, where an oval track around the room was con- structed, and the first "train" in western America put in motion. Gen.

* Letter from Prof. Geo. C. Schaeffer, U. S. Patent Office. t Ranck, page 185.

175

FAYETTE COUNTY.

Leslie Combs, Dr. Wm. S. Chipley, and other old citizens are still living who took a ride at fifty cents a ticket. Samuel Robb purchased the novelty for travel-visiting Louisville, Nashville, Memphis, and New Orleans, at which latter place it was burned while on exhibition. In 1827 he built another locomotive and sold it to a party who found it profitable to travel and exhibit it. In 1835 another locomotive-with two upright cylinders and lever beams, both engines attached to one asle, with crooks at right angles, and upright boilers-was built by Jos. Bruen, for the new railroad from Lexington to Frankfort, constructed of strap-iron rails spiked down to stone sills, which proved to be as unsubstantial as its advocates claimed it would be sub- stantial.

In 1845, in the silversmith shop of his son Milton Barlow, he .made a small, rude planetarium, to illustrate the motion of the heavenly bodies in teaching his grandchildren. The idea grew as he studied and labored, and his son and Wm. J. Dalsem aided him in working out such combinations of gearing as produced the minute fractional relative revolutions of the planets. After three years' patient labor, the first fine instrument was completed, and sold in 1849 to Girard College, Philadelphia. Other instruments were built during the next ten years, and after the exhibition of one at the World's Fair in New York, in 1851, sold for $2,000 each; two of the larger size to Congress for the Military Academy at West Point, N. Y., and the Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md., and one to the city of New Orleans-besides a number of smaller ones to colleges and public institutions. Thus has Kentucky the honor of presenting to the scientific world the only perfect instrument to show the motions of the solar system-the dates of all eclipses, of the transits of Mercury and Venus, and every other suggested problem during hundreds of years, that scientific men were curious to test it. It is one of the most exact and wonderful combinations of machinery ever made.

In 1840, Mr. Barlow had invented a rifled cannon, and made a model, but laid it aside. In 1855, encouraged by the liberality of congress, in buying two of his planetariums, he obtained for his gun a patent, with the most comprehensive claims. Congress appropriated $3,000 for an experimental gun-which was cast at Knapp & Totten's great foundry in Pittsburgh, and taken to Lexington to be rifled and completed by the father and son. It weighed, finished, 6,900 pounds, was 53 inches bore, and twisted one turn in 40 feet. It then was sent to the Washington navy yard to be tested, and developed greater accuracy and range than was expected. Although neglected for awhile by our own government, it attracted the attention of foreign ministers and agents, and is believed to have originated or suggested most of the rifled guns of Europe and the United States. Previous to this, Mr. Barlow invented an automatic nail and tack machine, which capitalists eagerly purchased. About 1861, a stroke of paralysis, from which he recov- ered but partially, cut short Mr. Barlow's usefulness as an inventor. His son Milton, on returning from the Confederate army in 1865, gathered up the fragments of $9,000 worth of planetariums built for educational institu- tions in the South-which could not reach them because of the civil war, and which were broken to pieces or scattered by the malicious and destructive spirit of some Federal soldiers-and finished two in elegant style. One of these, by the liberality of the Kentucky legislature, he was enabled to exhibit at the World's Exposition in Paris, France, in 1867-as Kentucky's contribution to that grand collection of the products of all civilized nations. It received the highest premium awarded to any illustrative apparatus.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Collins historical sketches of Kentucky. History of Kentucky: Vol. II, Part 26

Author: Collins, Lewis, 1797-1870. cn; Collins, Richard H., 1824-1889. cn Publication date: 1874 Publisher: Covington, Ky., Collins & Co. Number of Pages: 1654

Author: Collins, Lewis, 1797-1870. cn; Collins, Richard H., 1824-1889. cn
Publication date: 1874
Publisher: Covington, Ky., Collins & Co.
Number of Pages: 1654