HL 14 identifed; HL 15 below

Ok, y'all are getting them too quickly. I am going to have to take more obscure pictures -starting with the one after Hidden Location #15 below. HL15 should be very easy, but I promise more difficult ones in the future.

But first some comments on Hidden Location #14. John Flood correctly identified the location, writing "This looks like corner of Penile Rd, W. Manslick Rd & Old New Cut Rd. in Fairdale." Yes, to a point - an italicised point. The street names are correct and I'll address two of them below. And, yes, I would certainly call that intersection part of Fairdale. But, according to the United States Postal Service, I was in "Valley Station" when I took the picture while standing along the southern side of W. Manslick Road. All of the Penile Road addresses going off to the right also carry the Valley Station zip code of 40272. But the territory to the left on Old New Cut Road and on the other side of the intersection is, indeed, Fairdale, whose zip code is 40118.

I have nothing to report about Penile Road, and that is probably a good thing. So, let's start with Old New Cut, an interesting name. About twenty-five years ago, coinciding with the opening of the Gene Snyder Freeway, a road was built connecting New Cut Road as it then existed with W. Manslick Road, about 3/4 mile closer to Fairdale. This 3/4 mile stretch of highway went unnamed for many years. People referred to it as New New Cut or New Manslick or "that new road connecting to the Snyder." Eventually, however, developers bought the land along the northern side of the road, erecting several warehouses and a motel. With such development came the need for addresses, and address numbers need road names to make any sense.

After some - not much - discussion, it was decided to call the new stretch of road "New Cut" continuing the name of the road which extends south from Iroquois Park to this point. Further it was decided to call the older stretch of New Cut, the one now cut-off and appearing in our picture, Old New Cut, an awkward name to be sure. But the reason had more to do with the other street involved in the new connecting road - W. Manslick. Were the county streetname deciders going to give us yet another Manslick to deal with?

Check any map of southern Jefferson County and you will find six close but unconnected streets - eight if you count "Old Manslick" sections - with the name Manslick. At one time there were a few more, like the Echo Trail sections of southeastern Jefferson County. Presently the easternmost Manslick Road runs from Beulah Church Road west to Pennsylvania Run Road. A second section, starting about two blocks south of the first one, runs from Pennsylvania Run Road west to what is officially called Shepherdsville Road, but which many still call Old Shepherdsville Road, usually shortenend to Old Shep. A third Manslick starts about a block north of this one and runs from Old Shep west to Preston Highway, which, if you are wondering, was at one time the companion New Shepherdsville Road, but that name never caught on. That's all of the southeastern Manslicks.

Coming in from the southwest, beginning at the intersection of Berry Boulevard and Seventh Street Road, is the first of three Manslicks on this side of town. This one extends south to Palatka Road. A second Manslick picks up about 3/4 mile east of this point and runs south to Saint Anthony's Church Road. Another 3/4 mile from there, a third Manslick begins at Third Street Road and extends toward Fairdale, to the point in our Hidden Location #14 picture, at Old New Cut Road.

Why all the Manslicks?

First, let us dissect the name into its original name which was Mann's Lick, the name of a salt lick owned presumably by the Mann family. Actually, that's exactly what it is. Mann's Lick was a salt lick operating in the area of present day Glengarry, or Glen Garry, a subdivision in Fairdale near the intersection of National Turnpike and the Gene Snyder Freeway. Salt licks dotted southern Jefferson and much of Bullitt counties before places like Louisville and Shepherdsville existed. Thus, we are speaking of pre-Revolutionary War times. A community existed in this area known as Newtown. Newtown, in fact, grew large enough to be incorporated as a city in 1794, but its existence was one of about thirty-five years in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

The roads leading in from the east and west to Newtown were known as the "roads to Mann's Lick." One group came south from the Falls of the Ohio River, along the north-south buffalo trail generally today followed by the CSX (formerly L&N RR), I-65, and Preston Highway. They are generally known simply as Manslick Road. Another came from the east, perhaps a more southern path of the Midland Trail, or a more northern path of the Wilderness Trail. I really don't know. These, today, are generally known as E. Manslick Road. The roads closest to Fairdale are called W. Manslick Road. Now you know.

So, here is a new picture. Again, it should be very easy to identify.

Hidden Location #14

Here is a new location for our cartographic enquirers to get on their Google Earth machines and other such devices and offer up an answer. Actually, I'd rather you not do that. I would ask that you truly make an effort at identifying such places without the help of a machine, other than maybe your car or bike. If you do not know where it is, just say so. There may be other readers who do, but who aren't as savvy on the computer. Again, the whole idea is to find an unusual place then see if any of my readers actually know where it is. That's the idea, although I may not have enough faithful game players to make that happen with every picture. We'll see.

HL Thirteen Answers and a Thought

Hidden Location #13 wasn't nearly as difficult as I thought it might be. Marty Meyer and Patrick C rang in within thirty seconds of each other, with Marty's answer being posted first - Stevenson Avenue headed uphill from Mellwood to William and Arlington. Yes, that is Kaviar Forge on the left as Curtis Morrison points out.

Curtis also correctly identified the 100 block of Haldeman, adding an extraneous North, unnecessary and incorrect, but we won't take points off. The 100 block, north or south, at this point in the city, is divided by the railroad track. I appreciate the additional information Curtis provided on the location.

This latter group of new homes I found last year during the Easter Parade down Frankfort Avenue. I revisited the area late last fall in search for a particular building which was seen in a Todd Lally for Congress commercial. It was my initial belief that the building outside which he was standing was the one opposite the end of Weiss Place, another part of the infill construction of which Mr. Morrison spoke. Further research revealed that building to be the old Ehrler's Dairy operation on Belmar Drive, which had closed in the mid 1990s. We never quite figured out what Mr. Lally believed to be Congressman Yarmuth's involvement in Ehrler's decision to close the building nearly a decade before John took office. But, I digress.

We'll have another Hidden Location soon. I'm also thinking about writing an entry compiling some comments from a few Facebook friends and non-friends who seem to find fault with every step our new mayor has taken during his lengthy term in office, so far a total of forty-nine days. Given some of their rhetoric, you'd think he'd served as long as, say, President Mubarak of Egypt. Forty-nine days, though, is the current mark.

Well, at least I am thinking about it - I may not actually post it. These are folks who have every reason to be upset with the mayor as none of them supproted him. Of course, I've supported candidates who never made it through the Primary before. The following is a list of my first choices for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States of America during my thirty-three years of voting:

Kennedy, Jackson, Simon, Brown, Clinton, no clear choice, Dean, Dodd.

You may notice I got a total of one ultimate nominee correct, the 1996 re-election bid by Bill Clinton. But, as part of my loss, I did not make it my duty to trash everything the victors did, if they were successful in the November race. That sounds like something Mitch McConnell might say with regard to the current president's agenda for 2011 and 2012. Maybe I'm being overly sensitive since I've been described as part of the Fischer protectorate. Maybe.

Hidden Location #13 - Choice of two

I was sitting in my meeting today when I received a text from Marty Meyer telling me that if I had posted a new picture, he could have been figuring it out while in attendance at his meeting.

For the record, he was seated next to me.

Below are two pictures - two different streets although, honestly, not that far apart. One picture looks uphill while the other looks down. Where are they?

What goes up . . . .



Must come down.

I'm pretty sure there were no blue Volvo wagons around this time.

676. 676 and #12

First, the answer to Hidden Location #12 was offered to our seven faithful readers by someone known on the wires as JeffnClifton. I have somewhere in the corner cobwebs of my mind that his real name is Jeff Nowlin. Is that correct? The picture was taken in the 200 block of Idlewylde Drive looking south toward Calvin Avenue.

Appropriately the answer came from a self-identified Cliftonian as this street is somewhere along the borderlands between Clifton, Crescent Hill, and Clifton Heights. To his credit, Curtis Morrison had taken a stab at the location and was headed in the right direction when he mentioned Lower Brownsboro Road. But, as there were no Iron Facades or Downtown Bridges involved, and the fact that it is very likely most of the residents in this area were Greg Fischer supporters, he somehow lost his way.

I wish I knew more of the background of this area, as it is my custom to try to give a short historical sketch once the hidden location is revealed. I'll have to return to this one on another day as I know very little specific information.

*****


The other part of this entry returns us to an old custom - that of using the entry number as a lesson for a Kentucky highway of the same number. Today is entry #676 so we'll speak briefly about KY676, a major cross-county four-lane in southern Franklin County. KY676, I believe, was built in the mid to late 1970s. The purpose of the road was to alleviate traffic on downtown Frankfort's city streets.

Frankfort stands by hills surrounded - replacing Frankfort for Zion, so would go an altered hymn by the Irish Poet Thomas Kelly, written in 1806. Anyone who has ever driven into Frankfort knows one must go downhill to get down to the city proper. The city was originally laid out in the "S" curves of the Kentucky River, where the division in 1780 of Kentucky County, Virginia occurred, at the mouth of Benson Creek into the Kentucky River. There is presently a Riverfront Park overlooking some of this, along Wilkinson Street north of Broadway.

From the south, one enters Frankfort along either the old Lawrenceburg Pike (KY420) or more often, along US60, down Louisville Hill into Second Street, which is also the major approach from the west, the minor one being the Devils Hollow Road (eventually KY1005), which was the original entry from Louisville. From the north are the Bald Knob Pike (US421) and the Owenton Road (US127). From the east, one comes down East Main Street either from the Georgetown Pike (US460) or from Versailles Road (US60). All of these approaches at some point go down hill, and often steeply. Anyone coming into town prior to the construction of KY676 did it on one of these roads.

With the expansion of what was once called the Health Department and what many people still call the Human Resources Building on East Main Street, a need arose to create a "back" way into the project. This also allowed for expansion at Kentucky State University (KSU), opposite the Human Resources Building. KY676, which is signed as the East-West Connector allowed for this back entry. BEginning on the west side at US127 the road went down hill with its first original intersection at an extended Collins Lane, which at one time had jutted west toward US127.

Further down the hill came the intersection with KY420 which hugged the stone wall along its west side leading down into South Frankfort below the Capitol and Executive Mansion. This area has always been prone to flooding. At the bottom of the hill, the road crosses the Kentucky River in the Big Eddy area, on the Julian M. Carroll Bridge, named for the previous governor from McCracken County who after his term as governor remained in Frankfort and is now serving as a State Senator for Franklin, Anderson, Woodford, and parts of Scott and Fayette counties.

The eastern side of KY676 then works its way back up the hill with Frankfort's Capital View Park off to the north along the old Glenns Creek Road, redubbed as Kentucky coffeetree Drive, for what was for a few years Kentucky's official tree, and a variety of venues off to the south including Kentucky's Vietnam Veterans Memorial, shown below. The memorial, dedicated in 1988, takes the form of a granite sundial with the dial, or gnomon, of stainless steel. The names of Kentucky's 1100 fallen and missing veterans from that war are strategically placed such that the tip of the shadow produced on a given day by the gnomon falls upon the date that the veteran was lost to the war. It is an eerie and sensitively designed memorial which everyone should visit.

The newer Franklin County Regional Correctional Facility is also up on the ridge to the south of the highway. The major intersection on this side of town is with Martin Luther King Jr. Drive (KY1659), a major four-lane city street connecting with the back (and effectively the main) entrance of the Human Resources Building, as well as all of the KSU's facilities off to the east. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, the former Maryland Avenue, then crosses East Main Street and directly accesses the main campus of KSU. South of the East-West Connector, this street is known as Glenns Creek Road.

KY676 progresses further east, generally following the old railroad path which eventually leads to Midway and Lexington and has recently become a topic of discussion for a light rail line connecting Frankfort with Kentucky's largest two cities, Louisville and Lexington. But, I digress.

After crossing Galbraith Drive, the road makes its approach to Versailles Road, East Frankfort's major thoroughfare. The intersection here was one of a few "prototypes" combining some elements of an interstate intersection with cross-over stoplighted street level intersection as well. The Bardstown Road/Watterson Expressway intersection in Louisville is another example of this type of intersection. KY676 ceases numerically at this point, but the roadway itself extends under US60 becoming the Leestown Pike on the east side and numbered as KY 421, eventually leading into Lexington under the name West Main Street.

For most people who use it, it is simply the easy way into and out of the Human Resources Building on the east side of the river, and the circulating Captial Parking garage for the west side. Now you know.




KY676 photo by H. B. Elkins
Kentucky Vietnam Veterans Memorial photo by Lon Whitson

675. Whiskey Row/Iron Quarter - Curtis Morrison and I exchange thoughts on Facebook

Curtis Morrison:

If Mayor Greg Fischer continues to take cues from President Mubarak in the undemocratic disposition of Whiskey Row, all you loyal Fischer supporters will likely be activated to storm an upcoming rally of preservationists on the backs of camels, armed with those little Louisville Slugger bats they've confiscated at the airport. This all could have been prevented.

Me:
I have an opinion but it has nothing to do with the relatively recent ownership by Mr. Blue. Most of these buildings have been more or less empty since I was in my teens or 20s, which is to say for a hell of a long time. And the ones which were open back then - I can remember several - weren't in the best of shape even then. I recall a collapsing stairwell in one building in particular back in 1986. And the one on the far eastern end collapsed of its own accord a decade ago. Admittedly, those toward the west have done well.

I'm not happy about any compromise on the facade issue, of that I'll admit. But when the plans came out in 2007 for all the highrises set back away from the streets, I thought it was a great idea. My friend Michael Garton and I discussed this last night while waiting for Gil Reyes' play, Rosencrantz and Gildenstern Are Dead, to start at the Kentucky Center. We disagreed.

I wish there was to be more residential space, and particularly more affordable residential space in this project, or any project in the area. We have next to none of that. There's something worth fighting for.

But, comparing this mayor's one month and five days in office with the thirty year reign of President Mubarak is quite hyperbolic and frankly, silly. I expect better from you and your followers.

Deep in my heart, I'm a preservationist too. I remember my freshman year at college (or maybe I was a senior at Durrett) fighting the demolition of the old Will Sales Building, where the B&W Tower now stands at 4th and Liberty streets. I remembering touring with then-Alderman Allan Steinberg the old Savoy Theater on Jefferson Street and the Milner Hotel in the same block, hoping their facades could be worked into plans for the new convention center. We lost those battles and those buildings.

But using similar tactics, others succesfully incorporated the facade of the Compton or Clinton (or whatever it is - I know it starts with a C) Building into the new multi-storied Marriott at 3rd and Jefferson streets, providing construction jobs in the short run and hotel jobs for decades to follow.

Let's use a little logic here. We need to preserve the facades - the only real parts worth preserving. Work toward that end - I will join you. But we also need jobs. Here is an opportunity. Make your arguments using sensible language and reasonable ideas, not Slugger Battette wielding renegades on camelback. Don't expect anyone with any authority to help you in your crusade to take such comments with any degree of seriousness.

A new Hidden Location and an answer to the last one

At some point I need to get back to writing real blog entries instead of these little games. But, I am enjoying them so that may not happen for a while. First, a new picture, Hidden Location #12, for Marty to locate. Wait, I meant for everyone to take a stab at locating before Marty figures it out. Go.



Marty's answer for Hidden Location #11 is correct. That is the 1200 block of Hull Street looking northeast. This is the Irish Hill neighborhood just off Baxter Avenue near what is now called Lexington Road. The subdivision known as Irish Hill was laid out in two parts, the earlier one closer to Lexington Road, then known as Hamilton Avenue, was the old Valentine Schneikert property and developed by Adolph Hull, who probably named Hull Street. The Schneikert mansion still exists up on a hill behind some condos which front at 1234 Lexington Road. Very few people ever see the Schneikert mansion, which now has been converted to apartments and has a Pine Street address. I cannot locate a good picture of that home. Schneikert was a Louisville brickmaker in the post-Civil War era. His home was built prior to 1884.

[WRITER/EDITOR'S NOTE: Before some more informed soul than I points it out to me, someone like Dr. Tom Owen, I must confess I've eliminated a reference in the last sentence of the above paragraph to Mr. Schneikert's home being built of wood, as opposed to brick. When I wrote that earlier - the reference is now gone - I felt I was wrong. So, as part of my evening drive I went and found the house and found (most of it) to be constructed of brick, as is befitting the home of a Louisville brick merchant. Thanks for allowing me to clear that up].

Two people mentioned the old brick mansion at 1212 Hull Street, pictured below, believed to have been built around 1868. That was the home of Nicholas Finzer, a Louisville tobacco merchant - The Five Brothers Tobacco Company - as well as a member of the old Louisville School Board. A school once stood on E. Broadway between Shelby and Clay streets on the south side named for Mr. Finzer and Finzer Street runs behind the old school proeprty over to Smoketown. I've put a picture of the school below that of his mansion. It is now a parking lot.

These two homes in Irish Hill aren't that far apart. I can't determine where the proeprty division may have been based on the current street grid. But the balance of the Schneikert property was re-subdivided by an Act of the General Assembly on March 24, 1884. This later section became the property of the Payne family and Payne Street obviously is named for them. This subdivision extended over to the now-abandoned Eastern Cemetery where my Schlenk relatives are buried, including my great-grandmother Loraine Augusta Schlenk Lee Hall, and her parents, Emil and Minnie Schlenk.

*****


Nicholas Finzer Mansion, 1212 Hull Street


Nicholas Finzer School, formerly at 740 E. Broadway

Hidden Location #11

Here it is. I have two supplementary photos which may be added if Marty doesn't figure this one out right away. Leave comments. Unrelated, the groundhog saw his shadow yesterday in Pennsylvania, according to the official media. Spring is en route.

674. "Come on out to William H. King's . . . . , and Hidden Location #10 revealed

Out at the Fairgrounds, except we officially don't call it that anymore, there is a show going on, a show most of us in Louisville have attended at one time or another in our lives. It is being advertised as the Louisville Boat, RV, and Sport Show, and there is a little jingle that was being played earlier on 103.5 FM - WAKY - or as we would say here along the Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606, Wa-Kee Ray-Dee-Oh! The trouble is I can't tell you how the jingle goes because it hasn't been around long enough. In fact, as soon as I heard it I started singing another jingle for the same event. If you are old enough, you know the real jingle for this show goes "Come on out to William H. King's Sport, Boat, and Vacation show, 'Cause it wont be long until it that time of year" Now I know that more than a few of you were singing along by the time you got to the end of that line.

If you are old enough to remember the William H. King jingle, you're probably old enough to have recognized the location in our most recent Hidden Location entry. Marty Meyer correctly identified it as the corner of S. Second Street at W. Florence Avenue. Indeed, that is exactly where it is. The picture is looking north along Second Street's southbound lanes. Back in the day, as people like to say nowadays when they are talking about something that happened a long time ago - I'm especially unnerved when I hear one of my 23 year old friends referring to back in the day and you find out they mean sometime around 2007. But, I've digressed.

At one time, this corner was an integral part of the Watterson Expressway's intersection with KY1020. The former exit sign read "2nd St - 3rd St - Southern Parkway" heading in either direction on the Watterson. If you were in the westbound lanes and you took this triply-defined exit, you made a 90 degree turn off the Watterson and up the little hill on 2nd Street to Florence. At that point you were directed 90 degrees to the left (westwardly) along Florence over to 3rd and even further, if you wanted, over to Southern Parkway. That hill was known to oldtimers as Bluebird Hill although I do not know exactly why.

Marty identified the intersection as part of Wilder Park and this is qualifiably correct, but qualifiably incorrect as well. While the old City of Louisville neighborhood boundary for Wilder Park extended this far south, the original development, which began in the very late 1880s extended no further south than Fairmont Avenue. It is possible that Fairmont is named for the little hill to the south that came to be known at some point as Bluebird Hill, while the valley between Fairmount and the eventual Florence was known as Bluebird Valley.

The original Wilder Park subdivision, built on land once occupied by the old Greenland Race Track, an early Churchill Downs comptetior, ran from Collins Court south to Fairmount, and from Third Street east over to the old L&N Railroad. It was developed by a real estate investor by the name of Angus Allmond - hence Allmond Avenue which eventually graced (loosely used) the far eastern edge of the far southern edge of the neighborhood. The property was owned by a woman named Wilder Collins. Most of the Wilder Park homes north of Fairmont, in Mrs. Collins original plat, were built in the period between 1890 and 1930. Homes south of there came along just before and just after World War Two.

2nd Street, the divided avenue in the center of the development, was originaly known as Wilder Boulevard. The east-west cross streets followed the pattern of those streets north of Churchill Downs, adopting letters as their street names. Wilder Park's letters ranged from P to V. The only Louisville streetname remaining from the configuration is M street, just north of Churchill Downs.

(Unrelated to this story is that of the City of Oakdale, which began up near The Granville Inn at what was then called A Street, and extended south to about where the Watterson Expressway is now, between the L&N on the east and Rodman Avenue on the west. An Oakdale neighborhood remains south of Churchill Downs.)

So, congratulations once again to Marty Meyer, now 7-1-1-1 in our little game. I'll find a new location tomorrow or Sunday.

Hidden Location #10

Let's see how the panel does. I have a second picture from the same intersection which I may post later if this one proves too difficult. Leave your comments below.

673. A Full Moon and a Hidden Location Winner

There a big beautiful pizza-pie style moon hanging out about 1/3 the way up in the sky somewhere over Fisherville or maybe even Finchville. It is a cold clear night like this which makes me wish I lived somewhere off KY44 or KY248 out by Taylorsville Lake, where I'm sure that moon is as bright as the sun.

*****

We have a (new) winner in the Hidden Location game. All the previous locations have been identified by Marty Meyer, with one exception to that rule, which was identified by Curtis Morrison.

But now we have a new player and winner, my friend Joanna Erny. She correctly identifed the snowy downtown location as 8th Street looking north toward Main.

On the left is the Louisville Slugger Bat Factory and on the right an old historic building recently occupied by the Louisville-Jefferson County Revenue Commission. For one term, from 1999 to 2002, I was a Louisville-Jefferson County Revenue Commissioner. It is also sometimes called the Louisville Opera Building. It is presently undergoing extensive renovation.

Across Main Street, on the northeast corner, you can see the Alexander Building, the top floor of which is a penthouse apartment where political shindigs are held now and then. In the background is the federal government's 1960s gift to Louisville's waterfront, Interstate 64, the "64" part of 86-64, a grassroots effort to rid the waterfront of its overhead expressway and create instead a parkway setting. Hope springs eternal for that.

We'll have a new Hidden Location soon for our seven faithful readers to work on.

Congratulations Joanna on your win.

672. Billy Joel, Alison Lundergan Grimes, and Hidden Location #10

Back on November 3, 1973, as I was beginning the 8th grade at Durrett High School, California singer Billy Joel released his ode to lounge-lizard listening, a song entitled Piano Man. It is one of several songs I learned to play a few years later under the guidance of Shera Baker, a young lady who was two years behind me in school. Her living room and its piano served as a launchpad for those of you who've since heard me play, for good or for bad.

The first line of the fourth verse of Piano Man is "It's a pretty good crowd for a Saturday, the manager gives me a smile ... " While today wasn't a Saturday, and there were no pianos involved, there was a pretty good crowd today at an event I attended after work, and the manager, so to speak, was all smiles.

If you are in Louisville, you know we've been threatened with four to six inches of snow, an accumulation which has probably fallen from the skies, but for one reason or another has not quite accumulated on Mother Earth below. Nonetheless, the city went into its usual "snow mode" letting school out early, closing businesses, and generally providing a sales boon to the local groceries. See the picture below for a snowy scene in downtown Louisville.


Despite the cold weather and heavy falling snow, a "pretty good crowd" gathered today on the second floor of Louisville's famed Glassworks facility at 9th and Market streets - technically 9th is still Roy Wilkins Avenue at that point, a name typically observed only in the breach. The event was the Louisville reception for my friend Alison Lundergan Grimes, a Lexington attorney who today filed her papers for the Democratic nomination for the office of Kentucky's Secretary of State. Earlier events were held in Lexington and Frankfort, and tomorrow there will be additional events culminating in Maysville, a small river city in northeastern Kentucky, and the hometown of Alison's father, former Kentucky Democratic Chairman Jerry Lundergan, the metaphorical smiling manager in Joel's song. I'm supporting Alison in her bid to this office in the election which will be decided this fall.

Alison addressed the "pretty good crowd" for this snowy afternoon with three important women in her life looking on from the front row of the room, her mother and her two grandmothers. Her mother, Charlotte Lundergan, and I serve together on the Kentucky Democratic Party State Central Executive Committee. She is also one of Kentucky's representatives on the National Democratic Committee. Alison was joined by other members of her family as well as a host of Democratic luminaries from across the state. The current and two former lieutenant governors were present, as well as Speaker of the Kentucky House of Representatives Greg Stumbo of Floyd County, who introduced the candidate. There were also a few members of the Jefferson County Democratic Executive Committee present, along with others of the general public. The press was represented by Joe Gerth, a writer for the Courier-Journal. Again, for a snowy late afternoon, it was a "pretty good crowd."

Below is a picture which, for lack of any others in hand, we'll use as Hidden Location #10. For those who live or work downtown, as I do, this one should be relatively easy. Leave any comments below.

Finally I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge today's 50th anniversary of the Inauguration and speech of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the first inaugural of my lifetime. It was on this date fifty years ago that the new president admonished and obliged the American people to "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." I grew up with that expression never too far removed from one's mind, an era when the American populace was more concerned with the collective "we" which comprises America, as opposed to the individualistic "I" which, since the presidency of Kennedy's later successor Ronald Wilson Reagan, has destroyed the fabric of American culture, a great loss to each other, our Republic, and the world. When "The Fall of the American Republic" is written, which it will be soon, perhaps in the next fifty years, one of the turning points will be when Ronald Reagan reported in his inaugural that "the government isn't the solution, but rather is the problem." How more different could the attitudes be between Kennedy and Reagan, the former telling us to be concerned about our country to the point of "doing" for it; the latter proclaiming that the government is the problem and should be abandoned. Sad!

Again, Hidden Location #10 is below.

671. Annual Accounting of Counties Visited

Each year about this time I take down a map of Kentucky hanging in my office and put up a new one. And on that new map, as I have done with a map every year since 1979, I will mark the counties I drive through, visit, spend time in, set foot upon, or as in the case of Jefferson, live in. For thirty-two years I've kept track of this, sparked by by visit in 1979 to all 120 of Kentucky's county, a feat only repeated in 1987.

The high number in recent years is 71 in 2004. Despite being ill for a third of 2005 I somehow made it to 59 counties that year, the highest since that time; last year was 45.

The number of counties visited in 2010 reached to 57. Making the list all 32 years are, logically, where I live and my home county's immediate neighbors, and from there up to where my grandparents are buried in Woodford. Besides Jefferson and Woodford, these are Bullitt, Franklin, Hardin, Oldham, and Shelby. Meade is the next most visited at 29 of the 32 years, followed by Nelson at 26.

At the bottom of the list, unchanged from last year, and in fact unchanged since 1987, are Elliott and Lawrence counties. I just can't seem to get there. Other than those two, Martin remains unvisited since 1990, the longest period unvisited of any counties other than Elliott and Lawrence. Lawrence borders these other two; all are off the beaten path, meaning away from I-64. For several years I've wanted to do a US23 run from Ashland south to Prestonsburg, which would at least take me through Louisa in Lawrence County. As a note, the Lawrence County Courthouse, obviously one of the newer ones in the state, is pictured below. I've, frankly, never seen it. With a little creativity, that US23 path could be amended to get into both Elliott and Martin. Given this is a statewide election year, as were 1979 and 1987 - the only other years I've been there, maybe this is the year all three will get revisited.

I'll be driving back up to Washington once or twice this year so I will get close as I trek across I-64 on the way. Also, I hope to make it to the Hillbilly Days event this year in Pike, as well as the traditional visit to Fancy Farm in August. As of today, other than my drive back from Lexington during the early morning hours of January 1st, I haven't left the county yet this year. With a long weekend coming up, that is very likely to change.

Happy Trails in the New Year.

Hidden Location #9 Revealed

Hidden Location #9 managed to stump the panel. The picture was taken in the 2100 block of Peabody Lane facing just east of due north. Marty and "Anonymous" were both correct on the assertion that it was in the former City of Louisville. Marty added it was outside the Watterson Expressway, which he euphemistically referred to as the "Circle of Love," an appellation conjured up by Louisville's 50th mayor, Greg Fischer, who was inaugurated on January 3. The giveaways for that are existing sidewalks along with street lights, a staple for subdivisions and streets in the old City where property owners pay two tax bills as opposed to one, as they do in unincorporated parts of Jefferson County, many of which are closeby on the other side of Bardstown Road in the areas around and including Seneca High School.

Peabody, or this section of Peabody, along with streets named Belmont, Palmer, Moulton, and Sumner, make up the subdivision originally known as Village Green. There are also houses fronting on what is now called Goldsmith Lane in the subdivision. It is the only subdivision I know of where nearly every house has extended, or much wider, eaves that is customary on the suburbs. Most of these homes were built with 1050 to 1150 square feet of space.

The subdivision was built along the south side of what was then known as Meyers Lane in the mid 1950s. The easiest way to describe it to many Louisvillians would be to say it is the area behind Toy Tiger. Of course, if you haven't been around for a while you may not know what that means, so a second definition would be the area behind the Showcase Cinemas. Oh wait, they're gone, too.

The extended eaves can be seen in the picture which would be a dead giveaway to anyone who is familiar with Louisville's suburbs.

I do not have a new location waiting to be identified. I'll get one soon.

670. I was seven years old in 1968; Reflections on January 8, 2011

I was seven years old in 1968. As such, I do not remember a lot of it. Unlike my little brother, who can cite incidents from memory with the accuracy of blue-ray technology, my memory is rather faded and shaded for a great number of my earliest years.

I began 1968 as a second grader at Blue Lick Elementary School in southern Jefferson County. My teacher was Miss Hoagland. I rode Bus #402 to and from school each day catching the bus at the foot of my street, where Whippoorwill empties into South Park. Afternoons in my neighborhood, that period after school and before supper, consisted of bike-riding, tree climbing, playing in the woods behind our house, or just hanging out.

There were a few places where the "just hanging out" took place. At the dead-end of Mason in front of the Rogers' house was a gum tree. I'm not sure exactly what kind of tree it was but it had a clear gooey substance oozing from various points in the tree. At the other end of Mason, in the Riddle's front yard, on the southwest corner with Walter Avenue (where Walter was (and remains) one lane wide) were two trees that, at the age one is in second grade, was about as far as I was suppose to travel away from home, about 750 feet from our side deck.

Eventually, every evening about six it was time to come in and eat. We ate breakfast and dinner, called supper, religiously at the breakfast bar in the kitchen. For the record, our dining room was a formal room in which, until my grandmother's passing in 1976, we rarely ate other than at Christmastime. At this kitchen breakfast bar on one side sat me and my grandmother; on the other was my grandfather, my brother, and my mother. Opposite the end of the bar was an oversized portable dishwasher on top of which sat a Zenith television set. That's what you called them back then, a television set.

And it was at the breakfast bar, after we had eaten, that we all five sat and watched the national news learning the events of the day from across the Republic and around the world. We watched NBC and its newscast, which I remember being called The World Tonight, but I wouldn't bet more than a nickel on that memory.

Whatever it was called, it was on that black-and-white TV that I watched most of 1968 pan out, a melodramatic year which, thankfully, has not been equalled during my fifty years on the planet. Of great interest was the War in Vietnam. I recall that I had older cousins and a few friends and neighbors who were serving in Vietnam. I learned of other places too, called Laos and Thailand and Cambodia. If there were comments on the war, I do not recall them. It was from that berth as well that I watched the news of the assasination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in Memphis, Tennessee. I honestly had no idea who Dr. King was although my grandparents found his assasination to be horrific. I was mostly interested because I had just a few summers before that been to Memphis and was anxious to see if I could remember any of the locations now being played and replayed on the television screen.

It wasn't that TV but another larger one, an old big brown box of the Motorola brand, in the living room that I do clearly recall the assasination of Senator Robert Kennedy, late in the night. Politics has always been an integral part of my family and Kennedy's ascension in the Democratic Party was being followed as he had spent time in eastern Kentucky making friends with people from our state. My uncle had supported Senator McCarthy and I do not remember if my grandparents were Kennedy people or not. I do know that after his death, we strongly supported Vice President Hubert Humphrey in his bid to become president.

It was only from stories in the years to come that I learned more and more about 1968. When I was 14, one of my first jobs was working in a men's clothing store in Okolona operated by Mr. Howard Klein. Mr. Howard, as he was known in the neighborhood, was a wonderful man, my first real boss. He had moved his store to the Silver Heights Shopping Center location in 1968. He formerly had operated a shop at 28th and Dumesnil in Parkland but his business succombed to the riots which took place in the city that summer. He told me stories of how that area basically ceased to exist as a business center during the summer of 1968.

I also learned about the 1968 Democratic National Convention from my Uncle Don and my grandmother Hockensmith, both of whom were Democratic operatives. Don was from the left side of the Party while my grandmother was more of a moderate to center-left person. I remember scenes from the convention from watching TV.

Many years later while in college, I learned even more of the summer of unrest for our country, the summer of 1968. I learned about a government and response to the government of acronyms from SNCC to the HUAC, which became the HCUA, as well as SCLC and SNCC. I learned about CORE, the NAACP, events at UC-Berkeley, and something called the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, which many folks called the Black Panthers.

It seemed to me then, as a child living in a nearly-totally white suburban neighborhood, that most of the problems associated with 1968 were related to tension between whites and blacks. And as I became more educated, I learned that what I believed to be the truth was in fact the truth. A great number of Americans had not quite accepted the amagalmation of African-Americans into the general society, something that was in part a result of a civil war which had been fought in this country, and in my state, more than 100 years earlier.

Through my lifetime the tensions have seemed to either go away or just became more acceptable. Few people today work or shop or attend school in places that are solely white or solely black. The exception to that, as has been noted for many years, is during the worship hour on Sunday morning. In that place, we have remained quite largely segregated. Even in my rather liberal congregration of Episcopalians, I can think of only one African-American who attends on a regular basis.

But, on the whole, the blacks and whites of our country have lived more or less harmoniously for many years since the tensions of 1968. But that changed to an extent in 2008 with the election of a bi-racial president, Barack Obama. President Obama handily defeated the incumbent president winning states which Democrats had not carried in many years, perhaps since 1968. And that win began what has been seen as a strong decline in the civility between the races, a decline which can be heard most any day on AM radio.

And many ugly things which had never been said before were and are now being said regularly without much recrimination. Talk show hosts have all but called for a revolution. There has been a great rise in the number of hate groups springing up across the country. Places like the Knob Creek Gun Range in western Bullitt County have allowed their premises to be used to sell merchandise which could easily be described as racist and alarming.

Certain talk show hosts have been far more incendiary than others and no one who is listening cannot believe that these folks do not know that the words they are using can and will lead to violence.

The non-violent nature of our country, a nature fostered by Dr. King in the early 1960s before his assasination in 1968, was shattered today in Tucson, Arizona where a 22 year old gunman opened fire in a grocery store parking lot, killing six persons including a nine year old girl and a federal judge, and sending thirteen others to the hopsital, many with life-threatening wounds, among them a member of the United States Congress.

This was an assasination with great and grave results. I believe, unfortunately, that it is only the beginning. Our country is civilly broke. The confraternity of men and women which has sustained us for 235 years is no more. We have become a nation of I's - you's and me's - we've forgotten that we were a nations of we's. We've forgotten that the first and most important word of our Constitution is We, as in "We, the people."

I am a partisan person and I feel there is blame to be placed at the feet of certain individuals and certain political parties. I will not lay that blame here. At this point I will close, hoping that when America wakes up tomorrow morning we will reflect on the tragic events of January 8, 2011 and make a united effort at changing course. The alternative is civil war. This is where we are headed. And that is sad.

CIVIL WAR (1990)
Written by Axl Rose, Duff McKagan, and Slash.
Sung by Guns 'n' Roses

Look at your young men fighting
Look at your women crying
Look at your young men dying
The way they've always done before

Look at the hate we're breeding
Look at the fear we're feeding
Look at the lives we're leading
The way we've always done before

My hands are tied
The billions shift from side to side
And the wars go on with brainwashed pride
For the love of God and our human rights
And all these things are swept aside
By bloody hands time can't deny
And are washed away by your genocide
And history hides the lies of our civil wars

D'you wear a black armband
When they shot the man
Who said "Peace could last forever"
And in my first memories
They shot Kennedy
I went numb when I learned to see
So I never fell for Vietnam
We got the wall of D.C. to remind us all
That you can't trust freedom
When it's not in your hands
When everybody's fightin'
For their promised land
And

I don't need your civil war
It feeds the rich while it buries the poor
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
I don't need your civil war
Ow, oh no, no, no, no, no

Look at the shoes you're filling
Look at the blood we're spilling
Look at the world we're killing
The way we've always done before
Look in the doubt we've wallowed
Look at the leaders we've followed
Look at the lies we've swallowed
And I don't want to hear no more

My hands are tied
For all I've seen has changed my mind
But still the wars go on as the years go by
With no love of God or human rights
'Cause all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

"WE PRACTICE SELECTIVE ANNIHILATION OF MAYORS AND
GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS FOR EXAMPLE TO CREATE A VACUUM
THEN WE FILL THAT VACUUM AS POPULAR WAR ADVANTAGE
PEACE IS CLOSER" **

I don't need your civil war
It feeds the rich while it buries the poor
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
And I don't need your civil war
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no
I don't need your civil war
I don't need your civil war
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
I don't need your civil war
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no uh-oh-uh, no uh-oh, uh no
I don't need one more war

I don't need one more war
No, no, no, no uh-oh-uh, no uh-oh, uh no
WHAZ SO CIVIL 'BOUT WAR ANYWAY?

Hidden Location #9

Once again Marty Meyer correctly identified our hidden location, which was Cardinal Drive alongside Audubon Golf Course. This picture is taken in the 1400 block of Cardinal, a streetname which runs along the north and south sides of the Audubon Golf course but the two sides never meet. There is a right-of-way surrounding the golf course which on the map is identified as Cardinal. But the southern-most Cardinal, where our recent picture was taken, dead-ends a few block to the east. On the northside, Cardinal turns into Nightingale Drive at Eagle Pass. Technically, this isn't true as the Cardinal right-of-way proceeds around the property line between the Fincastle Heights apartments (actually a mutual ownership cooperative) and the new condos which face the golf course. You may also notice that a few of the houses on the southernmost Cardinal look more like those in Audubon Park than those in Camp Taylor. There is a reason. Before Camp Taylor the neighborhood was Camp Zachary Taylor the military installation, it was farmland largely owned by Sallie Durrett and her heirs. Some of it had been sold off into parcels. The entirety of what is now commonly known as the Camp Taylor neighborhood was in fact laid out as part of the Audubon Park subdivision with similarly rolling lanes and circles and small parks. But the Great War interfered and most of it was bought by Uncle Sam. The 1400 and 1500 blocks of Cardinal were already begun with homes similar to those across the fairway in what is now the City of Audubon Park. But they are all that were ever built on the southside. Eventually Camp Zachary Taylor closed, with most of its operations moved to the newer Camp Henry Knox, now Fort Knox. The subdivision which became the Camp Taylor neighborhood abandoned the plans of Audubon Park and used as its streets those created by the United States Army. A few new ones have been added - McKay, Grove and Orchard (where the Army maintained a fruit orchard), and some others, but for the most part the streets in use today in Camp Taylor are those created for service in World War I.

Below is a new hidden location. Good luck.

The new year

Today marks a blogaversary - the 4th birthday of The Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606. Our first entry, four years ago today, celebrated the 110th Congress and specifically the election of Congressman John Yarmuth and the then-incoming Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi.

In those four years the political landscape has gone from the newness of 2007 through the soaring heights of the election of Barack Obama as the Republic's 44th president, levelling off and slowing donw in 2009 during the president's first year, to a reversing-of-fortunes election in 2010 where the glory-fires of 2008 were doused by 2010's Tea. A brief progressive renaissance took place in the closing days of the anything-but lame duck session of the 111th Congress.

The 112th Congress will convene sometime this week with the Dark Side of the Aisle in charge being led by its orange-tinted barkeeper's son, John "Hell No" Boehner, the United States Representative from Ohio's 8th Congressional District, a collection of suburban and rural counties along southern Ohio's border with Indiana, just north of Cincinnati and west of Dayton.

Also convening this week, actually today, is the 2011 Kentucky General Assembly, led in the Democratic House by Speaker Greg Stumbo and in the Republican Senate by President David Williams, who is also a candidate for governor this year. I do not have any hope or expectation of an exceptional or even a successful Session. Our system of government in Frankfort needs an overhaul but that isn't likely to happen. Our filing dealine for members of the General Assembly - and all other offices in the Commonwealth - falls at the end of this month with the Primary a few short months later in mid-May.

This needs to change. While I disagree with nearly everything else promoted by Senator Williams, known as the Bully from Burkesville (in Cumberland County), he has for several Sessions now put forth the idea of moving the filing deadline to sometime in April and the Primary to sometime in August. As I have each time he has previously introduced such a measure, I lend my support to this effort. I believe it is in the best interests of the Commonwealth. Chances are good this measure will go nowhere, as it has in its previous iterations. Why would this year be any different?

In fact, because of the ongoing governor's race, this year will probably be far worse. Everything which is said and done will be couched in terms of who it will or will not help in the gubernatorial election this November. It is a hopeless course. The legislators and the Commonwealth would probably be better served if the two Houses convened and immediately adjourned so we could go ahead and run the governor's race without any interference with the need to actually govern. It is a sorry state of affairs.

There are other races on the ballot this year, all Constitutional offices with their operations in Frankfort. I'm participating in two of those - Adam Edelen's race for Auditor of Public Accounts and Allison Lundergan Grimes' race for Secretary of State. You will hear more about these in postings later in the political season.

Louisville inaugurated its new mayor Greg Fischer yesterday and will install a new Metro Council President this Thursday, fully expected to be 10th District Councilman Jim King, Mr. Fischer's opponent in last year's Democratic Primary. I expect the work of the Metro Council [where I should note I am employed] to be far more productive than either Kentucky's General Assembly or the Republic's 112th Congress and its ongoing Senate.

2011 does not promise to be a progessive year by anyone's imagination. So, in the meantime, I will make my postings - hopefully more than in the last year - and continue the ongoing life we all live, full of ups and downs and curves and straightways. Party on. Thanks Be To God.

Hidden Location #8

Once again Marty Meyer correctly identified the hidden location, the latest one being the 800 block of East Chestnut Street. I'm not sure how he got that one so quickly, but so he did, and he did so quickly enough for Curtis Morrison to accuse him of satellite-tracking me or something. For those not familiar with this block, it is best visited in late April when the dogwoods are in bloom. This is one of the prettiest blocks in downtown Louisville - actually in the Phoenix Hill neighborhood - when those pink blossoms show up. The old Ursuline Academy is partially pictured on the right. My Aunt Judy Whalen Noble was an Ursuline graduate.

Below is a new location. Not as difficult, I don't think, but then, apparently none of them have been too difficult.

2011

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress for all mankind.

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty night;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring happy bells, across the snow.
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1850)

Happy New Year.

Hidden Location #7

It's been a while - the "camera" part of my phone has been sending pictures other than to my email.

This one should be easy.



Happy Fifth Day of Christmas. Seven more to celebrate.

667. Merry Christmas and all that

First, some old business. On December 1, someone (Anonymous) posted a comment (which for some reason did not show up until today) about me singing Frank Sinatra's My Way in Mr. Moorman's Chemistry class and Mrs. Risner's English class. In my music list published in September, I failed to include it. While it has not remained one of my favorites, it was in fact at one time one of them. I learned to play My Way on the piano in Shera Baker's living over in Treasure Island. I still play it often as it is one of the few songs I was actually taught to play, by Shera no less, as opposed to most of my music which I picked up by ear. But Shera and I were never in class together so whoever posted that comment has to be someone in my class, another person who probably turned 50 this year. Whoever it was, I appreciate your reminder about what was once one of my favorite songs.

With that out of the way - sort of, we'll get back to the turning 50 - today is Christmas Day. Merry Christmas to all of you, Christian or not. Christmas is at once a religious holiday, a cultural one, and significantly a commercial one. Most people get something out of it, even the atheists. That's all fine with me.

I used to get more out of Christmas than I do nowadays. Growing up Christmas was a big, big deal. We celebrated five different places usually, the main one being at home with my maternal grandparents where me, my mother, and my brother lived. We usually had relatives staying one or two nights, either Aunt Dorothy, my grandmother's aunt, or Uncle Milford, my grandfather's little brother. We'd also go to my Dad's house, and to my Dad's parents' house, as well as my great-grandparents' houses in Frankfort - the Lewis family home on Old Louisville Road and the Hockensmith home, originally on Devils Hollow Road, but later on Cavern Drive off what used to be called Parkside Drive but is now the West Frankfort Connector.

Most of those people are dead - my great-grandparents (I knew four of my great-grandparents, six if you count step-great-grandmothers), all of my grandparents, Aunt Dorothy, and Uncle Milford, and quite a few others. Even a generation closer, my dad's older brother, Uncle Don to everyone who knew him, has been dead since April 2005. The family members have been replaced generationally by my brother's children - six of them, ranging in age from 23 to 7. So, at least the Christmas morning part of Christmas is reserved for them. The youngest three are still at my brother's house and while I didn't this year, I have been over there in Christmasses-past to see the wild abandon of opening presents.

The adults in my family, along with these three youngest members, will gather later this week at my Mom's for our family celebration, a small but nice affair. We'll eat dinner and exchange presents, many of which will be gift cards. My mother decides the day we actually celebrate (not only Christmas but all the other holidays including birthdays) based on a number of factors with this year's decision being complicated by her not feeling well the last week or so.

For me, Christmas has come to mean attending Mass. Over the years I've done so mostly at Holy Family, my church home for just over thirty years, up until this year. When I was in my twenties, I regularly attended with a number of college friends at Saint Francis of Assisi. A few times I went to the Cathedral of the Assumption downtown, once to St. John's UCC downtown, and a few other times I went to the Episcopal Church of the Advent, the church I finally joined very early this year after wandering in the religious desert for several years, all the while maintaining an active membership at Holy Family. Since joining Advent, I've tried to be just as active there as I was in my old church.

Christmas comes just once a year, so the song goes. Frankly, as I get older, I am thankful for that. Getting older, by the way, is what 2010 has mostly meant for me. While I had a very busy and successful year politically, all of that has been internally overshadowed by two related events - being 49 while anticipating being 50, and actually being 50, which I've honestly not yet mastered as I've at this point passed the 1/3 mark of my 51st year. For most of the year being 49, I recognized that I was getting older. I'm still apparently healthy despite significant health problems when I was 44. I'm also still active enough to enjoy myself. But I also realized that there is lots left to do.

On September 23rd I turned 50, celebrating in grand proportion (as far as I'm concerned) with a party (on the 19th) attended by 175 people and recorded for posterity and subsequently posted on my Facebook page. Friends from throughout my life attended and I was very pleased. My entire family was there at some point as was many in my current political family, noticeably my congressman who stayed for most of the three hour party. But then, instead of "getting" older, I actually got older when the 23rd rolled around four days after the party.

Suddenly, the terminus of my life is not so far away. Hopefully it is still well on down the road, but I am likely much closer to the end than the beginning. And that has not been a pleasant experience thus far. In all of my life, while I've had a few relationships, none of them have lasted long, and none of them have been entirely fulfilling. And now, at 50, I've come very close to deciding that I do not want to be alone as I wander into the twilight of my life a few years from now. And I've decided that there are things left to do which cannot be left undone. That famous "bucket list" that people have is rather full for me and the time has come to do something about that.

My guess is that means more than making new friends and going to new places. It also entails a new attitude about what and who is and isn't important. While I have few extremely close friends, I am blessed to have lots of friends, many of whom I've kept as friends for ten, twenty, thirty, and even a few for forty years. I've also worked hard at creating and maintaining a friendship base with those ten, twenty, and even thirty years younger than me. Somehow I think that helps keep one's outlook in perspective, as there are far more people younger than me in control of society than those of my age or older. Even President Obama is younger than me. Having young friends is also good for the soul. Further, some with whom I've been close the last few years are finding their own ways, independent of my control or influence. While it is hard to let go of some of that, it is also a necessary component of life but one that is fairly new to me. In particular my friend Keith, whom I first met in 2000, has departed with his new partner for New York to do whatever it is that people do when they are in their mid-20s and free of most any restraints. And I'm very happy for him and have been supportive when asked. I love him dearly.

I've also decided to divorce myself from a very limited number of people, although I'm not quite sure I'm fully prepared to do so. Thus far there has been only one on that list although I suspect 2011 will see a few more be set aside. And I've decided to aggressively pursue some new friends while I have time to do so. Such pursuit is the direct result of one conversation I had with the one person I've thus far set aside. I hope it will work. I have no idea if it will or not.

I have other plans for 2011. One is to continue the diet I've been upon since November 3rd. I've lost 25 pounds so far, just under half my goal. I'm very happy about that - it is the first time I've lost weight in twenty years. Ironically, the last time I went on a diet, twenty years ago, one reason was because I thought I was getting older. Now I am; now I have to.

My hope is 2011 will see siginificant change in my life. I'm not all that sure what that change might be, but I am planning to engage it, envelope myself in it, and enjoy it for all it may be worth. That's my Christmas present to myself. A renewal of my life plan. It is the best Christmas present I've given myself in a long time, perhaps the best ever. We'll see how it goes.

I hope Christmas has been and is and will be for you as rewarding as what I am planning for it to be for me. To my seven faithful readers, and all the rest of you, Merry Christmas and God's Blessings.

Latest Winner on Hidden Location

Marty Meyer must be following me around. He correctly identified the location as River Road, looking toward downtown, alongside the old River Road Country Club property.

The old country club property is being converted to a park by Louisville Metro government which owns the land. The clubhouse was recently raised. One of the features of this property is the appearance, here and there, of an old set of railroad tracks. The Louisville, Harrod's Creek, and Westport Railroad once ran alongside River Road, or just to the southeast of River Road. The rail line never quite made it to Westport, an idyllic little village in Oldham County. The final destination along the line was Propsect.

The narrow-guage tracks remain along quite bit of the route, covered over by time and topsoil. There are sets of tracks below many parcels of land in our county, and more than a few streets. They are most noticeable when one of the utility companies are doing work and their construction takes them below the current grade of the road. Arguments are considered to revive Louisville's already-on-site light rail system which formerly served horse-drawn trolleys and later interurban lines reaching out to places like Okolona, Valley Station, Middletown, Jeffersontown, and Prospect.

I'm not sure which lines are still there or which rights-of-ways remain. But it is worth considering - something I do every time I see those tracks peek through the ground along River Road at the old River Road Country Club.

Congratulations, Marty. There will be another hopefully more difficult hidden location soon.

Happy 37th, Rob. Rest In Peace, Mr. Ambassador

Today would have been my friend Rob's 37th birthday. I miss him. Next summer he will have been dead twenty years, the victim of a motorcycle wreck on Preston Highway at Standiford Lane.

Rob was joined today in eternity by Richard Holbrooke, a man I've never met, but one whose name has been in an out of American diplomatic news since before Rob left this world.

Mr. Holbrooke, a former American ambassador, was President Obama's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, two places among many that the president and America needs a second set of experienced eyes and ears. Mr. Holbrooke was that. This is a sad and great loss for America's ship of State.

Happy Birthday Rob. Rest In Peace Mr. Ambassador Holbrooke.

665. Can't we at least say "No" to anal? -- from The Rude Pundit

I received the following in the email today from my friend Ray Crider. I like it a lot. Be warned, there are enough f-bombs in it to start a decent orgy. It comes from "The Rude Pundit" whose writing can be found at www.rudepundit.blogspot.com.

*****

Note to the Weary Left: It's Okay to Have Principles:


So after backing President Obama on compromise after compromise on various bills, on the stimulus, on health care reform, after supporting and advocating for deals that were not only far from perfect, but were in some ways detrimental to the cause for which the bills themselves were created, after watching the President reach out again and again to Republicans, only to be told he wasn't reaching out enough and only to watch Obama say that he needs to do more to compromise, after seeing Republicans drub Democrats in an election because many Democrats were too afraid to stand for anything Democratic for fear of seeming too "partisan," after listening to Obama justify doing almost everything that George W. Bush did in the name of national security and, in some cases, going further, after years and years of watching Democrats allowing Republicans to set the terms of all arguments, whether in the majority or minority, after investing in Barack Obama the modicum of hope he asked for in changing the terms of that long, ongoing American political fistfight, only to see the whole thing twisted again by the right as they put forth the most obnoxiously anti-American candidates they could find and obstructed progress in an unprecedented way, finally, on this one thing, on absolutely opposing allowing the tax rate for the wealthiest 2% of Americans to rise by a small margin, we on the left are told by people across the political spectrum that we want too much and that we need to back down and that we need to be happy because this is the best we're gonna get.

To which the Rude Pundit can only say, "Blow me." You're allowed to dissent, dear, worried liberals. You're allowed to draw a fucking inviolable line. The Rude Pundit has supported Obama on issue after issue, but he is allowed to join with many Democrats in the Congress and call, "Bullshit." No one gets a blank check.

No, thank God, Allah, Buddha, Everyone, or No One, he's not facing the panic and horror of having his unemployment insurance cut off, the extension of which should never have been tied to the tax cuts at all (and was the stupidest move by every Democrat in DC). But what he's facing is the long-term horror of our decimated economy after a decade of irrational policies, topped by the political suicide bomb of the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. He's facing the inevitable result of multiple decades of unending attacks on the poor by government budget cuts and corporate exploitation. And who fucking warned everyone about this? Who stood there, even in the good times, waving their fuckin' arms and saying that there's gonna be hell to pay, when Reagan gutted programs for the poor and then slashed taxes while building up the military for no good reason other than to pay off contractors? Who jumped up and down for attention while Clinton triangulated the fuck out of the welfare safety net? Who had the most credibility when Bush II raided the Treasury to give money to the rich while fighting two wars? While all three of them gutted regulations on financial and other industries? Yeah, we on the left, motherfuckers.

Bernie Sanders' epic speech on the Senate floor wasn't just about the tax cut. It was about an insanity of instant financial gratification that puts the desires of the very few above the needs of the very, very many, an insanity that has fucked this country for the rest of our lives. Again and again, with the assistance of the conservative Democrat Mary Landrieu, who voted for the original tax cuts, Sanders came back to the income disparity that has turned the United States into an oligarchy. Shit, it was always that way. But at least it was a benevolent oligarchy. Not anymore, as Wall Street greed pulls on our flayed flesh to finally skin us all alive.

Don't worry. The tax cut extension will pass. The unemployment benefits extension will pass, as it should. We will put off any hard decisions on our future again for two years. And then, don't worry, we'll put them off again. Because that's who we are. That's our learned behavior. We are Americans and we've forgotten how to sacrifice anything because no one for a generation has asked us to. We're like Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas: we've decided to drink ourselves to death while being cared for by whores.

Oh, dear weary, weary leftists all, we've been treated like the once-virginal cheerleader who gave in when the quarterback wanted a hand job and then gave in again when he wanted a blow job, saying that it wasn't sex, no, not really, giving in, yes, even though it was against our core beliefs, to straight fucking, but, god, can't we at least say "No" to anal? Or is that too much to ask anymore?

Hidden Location #6 and the winner on #5

Marty Meyer correctly identified Hidden Location #5 as the corner of South Park and Blue Lick roads. Specifically the picture is looking to the south-southeast. The industrial building in the background, on the southeast corner, is a boat sales, service, and storage outfit. That property is the old Mohr property. Across the street for many years stood the old Holsclaw house, which was moved when I was a kid from that corner to just down South Park Road to the west. A Korean family has operated a small farm at that site for over thirty years. The Silver Heights Shppoing Center is just south of this intersection and I was standing in the property that was known, when I was a kid, as the Moody property. The old Moody mansion, historically the McCawley mansion, was torn down in the early 1990s.

Of the two streets in this intersection, Blue Lick is by far the older and may have been a part of the branch of the Wilderness Road which broke off from the more well-known one in central Kentucky. History tells us that a branch generally followed the Salt River west from Harrodsburg over to the Shepherdsville area, specifically to the Bullitt Salt Licks, thence northward to what is now Preston Highway in Okolona, and from there northwestward to the ancient Buffalo crossing of the Ohio River at 26th Street. All of these roads follow old buffalo paths established long before this area was occupied by the pioneers of the 18th century.

South Park, on the other hand, is relatively new. It was called either Depot Station or Deposit Station Road well into the 20th century and connected Okolona to Fairdale via Minor's Lane (or as the county now calls it, Minor Lane). The section from the southern terminus of Minors Lane, where Pape's Hardware once occupied the building on the northeast corner, was pushed through over to Blue Lick in the 1920s. The final section, connecting Blue Lick to Preston came somewhat later although I am unsure of when.

We have a new location today for your perusal and comments. In identifying the location, I would ask that you be specific - street, location, and general area. Good luck.