1939 Flood
We’ve told you stories of turbulence in our community. Now we’ll tell you a story of bravery in the face of tragedy.It was Independence Day, 1939. A sudden, violent rainstorm in the Haldeman area caused water levels to rise so quickly, residents had little warning and little time to leave their homes. As the night sky illuminated with rapid flashes of lightning, residents took to the hills, and the railroad, to save their lives.Flood survivors still share their experiences. Maxey Mauk tells of carrying her little brother, Joe, out of the deep water on her back.Just before the flood, Uncle Dave Trumbo went door to door on Raine Street and the area across the tracks to warn residents. Many people climbed into boxcars parked on railroad sidings, the rising water eventually forcing them to climb to the top. The water current was so strong, the boxcars soon began rolling down the tracks.Resident Hobart Williams and some of his friends were traveling east on Main Street in a Model A pickup truck when they were met by a wall of water near the current IGA Store. Before they could get out of the truck, the water had risen to its front fenders. They caught a boat floating down the street and used it to help rescue people from Hargis Avenue and Railroad Street.The carnival visiting town on the lot beside the current Citizens Bank was destroyed, animals and rides scattered by the flood water. Erected in 2014 on the 75th anniversary of the event, a brass marker in the west corner of the C&O Passenger Depot, indicates how high water levels reached there — nearly 4 feet. All told, 25 lives were lost in the 1939 Flood.
Former site of the Cosmograph Company
They called him the Utility Man. It’s maybe too simple a description for the man who brought this eastern Kentucky community into the 20th century. Edward Maggard was beloved for bringing Morehead residents the luxuries of modern life — electricity, phone service, water, and, possibly the most exciting of them all, the movies.Maggard, an inventor, businessman and entrepreneur, moved to Morehead from Sandy Hook in 1903 and founded Morehead Light Company, bringing light into the homes of the city’s 450 residents.Connecting Morehead by phone was his next adventure. Maggard established Morehead Telephone Company in 1919, stringing telephone wires that carried voice signals across the community and enabling conversation between residents who were located miles apart.He added water and gas services to the community in 1922, and later founded the county’s first ice plant. But it was a short movie Maggard produced about Morehead for the state legislature that played a pivotal role in making this community the regional economic center it would later become. Maggard’s film swayed legislators to locate a college here.Maggard opened the first theater in Morehead following that successful film. First located on Bishop Avenue and later in the Cozy Building on Main Street, Maggard showed his first silent movie accompanied by piano — called a nickelodeon — using Edison’s original projector. The projector produced a disturbing flicker on screen that inspired Maggard to invent his own shutter. He patented his design and opened a projector factory on this site. The projector, called the Cosmograph, was popular for several years before sound projectors made an appearance. One of Maggard’s Cosmographs is on display at the Morehead History and Railroad Museum.
Cora Wilson Stewart Moonlight School
Adult literacy education was born here.Its founder, Rowan County native Cora Wilson Stewart, began teaching elementary school in 1895 at age 20, progressing to become the first woman elected superintendent of Rowan County Schools, the first female president of the Kentucky Education Association, the director of the National Illiteracy Crusade, the chairwoman of President Herbert Hoover’s Commission on Education, and a delegate to the 1920 Democratic Convention.She was even nominated as President of the United States.Her passion was education, and more specifically, helping adults learn to read and write. Becoming aware of the magnitude of adult illiteracy, particularly in rural Kentucky, she founded the Moonlight Schools movement. She recruited volunteer instructors and began teaching adults to read and write on September 5, 1911, using the same one-room schoolhouses where children learned by day, like the one you see here. She developed a series of adult literacy books and materials to assist in her efforts, including a reading primer, “The Soldier’s First Book,” to teach military recruits to read during World War II.Stewart, who attended Morehead Normal School (which later became Morehead State University) and the University of Kentucky, expected the Moonlight Schools movement to progress slowly. But she and her volunteers were overwhelmed when more than 1,200 men and women between the ages of 18 and 86 enrolled on the first night of the program.Moonlight Schools would become an international movement.Stewart passed away at the age of 83 in a nursing home, after glaucoma took her eyesight.
Rowan Feud
It was August 4, 1884. It started here on the courthouse lawn.The Civil War had ended 19 years prior, but political emotions still ran high. Tempers flared and whiskey flowed freely on this hot summer day, when a closely contested election for sheriff resulted in a wild melee of fist-fighting, rock-throwing and, ultimately, a gunfight.When the smoke cleared, one innocent bystander was dead and another wounded.It was a tale of two feuding families, the Martins and the Tollivers. Naturally, each family blamed the other for what happened that day. The gunfighters, Floyd Tolliver and John Martin, were indicted for murder. After they were released on bail, they met yet again at a local saloon to determine their fate. Martin drew his pistol and killed Tolliver.To prevent his lynching, officials jailed Martin in nearby Winchester, Kentucky, but the Tollivers were determined to undermine the process. They forged custody papers and had Martin released to two alleged deputies. Martin was put on a train bound for Morehead, which was stopped by armed men in Farmers, Kentucky. The armed men boarded to give Martin a severe case of lead poisoning. He died the next day. But the feud was still alive.During the next three years, perhaps as many as 25 men were killed and the same number wounded in what became the Rowan County War. The conflict grew to involve nearly every resident. At the height of the local war, half the population moved away, some never to return, as lawlessness took command of the area.The State Militia attempted to quell gunfights three times, and the legislature considered dissolving the county. Over time, the Tollivers gained control and ruled ruthlessly.When his two cousins were murdered and their bodies mutilated, Daniel Boone Logan gained support of several locals tired of the fighting. He bought weapons in Cincinnati and had them shipped under the guise of farm machinery to the town of Gates, just east of Morehead. The vigilantes, or regulators as they called themselves, now armed, surrounded the town on June 22, 1887, and began to close in. The Tollivers spotted the regulators, and a three-hour gunfight ensued. Three Tollivers and an ally were killed, and one regulator mortally wounded.The killing stopped, but anger continued for two more years. Newspapers widely reported that two members of the feuding families, Frank Tolliver and Grace Martin, married in 1889, but an official record has yet to be located. Both families still reside in the community and the feud is, thankfully, a distant memory.
Courthouse Square
A courthouse is the flagship of every county. It is where justice is served, votes are cast, and, in our case, is the setting for much of our storied past.Rowan County, formed in 1856, was the 104th county to be established in Kentucky, and was formed from parts of Morgan and Fleming counties. Property for our courthouse square was donated by Isabelle Abbey Oxley, one Morehead’s first settlers.The first courthouse, a log structure, was destroyed in 1864 by Confederate General John Hunt Morgan when he burned it on his famous raid to the North. The next structure, a two-story frame, was active until 1899. Part of the building burned in 1880, but was not totally destroyed. It was on this structure’s lawn in 1884 that the Rowan County War began, when Floyd Tolliver and John Martin started a gunfight that killed an innocent bystander, injured another and launched a three-year feud involving nearly everyone in the county.The third and current brick structure, now on the National Historic Register, was built in 1899. In 2003, Rowan County Fiscal Court received a one million dollar matching grant from The Paul and Lucille Little Foundation. The building was restored to its current state, and since 2005, has served as the Rowan County Arts Center.The arts center provides a public venue for Morehead Theater Guild productions, artist displays, art shows and festivals. It also serves as a meeting location for local groups and individuals.****Starvation and poverty ravaged Rowan County during the Great Depression, just as it did the rest of the country.The Works Progress Administration, born from the Depression during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration, provided means for families and businesses to make a living during these difficult times. Local materials and labor were utilized to construct essential buildings and roads, improving infrastructure while creating jobs and boosting local economies.The Rowan County Jail and the Rowan County Superintendent’s Office were built during the WPA era, between 1934 and 1938. The jail replaced a wooden structure that was inadequate for housing inmates, who often boasted about how easy it was to escape. The wooden jail’s deplorable conditions are recorded in Rowan County Fiscal Court minutes.The Superintendent’s Office was the first central location for conducting school business. Until this building was constructed, school board meetings were held in outlying one-room schoolhouses, which tallied more than 50 in 1930. When the superintendent’s office was built, three new school buildings were also constructed, beginning the consolidation of one-room schools.When the old courthouse was added to the National Historical Register in 1983, these two buildings were not old enough to be included in the nomination. The requirement is for buildings to be 50 years old — the jail and superintendent’s office were only 45 at the time. The buildings were successfully added to the Register in 2016 with the approval of a boundary increase to the old courthouse, which allowed the entire courthouse square to be protected by the designation.
Morehead State University
Frank Button and his mother, Phebe Button, came to Morehead in 1887 with one goal — to help educate the people who survived the terrible feud here between the Martin and Tolliver families. The Rowan County War divided the community so deeply that many people fled, never to return. When the Buttons started teaching elementary classes at Morehead Normal School in October 1887, only one orphan child attended on the first day.It was a meager beginning to the school that would later become a state university.By the end of November 1887, there were 22 students at the school, which was formed under the auspices of the Christian Church.The first classroom building, Hargis Hall, was built in 1889 on land donated by Thomas F. Hargis, a former Confederate officer. Hargis Hall was joined by three other buildings: Hodson Hall, Withers Hall and Burgess Hall.In 1922, Morehead Normal School became Morehead State Normal School. And 1930, the school’s name changed to Morehead State Teachers College. The school thrived until World War II, when many students and faculty left to join the war effort. Its saving grace was the U.S. Navy, which contracted with the college from 1942 to 1944 to train future war technicians in electronics. The Navy sailors were known as Bluejackets during their stay, but also as the college’s rescuers.In 1966, Morehead State Teachers College became Morehead State University.The most recent school of study is the Space Science Program. Dr. Benjamin Malphrus started the program in a small house on Fifth Street. It is now housed in the Space Science Center, located on the eastern end of campus near the football stadium.
Old Town Cemetery
You’re now standing at the resting place of many of Morehead’s early settlers.Old Town Cemetery was established in the late 1800s by Isabelle Abbey Oxley. Buried here, Oxley was the original owner of this site and one of Morehead’s first pioneers. Oxley also donated land for the courthouse square, where the Rowan County Arts Center is now located.No one has been buried in this cemetery since the early 1900s, and at one time, residents were concerned the cemetery could contaminate water supply. In 2006, the Morehead Masonic Lodge #654, which has several members laid to rest here, raised money to restore broken monuments and the City of Morehead Public Works maintains the lawn of the ceremtery. The Morehead Theater Guild has performed a play at Old Town Cemetery titled “Dining with the Dead,” in which actors portray Morehead settlers buried here. The play was written and directed by James D. Reeder.
Caskey Hotel
The Caskey Hotel, owned by AC Caskey, sat prominently on Main Street in downtown Morehead. The 32-room hotel was built in the 1920s and was known as one of Morehead's most popular hotels. As history tells, a local musician, Jim Wilson, was asleep in the hotel and was awaken by the smell of smoke. He was successful in getting everyone out of the hotel safe. The hotel and the shops below the hotel were a loss. It took local and nearby Olive Hill fire departments two hours to get the fire under control. Additionally, several nearby buildings were damaged, seven school buses stored in a garage at the rear of the building were destroyed and firemen escaped flying debris when the building toppled. Damage estimates were reported well over $50,000.
Railroads
Before railroads, a trip to a nearby farm was an all-day affair. People loaded wagons pulled by horses or mules. Product orders from area stores took weeks to arrive, and markets for timber and other commodities were nonexistent. Without the ability to travel out of the county easily, Morehead remained isolated.Enter the Elizabethtown Lexington & Big Sandy Railroad, which built a freight station and lay rail through Morehead in 1881 to connect Kentucky cities Lexington and Ashland. Products soon began to flow in and out of Morehead. The lumber industry boomed. At last, residents were able to expand their horizons by traveling to distant cities and states.During the next 93 years, the railroad industry would be an invaluable asset to Morehead’s growth. Several railroad companies, including the Chesapeake & Ohio, the Tripplet & Big Sandy, The Kentucky Northern, the Morehead & North Fork, and the Christy Creek, were integral in providing passenger service and transporting timber, coal, clay and general freight until those industries played out. Though these railroad lines are now abandoned, their legacy of transforming Morehead and Rowan County into an industrial hub remains.**If walls could talk, these might tell you about the final gun battle in the Rowan County War. On that day in June 1887, more than 1,500 shots were exchanged right here on Railroad Street, now First Street, where you’re standing. Members of the Tolliver family, in their attempt to maintain control of the county, ran into the station and briefly exchanged gunfire with the regulators before attempting to escape.They say this building still has the scars — or bullet holes — to prove it.It’s Rowan County’s oldest commercial building, built in 1881 by the Elizabethtown & Big Sandy Railroad, which was bought out by the Chesapeake & Ohio in 1892. It is one of only two C&O two-story freight stations still standing, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.This freight station offered both passenger and freight service until the depot next door was built in 1904. Passenger service was transferred, and the building then served only freight until the line closed in 1985.When rail service ceased, the building was purchased by local businessman Curly Barker. He stored appliances and furniture here for his Big Store business across the street. It was later rented as a liquor store and then by a swimming pool supply company. In 2014, the building was rented, repaired and restored by the Morehead & North Fork Railroad, a local preservation group named for one of the six historic railroads in the county, and converted into the Morehead History and Railroad Museum. The museum contains information about railroads and general history for Morehead, Rowan County and eastern Kentucky. Plans include laying track between the museum and depot, and moving and restoring a 1924 C&O caboose to become an annex to the museum.