News and Music Discovery
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Many residents of the Four Rivers region devote their time to restoring and preserving our history. WKMS Reporters set out to meet some of those residents to produce the stories you'll find below. We get background on Kentucky's role in the forgotten war of 1812, then we meet a man who's devote much of his time to restoring honor by way of headstones to veterans of that war.Reporters Angela Hatton and Heidi Couch report on ways people in our region revert to the "old ways" to make sweet sorghum molasses and healthy teas and salves.Casey Northcutt and Shelly Baskin report on the little talked about history history of Burlesque and Moonshine.We also learn about ancient Native American Mounds in our region and how Murray State is preserving recorded conversations from nearly 45 years ago.

Kentucky Played a Major Roll in the Forgotten War of 1812

Wikimedia Commons
Zachary Taylor at the Battle of Fort Harrison

June marked the bicentennial of the start of the War of 1812.  Not many Kentuckians know much about the conflict, aside from the burning of the White House, and “The Star-Spangled Banner.”  Even fewer know about the role the Commonwealth played in it, despite the fact that if you live in the Jackson Purchase, you likely live in a county named for a soldier who fought and died in one battle of the War of 1812: Major Bland Ballard, Major Benjamin Graves, Captain Paschal Hickman, and Captain Virgil McCracken.  

For some more background, Todd Hatton spoke with Jim Holmberg, Curator of Special Collections for the Filson Historical Society in Louisville.

Todd Hatton hails from Paducah, Kentucky, where he got into radio under the auspices of the late, great John Stewart of WKYX while a student at Paducah Community College. He also worked at WKMS in the reel-to-reel tape days of the early 1990s before running off first to San Francisco, then Orlando in search of something to do when he grew up. He received his MFA in Creative Writing at Murray State University. He vigorously resists adulthood and watches his wife, Angela Hatton, save the world one plastic bottle at a time.
Related Content