Gary West

Back in 2004 I wrote an article for a statewide publication about drive-in theaters in Kentucky and how they had pretty much become a thing of the past. Twelve years later I wrote another one. In the late 50s and into the 60s there were 117, almost one per county, from one end of the state to the other. But not so fast my friend. It looks like they are making a comeback. Well, sort of. There are eight of what were considered dinosaurs still showing flicks in Kentucky and because of the way our world has been turned upside down they are being rediscovered, even repurposed to meet the demand...

Coins and stamps are the two most collectible hobbies in the world. But do you know what is third? Postcards. “It usually starts with seeing one at a yard sale, or flea market that shows a hometown or place of interest, says Ray Buckberry, a Bowling Green collector. Buckberry, and Hodgenville residents Carl Howell and Robin Milby are among several other Kentuckians who have spent years accumulating a collection of cards that do much more than take up space boxed up in a closet. “It’s not the numbers in a collection, but the quality that counts,” Howell is quick to say. “Postcards tell so many stories about people and a way of life.” Another...

I’ve been writing this column since 2002, and because of it I have been able to meet and even become personal friends with quite a few interesting people. One of those is Steve Nally. Bourbon master distiller Steve Nally is a big believer in the bottom to the top business approach. That’s the way he did it... starting at the bottom and working his way to the top. As a 21-year-old living in Loretto, KY, he needed a job. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do to make a living, but he felt sure it wasn’t going to be in farming. Living only a short distance from Makers Mark Distillery...

Rodger Bird stood in his own end zone waiting for the Virginia Tech kicker to get the 1963 University of Kentucky football season underway. He was a sophomore playing his first varsity game (freshman were ineligible back then) and a sold out Stoll Field in Lexington was waiting to see what was considered the greatest crop of home grown recruits in Wildcat football history. Bird, from Corbin; Rick Norton, Louisville; Sam Ball, Henderson; Rick Kestner, Belfry; Talbot Todd, Richmond; Basil Mullins, Paintsville, and Mike McGraw, Ft. Thomas were the core of coach Charlie Bradshaw’s treasure find. It didn’t take long for them to find out. Boom, the game was underway. Bird gathered...

Joel Ray Sprowls Lincoln Jamboree in Hodgenville is about as old school as it gets. It’s a throwback to days gone by in the entertainment world even in Kentucky. Although it has never attained the global status of Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry, it has left a deep footprint in the small town where Abe Lincoln was born, Hodgenville, Kentucky. Several years ago I had an invitation from Joel Ray to visit and spend a couple of hours talking about how he turned a “you’ll never make it” country music show into one that has lasted 67 years. “Some said it wouldn’t last,” he told me. “Well, I must have done something...

Do you ever go back to the old neighborhood where you grew up?  Is it recognizable?  Is the house you lived in still standing?  Have all of the neighborhood families moved away? There are times, especially if I’m by myself, I’ll get nostalgic when I go back to the town I grew up in, in the early 50’s and 60’s, and conjure up memories of days gone-by in Elizabethtown. It was before I-65 was built, and the bulk of traffic going north and south came smack through the middle of town via 31-W, referred to as “Dixie Dieway.”  If navigating around the town square wasn’t bad enough, railroad tracks impeded that...

It was April 3,1974, and the morning had begun as expected with an April shower that soon turned to sunshine. It was nice enough for some of those in Brandenburg, Kentucky, to crank up lawnmowers for their first seasonal mow. A couple of hours later, shortly after 4 p.m. the town, and those who lived there, their lives would change forever. The first and only F-5 tornado in Kentucky history swept into the area, virtually rendering Brandenburg, a town of less than 2,000, a mere shadow of what it once was. Thirty-one people died, 18 of those living on Green Street. Forty-five years ago there were no sophisticated weather radar systems or...

Anyone who has ever lost anything in a big city airport knows it’s pretty much a lost cause. The chances of getting it back are slim and none, and you know which one left town. Heck, getting a suitcase back from “lost luggage” is difficult enough, but walking off and forgetting your prized digital Nikon camera in the busy Cincinnati Airport is a gone-forever-moment. That’s exactly what Louisvillian Lloyd Gardner did several months ago as he and his wife, Janet departed for a vacation to Ireland in April. “When we got there I realized I didn’t have it in my backpack when I got ready to take some pictures,” Gardner offered....

No matter where you live in Kentucky or what month it is, Kentuckians are ready to talk a little basketball. With summer all-star games, college recruitment and NBA playoffs in the news, it seems fitting to tell a basketball story that has been lost to the ages. If you will step back in time with me to 1955 when a young man from Woodburn, Kentucky, in Warren County set out to enroll at the University of Kentucky know-ing his family would pay his way for the first two years and after that he was on his own. Jay Atkerson began high school at Warren County High School as a freshman hoping to...

Walter Tevis, in spite of an Ichabod Crane look and often wearing ill-fitting clothes, was popular in the Carlisle community. Shortly after coming to the school he met another new teacher, Jamie Griggs, a Home Economic instructor, and a recent graduate of Eastern Kentucky University. The two of them soon became an item and everyone in Carlisle knew it. Jamie would accompany Walter at lunch time on walks outside of the school, while he smoked and told her of his plans to become a writer. During football games the pair sold coffee and popcorn in the concession stand, and with Walter being 24 and Jamie 22, they felt they were...