A bit of catching up from the trip, other than the zoo.
Remember Stephen King's "Children of the Corn"? I have "Old Man of the Corn"...Luke couldn't believe how high it was, planted in a field along the street at the Wal-Mart in Peoria.
In Frankfurt, KY, we visited two distilleries, Jim Beam and Bulleit. EVERYBODY, world-round, knows Jim Beam.
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Jim Beam was exactly what you would expect - polished and putting out 400,000 cases per year.
In fact, while on the Warehouse Tour, we were shown the 13,000,000 th barrel of bourbon produced.
With large tour crowds, they had just the plan for the end of tour tasting - a bourbon dispenser! Yulp, you are given a plastic "credit card" at the end of the tour, redeemable at their special dispensers for 2 wee tastes of the bourbons of your choice. Insert card, hold cute little complimentary tasting glass underneath the pour spout, press the button of your choice, and bingo! A tasting.
Bingo! Little tasting glasses to take home!
We drove into Louisville for our second distillery. Did you know they make the Louisville Slugger baseball bats there?
But bourbon is king - even on the rooftops.
The Bulleit distillery is relatively new, started in the 1990's. The visitor center is more modern.
At one time, Old Fitzgerald was produced here.
I knew that bourbon's taste and color are determined by temperature as well as years of aging (12 is best!). But I didn't understand that as the barrels are stored in non-temperature controlled buildings, the process starts. As the weather heats up, the barrel staves expand, allowing the bourbon to seep into the newly charred oak. As the weather turns cold, the barrels staves contract, forcing out the bourbon but keeping a residue that would be responsible for a harsh taste to the bourbon. Each barrel and every stave are different. Over the course of the aging process, this expansion and contraction results in both the color and taste of the bourbon. Also, the color and flavor come from the caramelized sugar in the charred wood. Here is the edge of a stave with the "water line" of how far the bourbon seeped into it. Over a twelve year aging period, up to 70% of a barrel's bourbon may be lost by evaporation through the barrel. This loss is called the "angel's share" and definitely provides atmosphere in the bourbon aging warehouses. It also turns black the bark of nearby trees, making them look like survivors of a forest fire. This same bark blackening effect was used by "revenuers" to find stills in the woods.
Bulleit used to do their own barrel repair, having a cooperage on site. Here is the old building with the tools of the trade.
I don't believe OSHA was around then, but safety was always a concern!
After a tasting in which we were allowed to keep our cute plastic shot glasses, we drove through downtown Georgetown, KY. An old-fashioned town, with old storefronts and head-in parking.
Lady Justice graces the old courthouse.
From Georgetown, back to Frankfort, to tour the Capital Building.
The rotunda is beautiful - more marble and granite than you'd see in most state capital buildings. Abe Lincoln was there, along with Jefferson Davis behind him.
From the third floor, you can really appreciate the magnitude of the central area of the capital, with a beautiful dome that does subtle color changes.
The reception room is French, French, French, inspired by the palace at Versailles.
As is the garden in front of the capital building. Luke and I were the only ones on this tour and were allowed out onto the porch that overlooks the garden. It was a beautiful view!
How about a floral clock in your garden? A 65 foot wide one?
Now to the cemetery to view native son Daniel Boone's grave. He is interned with his wife, Rebecca.
I have a little something to say here....Good Old Hero Daniel is portrayed in 3 of the 4 sides of the grave marker as the hero - slaying two enemies at a time...
great hunter, bringing down wild beasts...
The statesman, negotiating land sales and treaties...
And how about Rebecca? She gets to milk a cow...
Seems that just being Daniels buddy is enough to get you buried near to him, as well as negating the need for any other accomplishments you might have done in you life.
We left KY today and headed further eastward to West Virginia. Today we took the Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine tour. A lot of fun! An underground "train" takes up to 35 guests through an old coal mine. It was educational and really makes you understand the life of a coal miner, especially in the late 1800's and early 1900's, before unions were formed to protect them.
Each miner was assigned a site that was his alone. He did all of the work that was needed to dig coal from that area and see that it got to the surface (via mule and cart). This is a 1 ton cart. They were expected to fill this at least twice during their 8-10 hour shift. The pay? $0.20 per ton.... That's $2/week.
The coal was obtained by pick and shovel, demonstrated by our tour guide, an ex miner himself.
This cutting machine was introduced in the '30's to make the job easier. But - it had a deadly effect - Black Lung Disease. With a pick and shovel, there was virtually no dust in the air. The cutting machine created so much dust that the air would be black. Prior to the "improvement", Black Lung was virtually unknown.
Lunch and the day's water were brought from home each day. The bottom of the "lunch pail" contained a gallon of water - your days' quota. A pan that sat on above the water held your sandwiches, soup, etc. A smaller pan above that held dessert! One of the problems in the mine was having someone steal your water. So, a little trick of the trade was to make your water undesirable to another - this was apparently a common trick - and very effective! Your dentures in the bottom of the water container! ugh...
The mine superintendent lived well, in a nice home build for him by the mine owner.
A church, school, general store, and houses for the workers were all build around the mines, creating a mine town. The small 3 room house beside the church is a worker's shanty.
The superintendent lived well. Here is the dining room.
The workers, on the other hand, had a harder life. In addition to a back breaking, dirty, and hard job, their income was very limited. We saw a copy of a miner's monthly itemized pay statement. At that time, the deductions were for some rock that was mixed in with his coal, $0.80 for a hospital visit, a payment to the company store for food and all necessities, plus a variety of mandatory withdrawals from the mine company, including $4/mo for rent. His final net income? $1.67 for that month. oh, school was a deal at .50/yr for each child but that was only through the 8th grade. No education past that. The mine companies paid in scrip - tokens that were redeemable only at the company store. You had no option but to buy everything there at highly inflated prices.
One little tidbit that we learned was that the town barber was really as much of a physician as barber. He not only cut hair, but also did bloodletting and tooth pulling. In fact, the stripes on the barber pole are red for blood, blue for the veins, and white for bandages!
A really nice 17 site campground owned by the city of Beckley is associated with the exhibition coal mine. It's wooded, well kept, showers, playground for the kids, and full hook-ups, too! There are only about 5 of us here tonight but it surely fills up on weekends.
Tomorrow we plan to finally enter VA again! But we've decided to make a slight delay in our return - we plan to spend a couple of extra days to see Mt Rogers National Recreation Area.
