Grant County

Dateline: Crittenden

Orange day lilies fill pockets of U.S. 25 on a stretch of road about a half mile from the interstate exit in Crittenden. I first noticed them on the outskirts of the state-owned Curtis Gates Lloyd Wildlife Management Area, which is situated across the railroad tracks that run north-south through Grant County.

Flowers and plants used to take up a lot more space here when the area was home to Lloyd Library Botanical Park, a sprawling farm owned by the WMA’s namesake Curtis Gates Lloyd. Where most visitors now come to hunt, shoot, and fish, Lloyd studied plants and mycology – the study of fungi.

He was quite an expert at it, too, reportedly leaving his job as a pharmacist and a lucrative family business in Cincinnati to travel the world collecting rare specimens. The collection reportedly grew to over 50,000 volumes before Lloyd returned home to the U.S. and settled in Crittenden to continue his botanical pursuits, including preservation. An old growth stand of hardwood forest that he worked to preserve is still found today on the WMA’s public lands.

The botanical park is long gone, but not forgotten. I stopped while I was in the area to visit with a lifelong Grant Countian who remembers an ornamental pond full of goldfish at the park. She also recalled dozens (maybe hundreds?) of Easter lilies growing along the same stretch where the orange lilies grow today!

Everything I’ve found about Lloyd personally describes him as a quirky yet brilliant man who enjoyed a good practical joke, even if he wasn’t around to see the reaction. Case in point: Lloyd penned his own (humorous) epitaph on his tombstone, which he had placed at the park before his death. The marker still stands at the WMA on a piece of land where Lloyd ordered the scattering of his ashes. It reads in part: “Curtis G. Lloyd – Monument erected in 1922 by himself, for himself, during his life to gratify his own vanity.”

He adds: “What fools these mortals be.”

Also gifted by Lloyd to the people of Crittenden is Lloyd’s Welfare House. The tidy white wayside building was built in 1921 as a community center. It can still be rented today for weddings or other occasions at its location in Grant County Park, 144 S. Main Street in Crittenden.  

US 25

The road we traveled to get to the WMA has a history all its own. Long before I-75 came along, U.S. 25 was the federal highway linking the southern U.S. to the Midwest. The highway’s system of interconnected routes (sometimes called Dixie Highway as a nod to an early section of the road system established by the Dixie Highway Association) officially joined the federal highway system in the mid-1920s.

U.S. 25 once extended from Statesboro, Ga. To Port Huron, Mi., but was shortened decades ago when the highway was decommissioned in Ohio and Michigan. That’s OK – road travelers still have plenty of U.S. 25 left to explore. Today the route extends 750 miles from Brunswick, Ga. to Covington, Ky., with more than 20 miles rolling through Grant County alone!

Rice Chapel

Not far from the Lloyd’s Welfare House in Grant County Park sits historic Rice Chapel. The well-preserved building was one of few African-American churches in the county still serving congregations in the early to mid-20^th century during a significant drop in Grant County’s black and African-American population.  (Ogg Chapel Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, which still stands in its semi-original state on Cynthiana Street in Williamstown, was another formative local African-American church.)

Rice Chapel now sits alone but was once joined by an historic school called the “Dry Ridge Consolidated Colored School,” the only public school for African-Americans in the county from the time it was built in 1925 through the 1950s. It was a Rosenwald School – one of many built in the early 20^th by former Sears and Roebuck CEO Julius Rosenwald to serve African-American children and their families impacted by segregation.

Years of work by the Northern Kentucky African-American Task Force to save the school building paid off in 2007 when the structure was moved next to Rice Chapel and became the Grant County Black History Museum, but it wasn’t to last. Criminals set fire to the building and destroyed it the following year. The chapel was also damaged, but still stands.

It wasn’t the last time criminals would strike. The interior of Rice Chapel was ransacked by vandals in 2017, but there was no fire of which I’m aware. Thankfully.

I stopped by the chapel a few weeks ago when I was researching this blog. The door was locked when I was there, but the weather was terrific and I enjoyed walking around the perimeter of the building and onto the front porch to snap some photos. Everything felt peaceful and reverent, which is exactly as it should be.

Tucked back off the road just a few yards from the Grant County Park is the Whippy-Dip, a roadside eatery with dozens of soft-serve flavor combinations.  I almost missed it until I noticed this ice-cream cowboy (at right) pointing me to it. Parking was ample, so I pulled over to check out the place. The menus are clearly displayed at the walk-up counter, and there are gobs of flavors for the choosing — more than 58, in fact, which can be served alone or mixed with another flavor. I had an espresso and peanut butter cone and wasn’t the slightest bit disappointed in the taste, or the price.

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[ Side trip – Grant County Farmers’ Market ]

Ice cream is dreamy, but so is the fresh local produce sold at the Grant County Farmers’ Market, which has a location next to the Whippy-Dip. Honey, squash, tomatoes, cucumbers, potatoes, onions, eggs, plants, and more are sold at the roadside stop, depending on availability. The market is usually open in Crittenden on Fridays and at its other location on U.S. 25 in Williamstown on Saturdays, although I recommend checking its Facebook page before heading out to confirm which location is open that day. Photos of what’s for sale on any given day are also posted.

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Dateline: Dry Ridge

Art, anyone?

Dry Ridge may be the most visible city in the county to travelers on I-75. Dozens of logo signs face the interstate interchange in this city where travelers can easily access hotels, popular local and chain restaurants, plus a big-box store or two.

Less obvious is the growing Kentucky arts community found here at the Bluegrass Artistry Barn, a location for artists to both sell and demonstrate their work. If you’re curious about the talent on display, check out recent videos of artists at work on the business’s Facebook page. (I understand that plans are also underway to offer creative classes to the public.)

Dateline: Williamstown

The play’s the thing

Art of the musical-theatre variety is waiting three miles away from Dry Ridge at Stage Right Musical Theatre Company, in the county seat of Williamstown. The theatre company was established four years ago, and today is both an entertainment and education venue known for its quality productions and its Rising Stars Academy youth education initiative.

COVID-19 foiled the company’s 2020 summer production of  “Mamma Mia – the Musical,” which has unfortunately been postponed. Updates on rescheduling and other upcoming productions – including the madcap Hitchcock-esque “The 39 Steps,” scheduled for October – can be sent directly to your inbox if you join the theatre’s e-mail list.

[ Food Log – Belle’s Smokin’ BBQ ]

Belle’s Smokin’ BBQ across the street from the Grant County Courthouse on N. Main/U.S. 25 is the home of the Smokin’ Spud, deep fried pickled bologna, and some of the best pulled pork BBQ I’ve ever had. The restaurant and live music venue is a fairly new tenant in the historic Lucas and Moore Drug Store building downtown, but Belle’s owner Jamie Smith hasn’t forgotten the building’s past: A circa-1953 drug store ice cream bar up front serves up goodies daily, including a crowd favorite — a blackberry and bacon ice cream sundae.

Grant County Courthouse

It was just another day of county business at the Grant County Courthouse when I stopped by after lunch, so I popped inside to have a look around.

The resolute-looking two-story brick and limestone building has stood in the town square since 1939 when it was built as both a hall of justice and center of county governance under the New Deal. Judicial matters have since moved to the Grant County Judicial Center down the road, but the old courthouse still houses county offices and loads of historic appeal.

Other than the “new” wing built around 1976 and necessary technological fixtures, the courthouse looks almost exactly the same as it did in the mid-20^th century. A cozy elevator with a scissor gate still takes passengers up to the second-floor Fiscal Court chamber where massive early 20^th-century cornice moldings reign over the side entrance doors. Downstairs, masonry installed four generations ago by the Public Works Administration buffers the main hallway.

Grant County meets Hollywood

It was the courthouse’s authenticity that made it a key filming location for the 2019 Netflix Ted Bundy biopic “Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile.” The Fiscal Court chamber — which still had the long, wooden benches original to the building at the time of filming in 2018 — is the courtroom setting for at least one scene depicting Bundy’s trial in Utah per a local news story.

Things look a little different today in the chamber. The wooden benches have been replaced with comfortable modern chairs, and the walls are sporting a new coat of paint (courtesy of the film crews, who painted the room to match the film’s desired color palette). It looks like the courthouse is ready for another 80 years. At least.

Dateline: Corinth

In southern Grant County along U.S. 25 is the city of Corinth, home to 83.8-acre Corinth Lake. It’s the lake that most of us notice when we travel north I-75 though the county, and it’s a beauty. Anyone who’s looking for a good place to catch black crappie, largemouth bass and channel catfish should give Corinth Lake a try.

If you’re interested in hitching your boat or carrying your kayak or canoe out this way for some good fishing, be sure to check state regulations first. You’ll also need a fishing license.

Side note: Other popular public lakes in Grant County are Boltz Lake, Bullock Pen Lake, and 330-acre Lake Williamstown — the site of the annual event Paddle Williamstown.

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Still curious? You can learn more about what Grant County has to offer by clicking on the Grant County Tourist and Convention Commission website here.

Featured image: Vintage service station and pumps, Dry Ridge, KY. Credit: Debby Lucas Angel