Monday Moonery

Why should we start sending people back to the Moon? Because it’s still there? Besides that. Rather, because the ranks of those who have flown to the Moon are getting pretty thin – something I thought of when I learned that Tom Stafford (Apollo 10) died. Now only seven of them are left, four who landed on the surface and three who got really close without landing.

At 88, the youngest of this rarefied group is Apollo 16’s Charles Duke. Three have passed just in the last few months, including Ken Mattingly (also Apollo 16) and Frank Borman (Apollo 8) and now Stafford. It wouldn’t be right somehow to have the experience of being close to the Moon slip out of living memory. The plan is for these astronauts to go next year on Artemis 2; we shall see.

If Artemis 2 does come to pass as planned, it would include among its crew one Jeremy Hansen, who happens to be a Canadian astronaut and would be the first non-American (non-citizen of the United States, to nitpickers) to pay a visit to the Moon. Assuming a knot of taikonauts doesn’t surprise the world before Artemis’ flight by appearing on the lunar surface hoisting the flag of the PRC.

Hansen, as Wiki succinctly put it, “Canadian astronaut, fighter pilot, physicist and former aquanaut.” If that’s not an action hero’s resume, I don’t know what would be.

Looks of rabbit-hole material here: Canada currently has four active astronauts (one of whom is Hansen) and a number of retired ones, including the dude astronaut who played “Space Odyssey” on the ISS about 10 years ago. They work or worked for the Canadian Space Agency, which has been around since 1989 but I’d say is fairly low profile. Canadians have been going to space since before then, since Marc Garneau went up on a 1984 Shuttle mission. He happens to be a Québécois and until recently fairly highly positioned in the current Tredeau government.

Here’s a question for Moon landing deniers: how come some other nation (say, you know, China) hasn’t faked going to the Moon by now? Certainly Xi Jinping would be able to marshal the resources, by various carrots and sticks, to get the filming and other fakery done.

If someone (say, you know, Kubrick) could fake it using late ’60s video tech, wouldn’t the vast improvements in digital image creation since then mean a higher quality fake by the Chinese government? One so good no one would question it? Except of course for brave moon-landing deniers.

First in War, First in Peace, and First in the Heart of Generative AI

The “Presidents Day” weekend has rolled around again, but it’s an ordinary weekend for some of us followed by an ordinary Monday. Including me. Still, I can’t let it pass without a mention. If it were up to me, it would still be widely known as Washington’s Birthday, as it was when I was young.

The state of Illinois, for its part, calls it Washington’s Birthday, and has separate holidays for Lincoln and MLK. It has not, as yet, changed Columbus Day to anything else, which surprises me a little, but I’ll chalk it up to legislative inertia and a still distinct Italian-American population.

With Washington on my mind, I went to the first free AI image generator I could find and had it spit out some images of the Father of Our Country in various art styles. Such as – and these are my exact prompts – “George Washington Manga.”

“George Washington Cubist”

“George Washington Dadaist”

That last one has a tinge of nightmare to it. Come to think of it, they all do. Still, while I’m not art expert, I don’t think these quite fit the bill.

Main Street, Louisville, But Not the World’s Largest Baseball Bat

Deep cold these last few days, so we passed the time, including the MLK holiday, in 21st-century central heated space, that is, home. Filed papers, hauled my boxes of postcards out of the closet for a look and a touch of reorganization – not to the point of being highly organized, though – and removed ornaments and lights from the Christmas tree and in one brief expedition into the frozen waste of our back yard, deposited the tree out there.

Should I burn it? Makes a glorious flame, if only for a few seconds. We shall see.

Wonder when the owner of this vehicle removed the Nativity.Louisville

Whenever that was, I have to say that I’d never seen that familiar display in this unusual location. For all I know, however, it could be the next big thing in honoring the First Christmas.

We spotted Bethlehem on wheels in east Louisville on the evening of December 29. The next morning we made our way to Main Street in downtown Louisville; and we returned to the area just before we left town on the morning of New Year’s Eve. Some blocks are exceptionally handsome.Main Street Louisville Main Street Louisville Main Street Louisville Main Street Louisville

The valuable facades of these pre-Great War vintage buildings look to be, in some cases, saved for later development behind them. Maybe mixed-use, largely residential but also specialty retail. I could imagine that outcome.Main Street Louisville

Not all of the street features refurbished leftovers from the late 19th century. Rising at W. Main and 5th Street is a behemoth occupied by a for-profit healthcare behemoth, the Humana Building. Designed by Michael Graves in 1985. Look up postmodern and I think you’d see an image of this building.

The structure is such a behemoth that it was impossible to get the building all within a shot, standing across the street from it. Still — something of a bird of prey vibe, seems like. Mecha-Owl? Main Street Louisville

It stands on the site of the Kenyon Building, pictured here in 1927.

The Kenyon itself no doubt replaced earlier, smaller structures. Louisville emerged as a city with rapidity in the early 19th century, with Main its first focus.

“West Main Street was the first street in the city,” Louisvilleky.gov notes. “The first businesses to line West Main Street included an attorney, grocer, boardinghouse, auctioneer, merchant, carpenter, tailor, shoemaker, tobacco inspector, blacksmith, engineer, physician, hatter, tallow chandler, barber, painter, upholsterer, insurance company, plasterer, druggist, and brewer.”

How many of those professions remain on Main Street? I’m not going to do anything like work to find out, but my guess would be attorneys and insurance companies, certainly, maybe an engineer or two, some physicians, and merchants, depending on how you define that. Very likely no blacksmiths, hatters or tallow chandlers.

In our time, Main is also a street of some curiosities. Such as Jane Fonda in microgravity.Louisville

Nightspot Barbarella apparently didn’t survive the pandemic. This is the entirety of the last note from Barbarella on Facebook (October 5, 2021): “Permanently closed bitches!!! Loved y’all. It was a wild ride. But the roller coaster has come to an end!” Louisville Louisville

That last image is the Metropolitan Sewer District 4th Street Flood Pump Station, since 2022 adorned with a mural called “Hope Springs – The Wishing Well” by local artist Whitney Olsen. The linked press release also makes mention of the recently completed, fully invisible tunnel under the city — the Waterway Protection Tunnel, four miles long and 18 stories below ground, to capture surges of storm water. I’m no engineer, but that sounds pretty impressive

A more-or-less empty plaza, formally called Riverfront Plaza/Belvedere, extends from Main to a view of the Ohio. Part of the plaza is built over I-64.

Off in the distance an outline of a statue is just barely visible from Main. I imagined that the statue honored Muhammad Ali. As long ago as 1978, the city renamed a major downtown street after him, though not without resistance that’s completely unimaginable now; and the sizable Muhammad Ali Center is also downtown.

But no: the 1973 work is much more traditional, honoring Louisville founder George Rogers Clark, who has, of course, a larger memorial elsewhere. (The Ali Center is in the distance behind him in my image.)Louisville

Felix de Weldon did the statue. He’s better known for the Marine Corps War Memorial (Iwo Jima Memorial) at Arlington National Cemetery and, interestingly, he also did the Malaysian National Monument (Tugu Negara) in Kuala Lumpur. I have a vague memory of seeing that, in wilting tropical heat. Weldon did much more over a long life. His partial listing of public sculpture on Wiki begins with King George V in 1935 and ends with another sort of king, Elvis Presley, in 1995.

The George Rogers Clark bronze dates from 1973, but there is another more recent statue on the plaza: York, the only black member of Lewis and Clark’s expedition and as such the first African-American known to cross the continent, in a 2003 work by Ed Hamilton.Louisville- Statue of York

Coming to the Corps of Discovery as Clark’s personal slave, York has quite a story, and an especially awful one after the expedition returned, only much recognized in recent decades (see 37:23 and after in this lecture). No doubt York would have preferred freedom after the trek to the Pacific and back was over, instead of honors 200 years later, but the former isn’t in anyone’s power these days, while the latter is.

The plaza also offers nice views of the Louisville skyline. The Galt House hotel is a whopper: at 1,310 rooms, reportedly the largest in Kentucky, plus 130,000 square feet of meeting space and six restaurants. Developed in the 1970s, the hotel bears a name that’s an homage to a series of earlier hotels called Galt, one with a particularly colorful history that was the site, in ’62, where one Union general offed another Union general with a pistol shot at close range.

THE MURDER OF GEN. NELSON. ON page 669 we publish an illustration of the ASSASSINATION OF GENERAL NELSON BY GENERAL J. C. DAVIS, which took place ten days since at Louisville. Our picture is from a sketch by our artist, Mr. Mosler, who visited the spot immediately after the affair.

Even more remarkably, the Galt is owned by a single family, not an transnational. A single, sometimes quarreling family, but there isn’t so much remarkable about that.

The 35-story 400 Market, with the domed top, is the tallest building in Louisville.Louisville

Look the other direction and spy the mighty Ohio.Ohio River, Louisville Ohio River, Louisville

Stairs lead from the plaza down to a riverfront park developed in the 1990s, but late December wasn’t a good time for such a stroll, even though the drizzle had abated by the last day of the year. Some other warmer time, perhaps. Whatever the merits of that park, I doubt that it can erase the fact that the Robert Moses gash that is I-64 largely cuts downtown Louisville off from the river – the very reason there is a city in the first place.

Main Street plaques, along with metal bats, honor baseball players along the way.Main Street, Louisville

Roberto Clemente is one of 60 honorees in the Louisville Slugger Walk of Fame, which stretches on sidewalks from the Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory on Main St. to Louisville Slugger Field a little more than a mile away. We decided not to visit the baseball bat factory itself, which includes the world’s largest baseball bat (bigger than “Batcolumn in Chicago? Yes, by 19 feet.). Still, we walked by a few other bronze bats and home plates embedded in the sidewalk.

Is Chico Escuela is among the honored? I have to wonder. He should be. Considering that he’s fictional, the plaque wouldn’t have to bother with tedious stats. All it would have to say (naturally) is, “Baseball been barra, barra good to me!”

A Tale of Two Kentucky Distilleries

Oh, boy.

Winter’s been pretty easy on us so far, but that’s almost over. We’re headed for the pit of winter now, maybe a little earlier than it usual comes (end of January, beginning of February, I always thought). It might be a long narrow pit that will be hard to climb out of.

Even so, I will enjoy Monday off, including all professional and nonprofessional writing. Back to posting on January 16.

Though not a drinking couple, we figured we couldn’t visit Bardstown, Kentucky, and not drop in on a distillery. Think of all the marketing dollars spent by the Kentucky Distillers’ Association, and the distilleries themselves, that have gone into making this part of the commonwealth a bourbon destination. Toward that end, the KDA established a “Bourbon Trail” in 1999, focusing on Kentucky, but also including operations in Indiana, Ohio and Tennessee.

First we drove to the gates of the Barton 1792 Distillery, which is in town and had a most industrial aspect to it. Also, the gates had a sign saying the place was closed to the public, in spite of what other information had told us.

So we headed out to another distillery on the map, Heaven Hill, on the outskirts of town. It’s a big operation. Off in the distance from the visitor center parking lot are clusters of enormous HH buildings – rickhouses, they’re called, a term used industrywide – to store barrels of the distillery’s products while they’re aging.

“Heaven Hill’s main campus [in Bardstown] holds 499,973 barrels and was also the site of the famous 1996 fire,” the HH web site says. “Fueled by 75 mph winds, the fire ultimately destroyed seven rickhouses and over 90,000 barrels of Bourbon, which was two percent if the world’s Bourbon at the time.”

Bacchus wept. His wheelhouse is wine, but surely he takes an interest in hard liquor too.

Wonder why the HH rickhouse designers didn’t add space for 27 more barrels, so the total would come in at an even half-million. Anyway, that’s a lot of hooch. As for the fire, I must have heard about it at the time, but have no memory of it. I understand that occasionally rickhouses collapse, too. Bad luck for any poor fool inside, who’d be victim of a freak accident. Alcohol kills a lot of people, but not many that way.

Heaven Hill was swarming with visitors, and all tours were sold out on the drizzly afternoon of December 29. We spent a little time at the visitors center looking at some of the exhibits, including about the fire, but also about the family that has run the distillery for many years, the Shipiras – originally successful Jewish merchants in Kentucky – and the original master distiller, Joseph L. Beam, who was Jim Beam’s first cousin.

Soon we went to the Willett Distillery, up the road a piece from Heaven Hill. It isn’t as large an operation, but it too is a family-run business, by descendants of John David Willett (d. 1914) and a Norwegian who showed up in America in the 1960s at a young age and eventually married into the family. Importantly for our purposes, spots were available on the last tour of the day.Willett Distillery

Our guide was a voluble woman in her 50s, who perhaps has a sign in her house that says It’s 5 O’Clock Somewhere. She was informative about distilled spirits, and herself, so we learned that she’s a widow with grown children and some grandchildren, and not originally from Kentucky. Or a bourbon drinker.

“I used to be a clear spirits gal, but since I’ve worked here, I’ve learned to love bourbon more,” she said.Willett Distillery

I might not drink bourbon, but I appreciate the fact that distilleries have a lot of cool-looking equipment. Willett certainly does.Willett Distillery Willett Distillery Willett Distillery

Best of all, we went into one of the Willett rickhouses.Willett Distillery Willett Distillery

Willett is small compared to Heaven Hill, with all of its barrels able to fit into one HH rickhouse, according to our guide. She said that more than once. But she also played it as a virtue, hinting — since it would be impolitic to say it outright — that the neighboring distillery was entirely too big for its britches.

Wickland, Home of Three Governors

From My Old Kentucky Home State Park, it’s a hop and skip, not even a jump, to another old Kentucky home, Wickland. Or as it is called on Google maps, Wickland, Home of Three Governors.

For good reason, it turns out. That wording is on the sign at the entrance.Wickland

Whatever else you can say about Google as a rapacious entity, you have to admire its maps. My affection for paper maps hasn’t dwindled, and I still use them, but sometimes things pop up on Google Maps that I instantly know I should visit, such as Wickland.Wickland

Though with a Bardstown address, it is a bit out of town.Wickland, Bardstown, Kentucky

Done in Georgian style, rather than Federal, Wickland is roughly a contemporary of Federal Hill (My Old Kentucky Home). We weren’t entirely sure it was open, but in we went, to be greeted by a woman perhaps 10 years younger than me whose name I forget, but who said she managed the place.

That meant taking taking down some of the Christmas decorations at that moment, but she paused that activity to tell us about the mansion for a few minutes, intimating that it was just as interesting as Federal Hill, but received much less attention. I’ll go along with that. She was the only other person there, and said that we were the only visitors so far that day.

Its original owner, one Charles A. Wickliffe, built the house in the 1810s from a design by a Baltimore architect named John Rogers, and later Wickliffe became governor of Kentucky. His son Robert C. Wickliffe grew up at Wickland but moved to Louisiana, where he was governor of that state just before the war. John Crepps Wickliffe Beckham, Charles’ grandson and John’s nephew, was also born at Wickland and he too was a governor of Kentucky, taking office in 1900 after the death of four-day Gov. William Goebel, who was assassinated. That’s an entirely different story, and one I won’t get into, but more about it is here.

John Rogers, incidentally, designed the Basilica of Saint Joseph Proto-Cathedral in Bardstown, which was locked when we came by the same day.St Joseph's Proto-Cathedral, Bardstown

After our brief chat, the manager of Wickland turned us loose for a self-guided tour. That is, we wandered around the mansion’s three floors, completely unsupervised. Also, unlike at Federal Hill, we could take pictures, so I did.Wickland, Bardstown, Kentucky Wickland, Bardstown, Kentucky Wickland, Bardstown, Kentucky

Nice. Not all of the Christmas decorations were down yet.Wickland, Bardstown, Kentucky

Wickland doesn’t charge anything to visit, but we made a donation equal to what we paid to see the more ballyhooed My Old Kentucky Home. Seemed only right.

My Old Kentucky Home State Park

When John Rowan began work on a house for his family in north-central Kentucky in the 1790s, he called it Federal Hill. Finally completed in 1818 largely by slave labor, it stands today as the centerpiece of My Old Kentucky Home State Park in the outskirts of Bardstown, a handsome structure in a pleasant setting.My Old Kentucky Home State Park My Old Kentucky Home State Park

Besides surviving an 1801 duel in which he killed the other fellow, and beating the rap, Rowan went on to be an important politico in early Kentucky, including a term in the U.S. Senate as an antagonist to Henry Clay and the Whigs, being a Jackson man. He died in 1843, missing the later unpleasantness, and even the war the Mexico.

We visited around noon on December 29. We were the only ones on the tour, in contrast (later that same day) to the distilleries we visited. I hadn’t read much about the place before the visit, and vaguely assumed that there was some good reason that the property’s current name evokes the famed Stephen Foster song. It inspired him in the composition in some way, perhaps.

The house museum doesn’t exactly discourage this line of thinking. At the visitors center is this portrait of Foster.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

There he is, in a 1939 painting by Howard Chandler Christy, receiving the gift of composition from a muse – Euterpe, I suppose, muse of music and lyric poetry and, perhaps, the modern popular song. To the left of the muse’s wings (did muses have wings?) is the entrance of Federal Hill, and there are visual references to some of Foster’s other songs as well.

The Kentucky Colonels’ organization commissioned the painting for the world’s fair in New York that year, and “My Old Kentucky Home” had become the official state (commonwealth) song not too many years earlier. So I assume the Colonels wanted to emphasize a Kentucky connection with the famed song, aside from the fact that the name is in the title and opening lines.

An aside: I know that a Kentucky Colonelcy is an honor bestowed by the commonwealth, but I’m still a little surprised by some of the names on this list, such as Princess Anne, Bob Barker, Foster Brooks (well, he was from Louisville), Phyllis Diller, George Harrison (actually, all the Beatles, even Ringo), David Schwimmer, Red Skelton, and both Smothers brothers (RIP, Tom).

The museum (at least in our time) doesn’t explicitly claim that Federal Hill was an inspiration for the song, since the evidence for that seems to be gossamer thin. I’ve read conflicting reports about whether Stephen Foster, described as a “cousin” of the Rowan family – which could mean various levels of consanguinity in the loose definitions of 19th-century America – even visited Federal Hill from his home in Pittsburgh.

It is clear, however, that “My Kentucky Home” was inspired by Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and as such, sympathized with slaves separated from family members without pity or recourse. The song’s association with a particular mansion in Kentucky, namely this particular one, apparently came later – well after the Civil War. The idea seems to have been promoted by, among others, the last member of the Rowan family to own the mansion, an elderly granddaughter who managed to sell the property to the commonwealth in the early 1920s.

Can’t really blame her if she took a little creative liberty with the history of Federal Hill, since she probably wanted to live somewhere with less expensive upkeep. Also, such a thing would be firmly within the American (and entirely human) tradition of historical storytelling known as “making things up.”

Be that as it may, Federal Hill is well appointed inside with period items, and our guide, a young woman dressed antebellum style, knew her non-made-up stuff. She also sang the first verse of “My Old Kentucky Home” for us, in a pleasant and practiced voice, which I understand is part of all the tours. Of course, the first lines weren’t quite the Steven Foster original, being:

The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home/
‘Tis summer, the people are gay.

The Kentucky legislature mandated the change, at least for official renditions, after an embarrassing incident in 1986 when a visiting group of Japanese students sang the song, original lyrics and all, to the legislature.

Our guide mentioned, almost in passing, an horrific incident from the time of John Rowan. In 1833, the family, or many of them, ate or drank something contaminated with Vibrio cholerae, and three of Rowan’s children (he had nine), a son- and daughter-in law, a granddaughter, and his sister and brother-in-law all died of cholera in short order, as did a similar number of slaves.

Many of these Rowans are buried within sight of the mansion, and the visitor center, for that matter.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

Sen. Rowan himself joined them later, marked by the obelisk. The memorial behind his, with the grieving figure and lyre, is that of Madge Rowan Frost (d. 1925), the granddaughter who sold the property to the state.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

The park, in the form of its guided tour, and written material on signs, doesn’t ignore the enslaved population, as no historic property of this kind would do any more, possibly following the lead of Monticello. Sen. Rowan owned as many as 39 people at one time. A sign near the Rowan cemetery details what is known about them.My Old Kentucky Home State Park

But not their burial sites; that remains unknown. Likewise, their cabins, along with most of the other outbuildings, are long gone. Mostly what you’ll see at the state park is a picturesque mansion retroactively tied to an enduring song.

Churchill Downs & The Kentucky Derby Museum

Even before you enter the grounds of Churchill Downs, you encounter bronze horses. Both are winners of the Kentucky Derby. One is Aristides, at the Paddock gate, who came in first in the first Derby in 1875 – long before it was a Run for the Roses,® or the first race of the Triple Crown,® or the Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports,® or the object of 21st-century renovations.Churchill Downs

The Derby was about drinking and gambling from day one, I believe, and not in moderation, yet genteel enough (at least in the stands) for the monied elite — traditions that grand event upholds to the present, all the other trappings notwithstanding. What better for a spring day in Kentucky?

The other horse, and statue, is more recent: Barbaro.Churchill Downs

I suspected right away that some physical remains of Barbaro were there as well, and yes, his ashes are, I read later. I’ve pretty much ignored thoroughbred horseracing most of my life, and even my limited interest in the ’80s was because I enjoyed going to the Derby in person. So I wondered about Barbaro. I must have heard the news story in the 2000s, but it had evaporated, gone amid the backdrop of a household with little kids.

Still, I figured, as a Derby winner his birth and death years (2003 to 2007) pretty much got to the heart of Barbaro’s career – a shooting star among race horses, brilliance to ashes. Later I looked up the details, including in a succinct, eulogizing video, and that’s about the size of it.

A thoughtful comment from the video’s comment section: Not making an anti-racing statement but, if you feel bad for Barbaro, take a moment to think about all of the other horses that broke down and died, on/off the track, too. Barbaro got kind letters, flowers, signs and even gift baskets with horse feed sent to his veterinarian centre, because he was a champion. Just seems sad that we only do that for the gifted athletes of the sport, even though every one of those incredible animals gave it their all for our entertainment.

@catarena8031

Near Barbaro is the entrance to the Kentucky Derby Museum, and near the admission desk is a countdown clock.Museum of the Kentucky Derby

(As it appeared on December 28.)

While we were still in the parking lot, headed for the entrance, we passed by a young couple leaving. Out of the blue the man said to us, “Take the Barn and Backside Tour. It costs more, but it’s worth it.”

“Really?” I said, in a friendly tone. They both nodded their agreement.

“You get to see a lot more,” he said, gesturing with his hands a bit, sort of making parentheses around his sizable beard. “Some of the stables and other places behind the track.”

We agreed that that sounded good and parted ways. I asked about it at the desk. Sorry, sold out. So we got the basic tour and museum admission, a spot over $20 per person. The museum, well organized and informative but not overtaxed with dense reading, was worth a look, for a small glimpse into a whole other world.

Also, you get to see a facsimile of Mage, last year’s winner.Museum of the Kentucky Derby

And the trophy War Admiral received in 1937 for winning the Derby.Museum of the Kentucky Derby

Along with a good many other items. Other displays included Triple Crown winners – each one had a kiosk – how thoroughbreds are raised, the building of the track and the early races, video screens to call up and watch previous televised races (I watched ’86; I only heard it when there), images of the flamboyant hats and dresses worn by female racegoers, and the part African-Americans have played in the event, especially as jockeys: a good many in the early years, including Oliver Lewis; nil as Jim Crow solidified; some since the legal end of segregation.

The tour started with a short presentation on a 360-degree screen well above eye level: part movie, part still images with a sound track, and about what the horses and the jockeys and all the many other support staff do to put on the Derby. Quick-moving, it idealized the event somewhat, but who would expect otherwise?

The cinematography was exceptional sometimes, giving me the sense that whatever else the racehorses are, they’re massive, powerful beasts of tremendous energy. And what manor of men would perch themselves atop these beasts at their top speeds? Besides relatively small men and a few women, that is. I have a new-found respect for jockeys.

Also, it got me to thinking, a little along the lines of the comment above. Sure, it’s fine to know about the winners down the years, and I’ll go along with the notion that, say, Secretariat was a very great racer indeed. But what about the also-rans? Not just also-rans, but last rans?

Back when Aristides took the prize to the crowd’s acclaim, a horse named Gold Mine proved not to be one, coming in 15th and last. When Sir Barton won on his way to the first Triple Crown in 1919, Vindex was 12th and last.

Vindex? After the Roman who rebelled, unsuccessfully, against Nero? Could be. I can imagine the owner reading about the bold Vindex in the works of I forget which Roman historian. It would have been a thing for a horse-owning Kentucky gentleman to do in his youth in late 19th century, possibly even in the original Latin.

One more. When Secretariat won the day in 1973, before a national audience (including a 12-year-old me), Warbucks was 13th and last.

From the museum, the tour group moved to under the grandstands, guided by a competent employee of the track. She told us a capsule history of the race and the Downs.Churchill Downs

Out to the lowest level of the grandstand. It’s a good view, I have to say.Churchill Downs Churchill Downs Churchill Downs

When was the jumbotron added? About 10 years ago.

The guide provided more history and some physical information about the track itself, and about the enormous stable complex on the other side of the track, way off in the distance, which sounded big enough to have its own zip code. (It doesn’t seem to.)

Then we headed back to the museum for a few more minutes, and that was that. Chintzy, Churchill Downs. That was more like a $12 museum + tour package. Not even a few minutes up in the grandstands? Did some whiz in the organization, or maybe a computer program, determine that eliminating the small but measurable cost in elevator maintenance and maybe slightly higher insurance premiums was worth shorting the patrons in their experience? Just speculation.

All I know is that the view from the grandstands should have been part of it. One visit to the Derby, I had access to the grandstands, and wandered around quite a while. You really get caught up in the thing looking down on the lively, colorful crowds and the active racetrack. Even on an empty winter day, I think you’d feel an echo of those festive times.

Three Louisville Churches

A friend on Facebook – and actual friend, known him 35 years — signed off with HNY today. Dense fellow that I am, that didn’t register, so I Googled it and found Happy New Year and Hot Nude Yoga. I’ll assume he meant the first one.

Fairly early on our first day in Louisville, we found our way to St. Martin of Tours, a Catholic church that rises in the Phoenix Hill neighborhood, among clusters of shotgun houses, more than I’d seen anywhere else.St Martin of Tours
St Martin of Tours

Must be St. Martin himself. He holds his basilica in Tours (I assume) as if on a serving plate.St Martin of Tours

I heard about him in a VU history class, but after so many decades, it was all a little fuzzy, so I looked him up. I remember now: Martin and his mentor Hilary of Poitiers kicked butt when it came to fighting the Arian heresy in the fourth century.

Patron of France, Martin is, but so much more: beggars, cavalry and equestrians, hotel and inn keepers, reformed alcoholics but also vintners and wine growers, quartermasters, and the Swiss Guards at the Vatican, among many others.

I suppose the saint was popular among the antebellum German immigrant population. They were on the receiving end of a Nativist mob attack not long before the war, a serious enough atrocity that it might have encouraged the waves of German Catholics to go to Chicago, St. Louis and other cities instead of Louisville.Cathedral of the Assumption

The mighty-looking organ was silent during our visit.Cathedral of the Assumption

A side chapel is a site of perpetual adoration, but I didn’t want to bother the man in there, who looked pretty intent. Closer to the altar are the bones of Saints Magnus and Bonosa, fourth-century figures and the subjects of the sort of vague saintly stories common in that period.

Later that same day, we parked across the street from Cathedral of the Assumption.Cathedral of the Assumption

It too was new in the 1850s when the Know-Nothings nearly burned it down. In our time, it’s closed on Thursday afternoons. So I took a short stroll in that part of downtown. Yuriko had sense enough to wait in the warm car. Louisville  Louisville  Louisville

We returned to the cathedral on Sunday for another look. Near the entrance, a baptism in progress.Cathedral of the Assumption Cathedral of the Assumption, Louisville

The Coronation Window.Cathedral of the Assumption

How many windows have proper names?

“Original to the Cathedral, the Coronation window depicts the crowning of the Virgin Mary as the Queen of Heaven,” the church web site says. “Designed by the Blum Art Co. in 1883, it is one of the oldest and largest hand-painted glass windows in the United States. The window was removed in 1912 and stored in the Bell Tower until 1994, when it was restored to its original position.”

A few blocks away is the Christ Church Cathedral, seat of the Episcopal Diocese of Kentucky, and at just over 200 years, one of the oldest buildings in Louisville.Christ Church Cathedral. Louisville, Dec 31, 2023 Christ Church Cathedral. Louisville, Dec 31, 2023

Homily in progress. We didn’t stay for it. The priest was probably not denouncing Arianism, but who knows.

Billy Goat Tavern & Grill ’23

I can’t say whether Billy Goat Tavern & Grill looks exactly the same as it did in the ’80s, but it sure felt the same on Monday night. The walls of photos, neon, beer taps, rows of bottles, knickknacks and basic restaurant tables and chairs, and plenty of worn red bar stools. The vibe is Chicago tavern clutter, comfortable as an old shirt.Billy Goat Tavern Billy Goat Tavern

Now that I think about it, I had the most Greek experience I’ve ever had at the Billy Goat, having never yet made it to Greece. Shortly before the 1988 presidential election, the Dukakis campaign staged a campaign parade on Michigan Avenue, and after work I went to watch, on a spontaneous quasi-date with a fetching Greek-American woman I knew. Was it a torchlight parade? In my memory, there were torches, but probably no: that seems like a 19th-century thing.

We were within feet of the candidate as he walked by, his expression a little stiff and discouraged. Later we repaired to the Billy Goat, which was wall-to-wall packed, including many Greek Americans – wearing the colors of the Greek flag, some of them — with everybody feasting on cheeseburgers and beer, the place alive with talk, and the clank of spatulas on the grill, and the hissing burgers and onion air, and the clouds of cigarette smoke still common in bars and restaurants.

I’m pretty sure the workers called out Cheezborger! Cheezborger! in those days, which might be an example of life imitating art, or more likely, life and art reinforcing either other.

Rumor was that Dukakis himself would make an appearance, and well he should have, but he never did. He should have shown up in his tank helmet, shaking hands and mugging for cameras. Rather than be embarrassed by it, he should have leaned into it, but no.

Back here in the 21st century, there are reminders of goats at Billy Goat. How could it be otherwise?Billy Goat Tavern

You can see a wall of bylines at Billy Goat. Once upon a time, both major Chicago newspaper buildings were within easy walking distance, even in winter, so newspapermen hung out there.Billy Goat Tavern

Best known was Royko, who worked the place into his column from time to time. From there, the place went on to wider notice, sort of.

I expect the number of journalists is fairly low these days, outnumbered by other kinds of downtown residents and workers, plus tourists. On Monday night at least, no one called out when you ordered your cheeseburgers; they just went to work at it.

Except for the vegan in our group – she was a good sport about it — we had cheeseburgers and chips and beer. What else? In theory, a few other things are on the menu, but we didn’t test it. No fries, either.Billy Goat Tavern

We also sipped from a single glass of Malört. It’s a Chicago thing to do.

Around the corner from the entrance of the Billy Goat, directly facing Lower Michigan Ave. and just north of the Chicago River., is a mural and a tavern sign.Billy Goat Tavern

The mural is a work by Andy Bellomo, “a self-taught artist who began her creative interest as a young teen studying the color, light, shapes, and lines of traditional stained glass in churches,” according to the the Magnificent Mile Association, as part of a number of murals known as Undercurrent (at least to the Mag Mile Assn.).

It’s been there about a year, which would account for me never noticing it before. Haven’t been down to Lower Michigan Ave. in a some years, but I can assure the world that it’s still the hard urban space it’s always been.

There’s more of the Undercurrent mural on the other side of the tavern’s entrance, not captured in the below image.

But I did capture, without realizing it, part of a different mural, one that’s been there for decades, by an artist mostly lost to time in Chicago, even though his heyday was only about 50 years ago. It’s on the extreme right edge of the image: a rainbow goat.

“Many people ask about the rainbow goats painted on the walls outside of The Goat,” notes the tavern web site. “They were painted in 1970 by Sachio Yamashita, known as Sachi… Billy [Sianis, original owner of the tavern] made a deal with Sachi. Every day after Sachi and his helpers finish their work, beer and borgers are free! Unfortunately Billy Goat Sianis passed away on October 22, 1970 just days before the paintings were complete.”

I might have noticed the goats before, but didn’t give them much thought. I didn’t notice them this time, or I’d have taken a full image, since how many rainbow goats could there be in the world? On walls, that is.

Pontiac-Oakland Museum and Resource Center

Not something you see very often: a wall of motor oil.Pontiac-Oakland Museum

I’d never seen such a thing until I came across it just a few doors down from the Museum of the Gilding Arts, in the Pontiac-Oakland Museum and Resource Center, which also faces the elegant Livingston County courthouse in Pontiac, Illinois. In the case of the museum, Pontiac refers to the car brand of that name, and Oakland does as well, as the predecessor of Pontiacs. Both brands are defunct now, but not in the hearts of enthusiasts.

The many cans of motor oil happen to be a backdrop for one of the cars on display: a 1960 Pontiac Venture.Pontiac-Oakland Museum

Nearby are other cars of roughly the same era.Pontiac-Oakland Museum Pontiac-Oakland Museum

A 1964 LeMans Convertible and a 1970 Pontiac GTO Judge, respectively. Not sure if that counts as a Little GTO.

The collection on display isn’t that large – not compared to Fairbanks or Reno, say – but it was well worth a look. Before its absorption into GM, and in fact before horseless carriages, Pontiac got its start as a carriage maker.Pontiac-Oakland Museum

An 1890s product of the Pontiac Buggy Co. “One of a handful known to exist,” its sign said.

Soon enough, Pontiac Buggy founder Edward Murphy began building 2-cylinder runabouts called Oaklands, and later built more successful 4-cylindar models, as products of the Oakland Motor Car Co. GM bought Murphy out in 1909, and focused on Oaklands for some decades. The GM Pontiac model didn’t exist until 1926, and then the Depression killed off the higher-priced Oaklands.

A 1929 Oakland.Pontiac-Oakland Museum

A Pontiac sedan of the same model year.Pontiac-Oakland Museum

Also on display: marketing odds and ends that emphasize the Native roots of the name.Pontiac-Oakland Museum Pontiac-Oakland Museum Pontiac-Oakland Museum

Some might object these days, but I can’t help suspect that Pontiac – Obwandiyag – able 18th-century leader of the Odawa – might have liked being associated, however tenuously, with such a solid object of commerce.

Wiki, citing a 2002 academic work, notes: “Their neighbors applied the ‘Trader’ name to the Odawa because in early traditional times, and also during the early European contact period, they were noted as intertribal traders and barterers.”