Cows & Hogs & Dogs! Oh My!

With the coming Spring, building in Hazard has started with a boom, and Main Street bids fair to be almost a solid business block. Outside capital is becoming interested, and the eyes of Kentucky are on Hazard, the heart of the coal field. The census will probably show that Hazard, Lothair and Lennut combined are about 7,500 people - enough to make a live, hustling modern city.

However, today Hazard's streets and alleys are filled with old paper and rubbish and a city with cows and hogs roaming the streets and with the dogs so numerous that one can hardly walk without walking over one. There is enough old paper on the streets and alleys to print the Sunday edition of the New York World. And there are also enough tin cans along the river bank to put tin roofs on half the houses in Hazard. Spring is here and nature is trying to purify the air with good clean sunlight. 1920

Five-Cent Novels & Moving Pictures

Almost any night at a late hour, small children can be seen alone on the streets of Hazard. Anyone knows that the street is not the place to mold boys into true manhood. Some boys are seen smoking cigarettes and cigars. Cigarettes stunt the growth of children and dull the brain and reduce them to a low state of morality. In addition, any one who observes can see that from some source the boys in Hazard are getting ideas that true life is one of a wild, desperate nature, and that a man is not a man unless he carries a gun and is ever ready for trouble. Whether these ideas are coming from five-cent novels or from low class moving pictures, we cannot say. Moving pictures, like books, are splendid when they are the right kind but the "knock down and drag out kind" of either books or movies will do more to corrupt the minds of the youth than any other two things mentionable. 1920

Escape Across The River In The Darkness

Thieves broke into the Hazard Drug Store on Main Street around 2 AM on April 22nd 1930. They gained entrance by breaking the lock on the back door. They then jimmied open a steel cabinet containing the store's supply of prescription whiskey and carried away the entire stock of 115 pints of bonded liquor. After stealing the whiskey the robbers ransacked the store and took whatever appealed to their fancy. Their selections included a number of watches, several flashlights, a quantity of cigars, cigarettes, and $25 from the cash register.

The robbers took plenty of time to rob the store but from their subsequent actions their nerves must have been in some what shaky condition. They jumped in their getaway car, a stolen vehicle that belonged to a Cleveland, Ohio man who was visiting Dave Pritchard in Hazard. The vehicle had been parked in front of Prichard's home. The theives drove out Big Bottom and apparently thought the lights of an approaching car was that of the police. They headed down Maple Street and turned down an alley that led to the river near J.L. Johnson's residence, stopping near the edge of the river.

Meanwhile - Bill Johnson and Oscar Baker were staging an all night fishing party nearby. After hearing the commotion they decided to investigate. As they neared the car three men jumped out and ran towards the river and Johnson and Baker gave chase. Johnson overtook one of the men but during the tussle they fell on a barbed wire fence. Johnson, who was underneath, was cut in the arm by one of the fence barbs and thinking the man was using a knife, let go his hold. The man and his two partners in crime made their escape across the river in the darkness. 1930

'Till The Cows Come Home

The grass is growing in the Backwoods and the cows have about quit bothering Main Street. My hope is that one day in the future - Hazard will have a bigger police force so they can keep the cows, hogs and dogs off the streets. But for now it is only a dream because the cows and hogs in particular walk on the sidewalks and the dogs are so thick that women and children can hardly travel the streets without stepping on one.

I think everybody has forgotten how deep the mud was here last winter during the 1919 season. They're not building any sidewalks. They must think there will never be another winter. There are seven new brick buildings going up on Main Street, all of them modern. The old wooden shacks on the street will look a little strange standing next to the new buildings.

The clock at the Perry County Court House hasn't worked for years but still manages to be on time at least twice a day. The clock was struck by lightning many years ago and no one has ever had any luck getting it to run.

The women of Hazard are going to vote for the first time in a Presidential election this year. The Democrats have nominated James Cox. His running mate and vice Presidential candidate is Franklin D Roosevelt. The Republicans have chosen Warren G. Harding as their candidate. So it will be between Cox and Harding. 1920

What Fun, Oh, What Fun

I was growing up in Hazard, along with so many others, we more or less made our own entertainment. Oh, we had dolls, including paper dolls, and items we got for birthdays and Christmas, but most of us were outdoors youngans and hated to come in when darkness started to fall, take a bath, and be put to bed. Our windows were open and the cool night air circled the room while I lay and listened to the night sounds outside until my eyes finally drooped and then closed in peaceful sleep.

We did not have to unwind our minds from the stress of pushing buttons, moving “sticks”, punching remotes, but were so tired from romping up and down the hills and hollers that sleep was not a stressful sleep but very peaceful and our thoughts would take us to “dreamland” whereby we entered into a fantasy world of our own, awaking with a sound mind and body ready to meet a new day.

Let me tell you about some of our entertainment, my close friends and I, shared in those days. My favorite was a beautiful stick horse that Uncle Matt whittled on to make him a pinto pony, using one of his Sunday ties or an old belt for his neck, making him very special. I would put on my cowboy boots (with little guns at the side, yep I was a tomboy), and gallop away to my heart’s content.

Then, one of the ingenuous fun things, were to take two empty tin cans, the bigger the better, and smash each one with a foot, making sure the foot fit the dent, and each foot was adorned with the cans of our choice (as we always could find old tin cans), and we would run and play with these on our feet, seeing who could wear them the longer before they got loose and we had to quit. The noise they made on the pavement (after our holler got paved), I reckon, made us happier when we could outdo one another.

“Stilts” were the thing, but we had to be extra careful when using stilts and when Dad would make mine they got taller as I grew. My first stilts were not too tall, but when I graduated from that set, the next made me taller and I felt so big up there in the air, walking up to the porch and saying “boo” to Granny, who let me have a “boo” when she got closer to me that day. “Stilts” or mine, were made from sturdy trees that had sturdier branches that could be cut away and leave a place for my feet. They also made me “brought on” stilts that they would fashion out of boards and slats. I loved the tree stilts better because I could maneuver them.

And, one of the best I kept to last because I had so much fun with these “caissons” and I made the military song come to life as I played up and down the place known to me as “Big Bottom”, “…over hill over dale we would hit the dusty trail as my caisson kept rollin’ along…” Yep, I kept my caisson clean as a whistle, very possessive of the old castaway tire. We didn’t own a car so I had to look around the neighborhood for a cast off. I washed and shined it, and would carefully place myself inside it and push myself off and round and round I would go until I hit something or drug my foot along to stop me. I have always wondered why it did not make me dizzy but as I remember, it didn’t.

Oh, yeah, one more…we would watch for someone to get an appliance in a big cardboard box, which I would snap up right fast, have Dad cut it for me (a big flat piece) and I would take it up on a grassy knoll and get aboard and gleefully take off down the hill. What a carefree life, huh? You see, this kept us busy during the summer “grass sliding”, waiting for the snow to fall so we could really go sledding over the white stuff. The green stuff became brown stuff as the summer went by because we made it bare to the ground but what fun, oh, what fun!!!!

Not Hat No Way

Perry Circuit Judge Sam Ward slammed the lid down on "order" in the courtroom today, and caught Bob Cooksey under the lid. Said the judge, "Bob came wandering into the courtroom, talking loud and wearing his hat. I waited a while and he continued the talk and his hat stayed on his head, so I just sent the sheriff down to bring him before the bench." Deputy Sheriff Ballard Stidham, who is waiting on the sessions of court, escorted Mr. Cooksey to the bench after he had removed his hat. A fine of $2 was assessed against Cooksey and so entered on the books. Judge Ward said that his only goal was to improve the order in the court room and that he would not be hard on those who didn't know the rules but said that Cooksey "should know better." The judge has ordered all of the benches on which the visitors sit, moved well back from the jury rail, and he says he is doing everything he can to stop the common practice of having anyone who cared to slip in to the bench, even during trials. 1940

Justice Late, But Justice Still

On the night of May 1st 1898, R. C. Knickols and Ballard Begley were out together playing cards in the Perry County Court House on Main Street. There was some trouble over the game and Knickols killed Begley by shooting him in the back. Knickols left the scene but was later captured on Owls Nest and brought back to Hazard and lodged in the Perry County jail. He was transferred to the Booneville jail in Owsley County and was indicted for murder and his case was to be tried in Owsley Circuit Court. However he escaped. Authorities were unable to locate Knickols and the search was eventually given up. 22 years past with no sign of the man who was wanted for murder. In 1920 - Rev. James Osborne was in Beckley, Indiana when he recognized Knickols. Osborne notified police who quickly arrested the fugitive. Authorities contacted Hazard police for information on the murder that happened back in 1898. Knickols was back behind bars.