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EXPLORING
KENTUCKY - November 2002 by Katherine Tandy Brown Deck the
Banks, O Ashland's Jolly
“Friendly people here make visitors feel right at home,” says Sue Dowdy, executive director of the Ashland Area Convention and Visitors Bureau. Though I’ve heard that from many CVBs, in Ashland I actually experienced it. Everyone I passed on Winchester Avenue, Ashland’s “Main Street,” caught my eye to smile and give a “hello” or a “hidee.” I truly felt welcomed. Settled as Pogue’s Landing in 1786 by a Virginia family of that name, this Ohio River town was re-named Ashland in 1854 in honor of the Lexington estate of Sen. Henry Clay, and soon became an iron, coal and manufacturing center. Though home to big industry, the city retains a homey, small-town feel. So it’s fitting that holiday celebration here kicks off with an all-volunteer event involving a large chunk of the community. In its 17th year, the Festival of Trees is run by the Paramount Women’s Association, which raises funds for renovations to the Paramount Arts Center (more than $8 million recently) and for its youth education program. Just named one of the state’s “Top 10 Festivals” by the Kentucky Tourism Council, this nine-day event begins the Saturday prior to Thanksgiving, with sponsors decorating 47 large Christmas trees displayed in the 325-seat theater. When this gorgeous 1931 art deco venue isn’t filled with trees, its rafters ring with live entertainment. “We’re a world-class stage in a small town,” said Kathy Timmons, the Paramount’s executive director. “And we’re right on Kentucky Country Music Highway 23.” For a trip back in time, the Highlands Museum & Discovery Center is but a short two blocks from the Paramount and during Holidays at the Highlands (November 13 through December 31), the two-story facility is decorated to the hilt. “We’re basically a history museum but we have activities tied in with our exhibits, so that when an adult and child come in, there’s something for both ages to do,” said Director Nancy Smith. Running through Dec. 20, “Stitches in Time” is rife with well-preserved 1800s-era clothing and with lovely quilts – crazy quilts, appliques and pieced works. A nice WW I and II exhibit honors local war heroes and from the museum’s extensive military artifact collection, “Hitler’s last phone,” which he used in his bunker. You also can learn about area history and archaeology, then visit two Adena Indian mounds, one in Ashland’s Central Park and a serpent mound in nearby Catlettsburg. And don’t miss the Country Music Heritage museum. A remarkable number of well-known country music artists have come from towns either on or near US 23, and their biographies and some memorabilia are here – Keith Whitley, Loretta Lynn, Crystal Gale, Ricky Skaggs, Hylo Brown, Billy Ray Cyrus, Patty Loveless, Tom T. Hall, and of course, Naomi, Wynonna and Ashley Judd. “The Judds are home-grown!” Smith laughs. Just another short half block and you’re at the Ashland Area Art Gallery (AAAG), begun 31 years ago by regional artists to showcase their own work and expanded to include a studio where welfare-to-work mothers learn the craft of pottery. If you’re just a snoop at heart and want to see how others decorate their houses, AAAG’s Christmas Tour of Homes on Sunday, Dec. 8 is your license to peek. A 25-year tradition, the event features six or seven homes that can range from elaborate to modest, and is a major fund raiser for the gallery’s art education program. Beginning with refreshments and seasonal harp music in the gallery, the driving tour lasts from 1 til 6 p.m., sometimes includes a church, and usually attracts some 600 snoopers. “You can’t possibly leave this gallery after this event and not be ready for Christmas,” said Brenda Keathley, executive director of the Ashland Area Art Gallery. “And we’re a great place to holiday shop. In addition to our artworks, we’ll have Christmas ornaments for sale. There’ll be gifts from $5 to $6,000 each!” “We call Winchester Avenue ‘the cultural corridor’,” Keathley said. “It’s an extension of US 23, the Country Music Highway, and we have the performing arts with the Paramount Arts Center, visual arts with this gallery, historic preservation with the Highlands Museum, and literary arts with the Jesse Stuart Foundation. There’s nowhere else in the Commonwealth that I can think of with four separate disciplines within a five-block range.” Within a short walk or drive, you can assuage your holiday appetite at any of a number of eateries, like Rocco’s, the Frame Up Gallery Coffee House & Tea Room, and at the Bluegrass Grill, a 50-years-plus drive-in with specialty burgers. Come Nov. 26 you’ll want to claim your square of sidewalk on Winchester Ave. when the Ashland Christmas Parade wends its way through downtown for two evening hours before 20,000 to 30,000 holiday happy spectators. That same day, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, the city turns on its Winter Wonderland of Lights display. Some 750,000 tiny twinkling lights will illuminate Ashland’s main thoroughfares and Central Park will be filled with 40 lighted displays. Ashland will stay alight until alcohol-free New Year’s Eve on the Plaza ushers in 2003. Contact the Ashland Area Convention
and Visitors Bureau for more info at (800)377-6249 or www.visitashlandky.com. Katherine Tandy
Brown is a staff writer for The Lane Report. |
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Copyright 1996-2002, by Kentucky Business Online. All rights reserved. Editorial content
is copyright 2002, Lane Communications Group The Lane Report is a trademark of Lane Communications Group. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. |
In
these times when Americans seem to be re-embracing motherhood and apple
pie, down-home holidays have a kind of “touching base” appeal.
And if getting back to basics makes your bells jingle, head your sleigh
eastward come Christmastime to Ashland.