Editor’s Note: Having completed the adoption of the current Kentucky Constitution in August 1891 and the start of America’s involvement in World War I in winter-spring 1917, we now move to the last months of WWI, the period of the United States’ major involvement. For historical purposes, the Sun reprints the Clippings “warts and all,” and so derogatory and racist stereotypical words are reprinted in an effort to combat any attempts to “clean up” history for modern eyes or assuage modern consciences.
The Woodford Sun
September 19, 1918
[SENATOR JOSEPH BLACKBURN DEAD] Former Senator Joseph C. S. Blackburn, of this county, died early last Thursday morning in Washington at the residence of his son-in-law and daughter, Brig. Gen. William Hall and Mrs. Hall, of heart disease, from which he had been a sufferer for several years. He was the youngest of 12 children, and was born near Spring Station at his family’s homestead on October 1, 1838. His father came to the “cane lands” of Woodford County from Virginia soon after 1780 and built a fort. His mother was of the Bell family who settled near Pisgah. He was education at Sayres School in Frankfort and Centre College, where he graduated in 1857. He studied law with his relative, the great lawyer James Kinkead of Lexington and was admitted to the Bar. He first went to Chicago to practice, and in a remarkable coincidence his first case before the U.S. Court in Chicago was given assistance by Abraham Lincoln, then a lawyer. Blackburn dedicated the last years of his life to directing the building of a great memorial to Lincoln. Blackburn returned home and stumped the state for Breckenridge in 1860 while engaging in farming and lawyering in his home county. He was elected representative from Woodford to the State Legislature in 1871, and in 1874 was elected to the Congress after a memorable race against Edward Marshall. He served four terms in Congress, and was then elected to the U.S. Senate in 1885, 1890, and finally in 1906, and then retired in 1907. As a senator for 18 years, he was among the most ablest members, a masterful orator, and a famous reputation for his memorization of names and faces. He was active in every campaign in Kentucky. No man in public life in Kentucky ever had as large a personal following. On his retirement from the Senate,President Roosevelt appointed him the Civil Governor of the Panama Canal Zone. In 1909, he resigned to return home to Versailles and his Spring Station farm. In 1914, he was appointed the head of the Lincoln Memorial Commission, and so returned to Washington, though he often returned home. After lying in state at the State Capital, the great man was buried in a simple ceremony at Frankfort Cemetery. Among the pallbearers, was A.A. Bowmar, Publisher and Editor of the Woodford Sun.
[FARM NEWS] Thomas P. Dunlap and son have purchased the “Alex Dunlap place, which lies opposite their farm on the Old Lexington and Frankfort turnpike from Mrs. Belle F. Dunlap. It comprises 305 acres and is one of the best farms in the county. Possession will be transferred on March 1, next year.
[NO COVENANTED PEACE (Bowmar editorial)] America, unless we repudiated civilization and abandon humanity and put a premium on savagery and brutality, can make no covenanted peace, no peace by agreement or negotiation with Germany. It would be a covenant with hell, a partnership with infamy.
[YANKS BIG VICTORY] The big feature in the war news this past week was the powerful and successful blow against the Germans by the First American field army under Gen. Pershing, which wiped out the St. Mihiel salient. The Yanks advanced many miles and trapped between 50,000 and 60,000 Germans. The victory is regarded as of great strategic importance.
[PRAISE FOR COLORED CITIZENS] The colored Americans as a race have proved their loyalty as soldiers, as workers, and as citizens generally. There are no exact figures of the amount of Liberty Loan bonds and War Savings Bonds they have purchased, but enough is known to wartrant the statement that according to their means and ability, their financial support of the Government has been splendid. The Treasury Department has on more than one occasion referred to this fact. Here in Woodford County, the colored Poole have made an especially fine record.