Hi Frazier friends!

The holidays are coming—and we’re lighting up the museum like never before! This week, the Frazier is transforming into a winter wonderland with nearly 100 lit holiday trees throughout the galleries. The trees, donated by Amazon, aren’t just for show—they’re a community-wide partnership and decorated by local businesses.

Join us from November 21 through January 6 as Lights on Main returns, presented in partnership with I Would Rather Be Reading. It all starts with the Preview Party on Thursday, November 21. Buy your ticket here and kick off the season with tree judging, special cocktails, and tastings from Alani, Hop Atomica, Monk’sRoad, Noble Funk, and O. H. Ingram. There will be live music from Mrs. Claus and the Stocking Stuffers (yes, they’re real!) and food for purchase from local vendors.

Here’s the lineup of Lights on Main events to make December shine even brighter.

• Late Night Thursday: Kentucky Christmas, Y’all! Thursday, December 5, 5–8 p.m. (Get Tickets!) The Buzzard Rock String Band will perform live music. Buzzard’s Roost, Kentucky Peerless, and Hop Atomica will bring the Bourbon and beer spirit with tastings while Bearno’s will sell hot pizza slices. Plus, you can meet local authors Cameron Ludwick and Blair Thomas Hess as they chat about their new book, Kentucky Y’all, a love letter to the people and culture of Kentucky. (PS: A signed copy of their book makes a perfect gift!)

• Ugly Sweater Night (Free Admission!) Sponsored by Passport by Molina Healthcare. Thursday, December 12, 5–8 p.m. Not sure what to wear? We’ve got the perfect dress code: ugly holiday sweaters! Dig out your most festive (or outrageously hideous) sweater and you could win a prize. Local school choirs will sing holiday tunes, and you can sip tastings from New Riff, Monk’s Road, and Hop Atomica. Bearno’s will return with pizza slices for sale. And here’s the best part: admission is FREE thanks to Passport by Molina Healthcare!

• Free Family Day Sponsored by Passport by Molina Healthcare. Sunday, December 15, 10 a.m.–2 p.m. Celebrate the season with a special multicultural holiday event! Bring the family for a day filled with hands-on activities—all generously sponsored by Louisville Downtown Partnership—along with festive crafts and a chance to meet the Grinch. Plus, Santa will stop by, so make sure to catch him before he heads back to the North Pole at 11 a.m.! Con Aji y Café food truck will park out front.

• Late Night Thursday: Classic Christmas. Thursday, December 19, 5–8 p.m. (Get Tickets!) Christmas is almost here, and we’re bringing out all the festive vibes! Enjoy classic carols sung by the renowned Male High School choir and the Panpipe Flute Choir. Sip on tastings from Hop Atomic and Angel’s Envy, who will also offer on-site bottle engravings for that extra-special gift. Bearno’s will sell slices, and our Museum Shop will be fully stocked with unique finds for those last-minute gifts.

So why not make Lights on Main part of your family tradition? Come join us—we can’t wait to light up the holidays with you!

And starting today in Frazier Weekly, we roll out our Countdown to Christmas with Staff Picks in the Museum Shop. We’re saluting veterans on this special day, and why this day is making history today with the opening of Norton West Louisville Hospital.

Mindy Johnson
VP of Operations
Frazier History Museum

This Week in the Museum

Countdown to Christmas: Rachel’s Staff Pick in the Museum Shop

Lucky me, I get to kick off our Countdown to Christmas series with the first staff pick in our Museum Shop.

Lucky us as a community, if you haven’t visited our Museum Shop, add this to your list of places to find unique, quirky and Kentucky-centric items, and yes, Bourbon!

You all know me, and know I love a good story, so my staff pick centers on a cutting board made from reclaimed wood with its own story.

There are a variety of Reclaimed Kentucky Hardwood cutting boards and wood to choose from, but the one that caught my eye was perhaps one of the most rustic made of rainbow poplar. And it makes sense when you read the story about the wood. It was made from an old barn that came tumbling down in Nelson County.

Each cutting board has a tag with the type of wood and where it was reclaimed—its own bit of Kentucky history with prices starting at $38.

I was sold the minute I saw it, not just for me, (spoiler alert), but for some lucky members of my family.

You can visit the Museum Shop for free, so come by and start your holiday shopping early. We’ve already got our tree up!

Time to get your jingle on: another staff pick is coming your way next Monday, and each week in Frazier Weekly leading up to Christmas.

Rachel Platt
VP of Mission

Frazier Offering Holiday Tiny Tours & Tastings During Lights on Main

As the holidays rapidly approach, folks looking for a new way to jump-start their holiday spirit have got a fantastic option at the Frazier Museum. Step into a magical winter wonderland at this year’s Lights on Main, a special exhibition the Frazier is hosting in partnership with the nonprofit I Would Rather be Reading (IWRBR). From November 21 to January 6, the Frazier will be transformed into an enchanted holiday forest with three floors of trees beautifully decorated by local schools, organizations, families, and individuals.

Lights on Main is enough of a reason for small groups to visit the Frazier Museum during the holidays. The following suggestion is for Bourbon lovers who want to do a Tiny Tour that includes a guided tour of our Spirit of Kentucky® exhibition and then caps off with a Bourbon Tasting of three Bourbons from three different distilleries in our Speakeasy led by your truly. Groups need to be a minimum of eight folks and pricing for the Tiny Tour & Tasting starts at $25 per person, which includes admission to the museum along with the tour and the tasting. This is a unique offering that can be a wonderful way to jump-start your holiday spirit while learning about and tasting Kentucky’s native spirit.

Please contact me at (502) 753-5666 or syates@fraziermuseum.org with any questions or to book your Tiny Tour & Tasting.

Stephen Yates
Community & Corporate Sales Manager

From the Collections: Air Force Col. Garnett C. Brown’s Flight Suit, 1960s

Today is Veterans Day, so we wanted to take a moment to look the origins of the holiday. Veterans Day was originally established to remember the end of World War I and was called Armistice Day. However, in 1954, the scope of the holiday broadened to include veterans as a whole.

Therefore, in honor of Veteran’s Day, today we feature a flight suit worn by Colonel Garnett C. Brown of Louisville, Kentucky. Brown flew a C-123 tactical airlift during the Vietnam War. His thirty-year career with the United States Air Force included five years flying combat missions as well as service with the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon and the Department of State with the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. This flight suit is currently on display in our Founder’s Gallery, so come on down to the Frazier and see it.

To all of our veterans: thank you.

Tish Boyer
Registrar & Manager of Collections Engagement

Highlights of 120: Mason County: Col. Charles Young

Did you know the first Black man to achieve the rank of colonel in the United States Army was a Kentuckian? Born in Mays Lick, Mason County, Charles Young (1864–1922) was promoted to lieutenant colonel on July 1, 1916, owing to his exceptional leadership of the Tenth Cavalry during the Mexican Expedition. Col. Young is just one of the many Kentucky veterans we can honor on this Veterans Day.

Learn more about Col. Young in this video from our 120: Cool KY Counties exhibit.

Simon Meiners
Communications & Research Specialist

Frazier Announces 2024–25 “In from the Cold” Winter Break Camp!

Step in from the cold this winter break at the Frazier, where we’ll take a look at some of the coolest things from history: from Mt. Everest cold cases to strange winter sports. We’ll even spend some time diving into the great books you may curl up with around a cozy fire and solving a mystery or two. We can’t wait to hang out! Sign up today for some winter fun at the Frazier.

• Cold Case: History’s Unsolved Mysteries. Monday, December 30. From Roanoke to Amelia Earhart to sea monsters and more, we’ll look at some amazing cases that have gone ice cold.

• The Birth of Cool. Tuesday, December 31. History is full of really cool people—from Shakespeare to Houdini. We’ll learn about people who were stars in their day for things as diverse as painting, tightrope walking, escape artistry, and more.

• Cozy up by the Fire. Thursday, January 2. Books are the perfect item to have when cozied up by the fire. We’ll talk all things book from Sherlock Holmes to a special guest session for our camp littles.

• The Ice and the Snow. Friday, January 3. As we’ll see with Civil War snowball fights, strange winter sports, and sled dog races, people have always made the best of winter weather.

Nicole Clay
Education & Engagement Specialist

KET’s Inside Louisville Explores Twenty Years of the Frazier History Museum

What a week it was for sharing the Frazier’s growing impact on every corner of our Commonwealth! From Greenup to Fulton Counties and covering 421 miles in between, the Frazier History Museum shares stories about all of Kentucky and each of its 120: Cool KY Counties. And I can tell you, our team of storytellers loves to do it.

Last week, both Rachel Platt and I had the chance to sit down with our friend and former WHAS11 co-anchor Kelsey Starks for her KET show Inside Louisville. Kentucky Educational Television reaches over one million people throughout the Commonwealth and surrounding states every week. It is Kentucky’s largest classroom.

Thanks Kelsey! It was kind of like we’ve done this before. I appreciate your interest in talking about one of my favorite topics, “Twenty Years of the Frazier History Museum.”

From our Bridging the Divide programs to Bourbon, from our founder Owsley Brown Frazier to the museum’s collections, exhibitions, and position as the place where the world meets Kentucky—all topics were on the table.

Watch here!

Andy Treinen
President & CEO

Bridging the Divide

Historic Opening of Norton West Louisville Hospital

I am really thinking about the history of this moment: a new hospital opening today, the first one built west of Ninth in more than 150 years.

Some say they can’t find another hospital like this being built in a traditionally underserved area.

Let that sink in a moment.

I got to tour Norton West Louisville Hospital last week and went to the ribbon-cutting ceremony on Friday. As Norton Healthcare CEO Russ Cox said, it’s time.

Today, opening day, the hospital is focusing on its patients. No distractions.

From the natural light in the entryway to the high ceilings, its green space, and smiling faces greeting you, everything about this hospital is intentional, even the vibrant artworks from local artists.

The twenty-bed facility will employ more than 380 employees and offer a myriad of health services.

Not just health services, but a lifeline for the basics with its partnership with Dare to Care and a food pantry.

And don’t forget the Goodwill Opportunity Campus with all its services is its neighbor.

Norton West Louisville Hospital also offers community spaces for residents to come inside and gather.

The philosophy is hospitals should be a space in sickness, but also in health—and demystifying it as a place to fear.

The cornerstone belief is also health equity should be at the foundation of our community.

Every person, in every neighborhood, should have the same opportunities to get the health care they deserve.

Well done, Norton Healthcare.

I am really thinking about the history of this moment.

It’s time.

Rachel Platt
VP of Mission

U of L Archives & Special Collections Hosting Exhibition on Louisville’s Fairness Campaign

Swing by the University of Louisville’s Archives and Special Collections to catch our ongoing exhibition in its final month: Fairness Does a City Good: A 25 Year Retrospective!

Twenty-five years ago, Fairness organizers in Louisville and across the state of Kentucky oversaw a wave of change. Within 1999 alone, activists fighting for the extension of anti-discrimination protections to LGBTQ+ Kentuckians won inclusive legislation in Louisville, Lexington, Henderson, and Jefferson County. The sheer number and scale of these victories can seem somewhat mythic in the context of the ongoing fight for queer rights in Kentucky. However, the history of Fairness Campaign reveals tools, approaches, and forms of hope that can mobilize us to join the enduring struggle for justice.

This comprehensive exhibition is a textured, visual narrative of the fight for Fairness in Louisville, crafted via the archival records donated by the Fairness Campaign. From its founding in 1991 and onward, the Fairness Campaign served a variety of functions. It was an organizing collective, a community of friends, a support system, and an outlet for queer expression. Built into the fabric of Fairness was also a call to anti-racist work, as the organizing team recognized that there could be no queer liberation without that for people of color, specifically Black Americans.

In celebrating the patchwork nature of social justice movement work, this exhibition pieces together personal accounts, ephemera objects such as t-shirts and posters, photographs, and organizational records to represent a recent historical story of struggle and triumph. Oral histories, protest banners, and highlights from the Barry Bingham Jr. Courier-Journal photograph collection are featured prominently. The exhibition invites the audience to recognize the ongoing fight for equality in Louisville, and more broadly in Kentucky, and be a part of the fabric of change.

The exhibition is on view during Archives and Special Collections’ open hours, Monday through Friday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m., through December 13, 2024. Archives and Special Collections is located on the lower level of Ekstrom Library on the University of Louisville’s Belknap Campus. Archives and Special Collections is grateful for the support of the Frazier History Museum, and we look forward to collaborating to share these histories more widely in the future.

Cassidy Meurer
Archivist for the Barry Bingham Jr. Courier-Journal Photograph Collection, U of L Archives & Special Collections
Guest Contributor

History All Around Us

Veterans Day Ceremony to be held Today at St. Louis Cemetery

I wanted to make sure you are aware of a Veterans Day ceremony today at the St. Louis Cemetery at 1167 Barrett Avenue at 3 p.m. that includes Governor Andy Beshear.

It is part of the St. Louis Cemetery Unmarked Graves Project led by Ned Berghausen.

Later today, sixteen Civil War, Buffalo Soldier, and World War I veterans will be honored at the second annual Veterans Day observance with full military ceremonies.

To give you a bit of history, 1,633 Black Catholics were buried at St. Louis Cemetery between 1867 and 1937, nearly all of them in unmarked graves. Through archival research, their identities have been uncovered and documented.

St. Louis Cemetery is listed on the National Parks Service’s Network to Freedom, a national program recognizing agents on the Underground Railroad.

Approximately 500 white veterans are buried at St. Louis Cemetery in segregated sections. They will also be honored during the ceremony.

If you attend, you’ll also see a Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) survey being conducted that will locate the burial sections of the more than 1,500 Black Catholics buried in the two segregated sections of St. Louis Cemetery.

Thanks to the St. Louis Cemetery Unmarked Graves Project for all their meaningful work.

Rachel Platt
VP of Mission