Good Monday morning,

Like so many of you who grew up in the basketball meccas of Kentucky and Indiana, I have loved NCAA tournament time all my life. While it’s true I’m kind of a sports dork, this affinity for March Madness was founded in experiences much deeper than tracking a bouncing basketball. I value shared experiences, I relish competition, and I absolutely love a good story! This is the time of year Cinderella’s heart-stopping tale is told over and over again.

Andy Treinen poses with the television the winner of Membership Madness will receive in the “Athletic Kentucky” section of the Frazier’s *Cool Kentucky* exhibition, February 23, 2022. Credit: Frazier History Museum.

With that, I bring you a chance to win this brand new 70-inch television through Membership Madness. If you are a Frazier member, you are already eligible to fill out a bracket for a chance to win. With each advanced level of membership, you can earn another bracket to play. If you’re not a member or a former member, you can get in on the fun for as little as $20. That, folks, is what they call a win-win. Membership includes admission to the Frazier for a full year AND you have a chance to win a 70’ hi-def TV AND you get to have fun tracking tournament games for the next few weeks. I guess that’s a win-win-win.

Get your membership now and we’ll send you a bracket the evening of Selection Sunday, March 13. You will have until end of business on Wednesday, March 16, to fill out the bracket and get it back to us. Thanks to Assured Partners for being such great partners.

Andy Treinen poses with the Membership Madness bracket, February 23, 2022. Credit: Frazier History Museum.

In this week’s newsletter, Rachel Platt sits down with Mayor of Louisville candidate Greg Greenberg to talk about the recent attempt on his life and his vision for a better Louisville. You will learn about objects in storage, summer camps 2022, and some medicine bottles from the Fitzbutler family of Beecher Terrace in our West of Ninth exhibition.

Amanda Briede shares the great story of Oksana Masters. Not only is Oksana competing in the 2022 Paralympic Games right now, much of her gear is in our Cool Kentucky exhibition. Meanwhile, we’re featuring Go Fish–style playing cards in the museum store in advance of an exciting announcement the store will make a month from now.

Stay tuned!

Editor’s note: The answer to the trivia question posed in the February 21 issue is Bellarmine University.

This Week in the Museum

Curator’s Corner: Beijing 2022 Paralympic Games Skiier Oksana Masters’s Bibs

If it feels like I was just telling you about Louisvillian and Atherton High School alum Oksana Masters and encouraging you to cheer her on during the 2020 Summer Paralympics, that’s because there was a mere six months between those games — which took place in Tokyo in August and September of 2021 — and the start of the 2022 Winter Paralympics in Beijing. This isn’t a problem for many athletes; but for someone like Oksana, who competes in both summer and winter sports, the postponement of the 2020 summer games left little time for transition from street to snow. After winning gold in September in both the Para-cycling road race and time trial, Oksana became only the fourth woman and sixth American to win gold medals in the Summer and Winter Paralympics. Her current medal count is 4 gold, 3 silver, and 3 bronze.

I am looking forward to watching Oksana win even more medals when she competes in Nordic Skiing at the winter games, which start March 4. But in the meantime, you can stop by the “Athletic Kentucky” section of our Cool Kentucky exhibition to see Oksana’s racing bibs from the past two Winter Paralympics: Sochi in 2014 and PyeongChang in 2018, along with several other pieces related to her many other sports.

Also, keep an eye out for Oksana in international marketing campaigns for Delta, Toyota, Fenty Beauty, and the Kim Kardashian–founded underwear brand Skims.

Museum Store: Go Fish for Women’s History Month

March is Women’s History Month, and it’s less than a week away! Really get into the spirit this year and celebrate with some wonderful items from our Museum Store. Wonder Women, a Go Fish–based card game comprised of forty-four illustrated cards featuring aviators, athletes, activists, artists, scientists, fashion icons, and other inspirational women, is both informative and fun. The Herstory Museum Puzzle features incredibly inspirational women, as well — and it’s a pretty darn great puzzle! The products are $11.99 and $17.99, respectively.

Legacy of Russell Resident and Central High School Teacher Lyman T. Johnson

A website devoted to notable University of Michigan alumni states that one alum, Lyman T. Johnson (1906 – 97), “is not remembered as a civil rights giant like Martin Luther King Jr. or Rosa Parks.” This may be true outside of Kentucky, but within the state, he is regarded as a seminal figures of the civil rights movement.

Lyman T. Johnson poses outside Lyman T. Johnson Middle School, undated. The school is located at 2509 Wilson Avenue in the Park Hill neighborhood in West Louisville. Credit: Wade Hall papers, University of Kentucky Special Collections.

Without Johnson’s courage, the integration of higher education in Kentucky might have happened later than it did. In 1949, five years before the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board, he successfully sued the University of Kentucky to be allowed to matriculate in its all-white graduate program. Without his keen wit and intelligence, the fight to end discrimination in public accommodations in the 1960s might not have come about as smoothly as it did in Louisville.

Born in Columbiaville, Tennessee, Johnson obtained a master’s degree at the University of Michigan in 1931. In 1933, he relocated to Louisville, Kentucky, moving in with his sister, who lived on Chestnut Street at Eighteenth Street in the Russell neighborhood of the West End.

It was here that, as a teacher at Central High School in Russell, Johnson casually inspired his students to practice nonviolent resistance:

“I told my students: “Well, young folks, the superintendent says he’ll fire me. The judge says he’ll hold me in contempt of court if he found me using school children. So I’m not going to ask a single one of you — I’m not even going to invite you — to help with the demonstration this afternoon at Walgreen’s at a half past three. School will be out at three o’clock, which will give you plenty of time to go home and tell your mothers that Mr. Johnson will not invite you to participate in the demonstration that he’ll be leading at half past three at Walgreen’s on Fourth Street.”

Promo for the Lyman T. Johnson Awards Celebration. Johnson is pictured to the left. Credit. LCCC.

So tremendous was Johnson’s impact in the Commonwealth that there is a middle school named in his honor in the Park Hill neighborhood, a graduate fellowship in his name at the University of Kentucky, and an annual awards ceremony named after him, organized by Louisville Central Community Centers. This year’s Lyman T. Johnson Awards Celebration presented by LCCC and the Lyman T. Johnson Honor Society will take place 11 a.m., Thursday, March 17, at Old Walnut Family Strengthening Center, 1300 West Muhammad Ali Boulevard. The ceremony will also be livestreamed via YouTube.

You can register here.

Sources

Hall, Wade. “Interview With Lyman T. Johnson, May 30, 1979.” Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, University of Kentucky Libraries. May 30, 1979.

Adams, Luther. Way Up North in Louisville: African American Migration in the Urban South, 1930 – 1970, p. 134. 2010.

Physician Dr. Henry Fitzbutler’s Beecher Terrace Practice, c. 1872 – 98

When you think of physicians in the late 1800s, you generally think about those individuals working for hospitals and large universities as the practice of medicine began to advance. What you don’t tend to think about is the local doctor living and working in their community — but those individuals did exist. One such doctor was Dr. Henry Fitzbutler, who worked and lived just west of Ninth Street here in Louisville. He was successful, politically active, education-focused, and active within his community, as were members of his family.

Dr. Henry Fitzbutler, undated. Credit: Fitzbutler College, University of Louisville School of Medicine.

Born in Canada in 1837, Dr. Fitzbutler moved with his family to the United States to practice medicine. He graduated from the University of Michigan at the age of thirty-five then founded a practice in Louisville the same year. He went on to found Louisville National Medical College, one of the only medical colleges in the country completely run by African Americans at the time. Dr. Fitzbutler also established Falls City Express, a weekly newsletter for the residents of the West End of Louisville, to continue to bolster and grow the community. When a colleague left the board at Eruptive Hospital to become a health officer, Dr. Fitzbutler took over. He was prominent in local politics, as well.

Dr. Sarah Fitzbutler, undated. Credit: Fitzbutler College, University of Louisville School of Medicine.

Dr. Mary Fitzbutler Waring, c. 1922. Excerpted from a 1922 publication. Credit: New York Public Library Digital Commons.

Dr. Fitzbutler’s wife, Sarah, held shares of the newly incorporated Louisville National Medical College company — until it closed its doors permanently a few years later. She became the first African American woman to graduate with a medical degree in the state of Kentucky. One of the Fitzbutlers’ daughters, Mary, also attended Louisville National Medical College and began her own practice while also teaching in Louisville Public Schools with her sister, Prima. She was quite active in many women’s groups throughout her life upon moving to Chicago, as well, before passing away in 1958.

Archaeological excavations on Beecher Terrace, located off Jefferson Street just west of Ninth Street in the Russell neighborhood of Louisville, led to the rediscovery of Dr. Fitzbutler’s story and those of so many others. Artifacts can be seen from the many individuals who lived in the area in the Beecher Terrace case in the Frazier’s West of Ninth: Race, Reckoning, and Reconciliation exhibition — including medicine bottles, home goods, toys, and more. If you look closely at the case, you’ll see some pharmaceutical bottles prescribed to the families and other medicinal bottles associated with the doctors of the area.

In an unfortunate turn of events, Dr. Fitzbutler and his family suffered from slander in the press when Louisville Police accused him of participating in the grim death of a Miss Flora Elliot. Elliott had died June 3, 1898, at a hospital in New Albany, after having seen Dr. Fitzbutler the previous day. According the Courier Journal, Flora’s boyfriend, Irvine McCoy, had paid Dr. Fitzbutler to help Miss Elliot out with a “delicate situation,” resulting in a “horrible butchering” to her abdomen. After Dr. Fitzbutler spent a few weeks in jail, the case was dismissed due to lack of evidence.

Dr. Fitzbutler adamantly refuted the charges in the press; however, the damage to his reputation had already been done. He left town and became a government physician, working abroad in places such as the Philippines and England.

Dr. Fitzbutler contracted bronchitis in England and passed away December 28, 1901.

Sources

“A Row in the Camp: High Old Time at the Meeting of the Tenth Ward Republican Club.” Courier Journal. May 29, 1889: 2.

“Hungry: City Hall Thronged by Willing Patriots.” Courier Journal. January 19, 1896: 13.

“Colored Doctors: Six Graduates From the Louisville National Medical College.” Courier Journal. April 9, 1896: 8.

“Butchered: Awful Fate of Miss Flora Elliott.” Courier Journal. June 5, 1898: 7.

“Judge Thompson Dismisses Dr. Fitzbutler and Irvine McCoy.” Courier Journal. June 17, 1898: 7.

“Well-known Colored Physician Dead: Dr. Henry Fitzbutler a Victim of Bronchitis Contracted While in England.” Courier Journal. December 29, 1901: 29.

“Negro College Incorporates.” Courier Journal. December 29, 1903: 6.

“Louisville National Medical Hospital Opens for its Twenty-first Year’s Work: Negro Institution Unique in Many Respects and Conducted Most Respectfully.” Courier Journal. October 3, 1907: 4.

“Negro Medical College Passes Out of Existence: Institution Founded Twenty-four Years Ago Gives Up the Struggle.” Courier Journal. May 25, 1912: 14.

“Dr. Mary Waring.” Courier Journal. December 6, 1958: 11.

Mattingly, Carol. “Dr. Mary Fitzbutler Waring (1869 – 1958), physician, educator, and civil rights activist.” H-Kentucky. June 12, 2021.

Stave & Thief Executive Bourbon Steward–led Ready, Set, Go! Tastings

As the official starting point of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail®, the Frazier History Museum shares stories of the people, places, and producers of the Kentucky Bourbon industry. To learn more, visit our Kentucky Bourbon Trail® Welcome Center or tour our Spirit of Kentucky® exhibition.

Join me in a Ready, Set, Go! Bourbon Experience here at Frazier to learn the differences between the flavors of multiple brands, to experience a proper Kentucky tasting, and to hear interesting tidbits of Bourbon history.

Here’s my story: I returned to Kentucky ten years ago and decided to embrace the country’s native spirit — Bourbon. After embarking on some distillery tours, joining a group called Whiskey Chicks, and attending various tastings, what made the biggest impact on me were the distillery stories, the histories — some dating back generations — of the brands, families, and facilities that produce this wonderful golden spirit. Now, I am in my tenth year of exploring Bourbon, and I’m continuing to learn new things to share.

In January 2022, in an effort to further by Bourbon education, I became an Executive Bourbon Steward through the Stave & Thief Society. Did you know up to seventy percent of the flavor of Bourbon comes from the toasted/charred white oak barrel, depending on its age? Did you know Bourbon can be only made in the United States, or that ninety-five percent of Bourbon is made in Kentucky?

Ready, Set, Go! Bourbon Tastings are offered weekly, Thursday through Saturday, at 11:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. I look forward to meeting you and sharing a fun and informative time with you.

Objects in Storage Viewable on New Frazier Collections Highlights Page

Have you visited our Collections pages recently?

When you visit the Frazier’s website, and hover over the “Collections” tab in the navigation bar at the top of the page, you’ll find an entire dropdown menu devoted to artifacts in our permanent collections. We’ve recently updated our Collections Highlights page to include a variety of artifacts related to the history of the Bourbon and tobacco industries, domestic life in Kentucky, and notable people. This ever-growing space, which provides access to items not on display, adds content on a regular basis.

Here’s a behind-the-scenes look at what we do to bring objects from storage to our website.

First, we take web-quality photographs of individual objects with our portable photo studio. Once photos are fully processed, we store them digitally according to the object’s unique accession number so we can find them easily in the future for our own records and external use. After photos are properly filed, we can share them across the museum’s digital platform to bring more stories and more history from our collections to you.

Our latest highlights include a 1930s pickle fork from the historic Galt House hotel, memorabilia from the life and career of professional wrestler Jim “Black Panther” Mitchell, and additions to our tobacco industry and advertising collection.

Visit our Collections web pages — Collections Highlights, Collections Blog, and Collections FAQs — regularly to explore Kentucky history beyond our exhibitions and to contact us with any feedback or questions about donations.

Announcing . . . Summer Camps 2022!

Sunny, warm days are on the horizon, and with that comes summer vacation! We in the Frazier’s education department always look forward to eight fun-filled weeks of laughter and learning with our summer camps. With that, we are thrilled to announce our camps to you in today’s issue of our newsletter. Register here today — spaces are limited, and filling up fast. Some of our most popular camps are looking like they will sell out soon, so don’t miss your chance!

We always strive to bring unique themes tailor-made to our campers’ interests. With that, we’ll be deep-diving into specific topics we’re offering this summer in the coming weeks. This week, I’d like to introduce the camp I am most excited about: Camp Takeover!

It started with a camp called Page to Stage, inspired by the historic interpretations our teaching artists performed for guests. Campers would spend a week writing their own performances and then getting in front of the audience, and the creativity that came out of it and the friendships it fostered were always amazing to see. This year, we are amping it up to bring more to the table: Campers will have the option to write a historic interpretation, but they’ll be doing much more than that. In fact, they’ll be taking over interactions for the entire museum on Friday, June 17: giving tours, reading stories, and more! Parents are invited to come watch their child shine while they run the show. That’s not all — the campers will be meet with amazing Main Street partners to learn how to work with the public, gain public speaking skills, and maybe try their hand at taking over a different historic site!

You can sign up for Camp Takeover here, or see the full lineup here. Stay tuned for more spotlights!

With Membership Madness starting, we have to sweeten the deal for you! Did you know that, as a member, you get a discount on camps? Become a member today to enjoy this benefit.

Bridging the Divide

2022 Mayor of Louisville Candidate Craig Greenberg on his Campaign

I first interviewed Craig Greenberg, one of Louisville’s candidates for Mayor, on February 9, intending to publish the interview in today’s issue of our newsletter.

But on February 14, there was an attempt on his life. Police made an arrest, and the young man charged in the case, Quintez Brown, was subsequently released on bond.

I felt my original interview with Greenberg would no longer be enough, and Greenberg agreed. He says parts of him will fundamentally change after what happened to him and members of his team, and he’s still sorting it out.

Recorded February 21, my second interview with Greenberg deals with that attempt on his life, and whether it had him thinking about perhaps leaving the race.

In my original interview with Greenberg, he began it by talking about a saying that really has become his mantra in life: It translates to “repair the world.”

He says it’s the driving force behind many of his big life decisions, including the decision to run for Mayor of Louisville at a time when the city needs repair and unification.

I asked him how he would bridge so many divides in Louisville, about comparisons to our current mayor with his business background, those endorsements he got from several members of Metro Council, and where he sees hope.

Here is the original interview with Greenberg, recorded February 9, five days prior to the attempt on his life.

Staff Pick

Off the Snead Shelves: The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love by bell hooks

On the last Monday of the month, education and engagement specialist Shelby Durbin highlights a book from the Snead Iron Works bookshelves installed in the “Literary Kentucky” section of “Cool Kentucky.” In 1848, Snead and Company Iron Works opened at Ninth and Market Streets, a block away from what is now the Frazier. The company grew its business by making everything from kitchenware to gates, spittoons, and, of course, bookshelves. Although the successful bookshelf-making firm eventually relocated to Jersey City, New Jersey, Louisville will always be the place it got its start. Today, you can find Snead iron bookshelves all over the world, in places such as the Vatican, the Harvard Library, the New York Public Library, the Main Branch of the Louisville Free Public Library — and now, the Frazier Museum! All of the books displayed on our shelves are written by Kentucky authors. We are honored to celebrate Kentucky’s rich literary contributions in the museum and our newsletter. — Simon Meiners, Communications & Research Specialist

For this month’s installment of “Off the Snead Shelves,” I turned my attention to feminist writer, scholar, and professor bell hooks.

Named Gloria Jean Watkins at birth, bell hooks was born September 25, 1952, in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, and died December 15, 2021, in Berea. During her lifetime, she published over thirty books, exploring topics such as anti-racism and the importance of intersectional feminism. Some of her titles include Belonging: A Culture of Place (1990), All About Love: New Visions (1999), The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love (2004), and Appalachian Elegy: Poetry and Place (2012).

In addition to being an accomplished writer and activist, hooks taught in universities around the country for several decades before returning to her Kentucky roots. She joined the staff at Berea College in 2004. Ten years later, the bell hooks center was founded at Berea. hooks would later donate her papers to the center in 2017. In 2018, hooks was inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame, a much-deserved honor.

bell hooks signs books at her Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame induction ceremony at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning in Lexington, January 31, 2018. Credit: Tom Eblen, *Lexington Herald-Leader*.

In the “Literary Kentucky” section of our Cool Kentucky exhibition, two of bell hooks’s most famous works are shelved next to books by other influential Kentucky writers. We have copies of The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love and All About Love: New Visions. This past month, I read The Will to Change, which delves into how oppressive systems impact men in painful ways. Next, I plan to read All About Love, which examines the ways we give and receive love in our personal and private lives. My first bell hooks book was incredibly thought-provoking, so I’m looking forward to seeing what the next book has in store!

bell hooks relayed the importance of accessibility in her works, which engage audiences from a wide range of ages. She laid the blueprint for much of contemporary feminist theory, and we are honored to share her legacy at the Frazier History Museum. We hope you stop by and visit our shelves in Cool Kentucky to flip through her works and explore the works of other talented Bluegrass-native writers.

In addition to promoting our permanent collection of books by Kentucky authors, I’m excited to announce “Free Book Fridays at the Frazier.” On Fridays (while supplies last), we will be giving away select books from our collection to loyal patrons of the museum. We hope you stop by and check out our “Literary Kentucky” section and maybe even take a book or two from our free book table.

Happy reading!

History All Around Us

Freedom Landing to Mark Underground Railroad Ferry Docking Site in New Albany

The (Un)Known Project: New Albany, Freedom Landing, will be under construction this spring at Sixth and Water Streets directly across from Louisville on the Ohio River. At this location, ferries traveling from Kentucky, carrying freedom seekers who set out to begin their journey on the Underground Railroad, used to dock.

Freedom Landing will honor the countless stories and lives of those freedom seekers who both passed through the area and those who settled in New Albany. Through education and community engagement, we hope to share these stories as well as uncover the untold stories of those we do not yet know. Benches and cast feet sculptures by artists William M. Duffy and Dave Caudill will be facing northeast toward the steeple of the Town Clock Church — a beacon of freedom for those escaping slavery, visible from this installation. The City of New Albany, in collaboration with IDEAS xLab, will extend a sandblasted footprint path from the benches, up Sixth Street to the church that served as a stop on the Underground Railroad.

We look forward to the opportunity for residents and visitors alike to interact with the significant locations tied to the Underground Railroad here in New Albany. As we work to create a visual representation of the history of Freedom Seekers and those who assisted them in New Albany, we hope to deepen our understanding of ourselves and our community while memorializing our community’s history.

This endeavor is the city’s next step in sharing our rich and storied heritage. This installation will serve as the next stone on the path of the great work started in Louisville with IDEAS xLab’s On the Banks of Freedom, which tells the stories of those known and unknown on their journey to escape slavery.

New Albany, Indiana, served as passage to a new life full of possibilities for countless African Americans. It is our duty to tell these important stories. We are proud to continue sharing the history of our city and the vital role it played in the Underground Railroad.

Membership Madness, Beijing 2022 Paralympic Skiier Oksana Masters, Beecher Terrace Physician Dr. Henry Fitzbutler, and More

History of the Frazier, Ukraine-born Louisvillian’s Displacement From Kyiv, 1941–44; Coronavirus Capsule Revisited, and More

The Journey, Ripley-Maysville Crossing on the Underground Railroad, Dixie Highway’s Franco’s Restaurant, and More