For more information:
• Brown Brothers Cadillac

Producer/Editor: Brandon Wickey
Videographer: Amelia Cutadean
Audio: Brent Abshear

Brown Brothers Cadillac

Classic Chrome

Join us at Brown Brothers Cadillac in Louisville for a tour through the history of the Cadillac, from the 1902 Model A to the 1962 convertible.

Brown Brothers owner Gary Brown takes host Dave Shuffett on a tour through the private collection, including a car that was loaned to former Gov. John Y. Brown for his inauguration parade and another used by Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf in the Pegasus Parade after the first Gulf War.

For more information: City of Leitchfield Web site

Producer: Dave Shuffett
Videographer: John Schroering
Audio: Roger Tremaine
Editor: Dan Taulbee

Our Town—Leitchfield

“Our Town” is a new segment this season on Kentucky Life. This week we visit Leitchfield, located between Nolin and Rough River lakes.

Leitchfield, the county seat of Grayson County, was named for Major David Leitch, on whose land the town was built. The town had its share of misfortune in its early years: In the mid-1800s Confederate forces burned the county courthouse; a huge fire almost destroyed the downtown area in 1895; and the courthouse burned again in 1896, destroying all records.

Recent years have seen tourists flocking to the community for recreation, thanks to the Rough River Lake and Nolin River Lake flood control projects completed in the early 1960s.

Leitchfield celebrates the end of summer by hosting the Grayson County Fair, which ends on Labor Day. Join us for some classic small-town fun.

For more information:
• Information on John Calvert’s career from the Internet Movie Database

Producer: Joshua Niedwick
Videographers: Mark Irons, Alan Miller, Eric Stemen
Editor: Jessica Gibbs
Production Assistant: Jesse Smith

Magician John Calvert

The Illusionist

John Calvert was bitten by the magic bug at an early age when his father took him to a magic show. Now at age 98 he holds the record for the world’s longest-running magic show.

His work as a magician earned him a film contract in Hollywood, where he made over 40 films. He was once a stand-in for Clark Gable. Calvert has been an inspiration for a new generation of magicians, including Siegfried and Roy. Among his illusions are making an organ float in midair and cutting off a man’s head with a buzz saw and putting it back on.

A native of Indiana, Mr. Calvert now makes his home with his wife, Tammy, in Bowling Green, where we caught up with him.

For more information:
• The “Marked Rock” Web site produced by Bill Thayer and hosted by the University of Chicago includes photos of the petroglyphs and the author’s thoughts on their origins.

Producer: Dave Shuffett
Videographer: Dave Dampier
Audio: Roger Tremaine
Editor: Dan Taulbee

Weird Kentucky: Petroglyphs

Rocks and Runes

We explore a mystery in Clay County by examining the Red Bird River Shelter Petroglyphs, a series of carvings on a stone in Manchester. The location was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989 as a prehistoric rock art site. Some people interpret the carvings as inscriptions from at least eight extinct alphabets; others are skeptical of that claim and believe some of the markings are more recent.

The river is named for the legendary Red Bird, believed to have been a Cherokee chief who lived in Clay County at the time European settlers started coming to the area. The Kentucky State Historical Marker at Big Creek Elementary School says Red Bird and his friend were killed in battle protecting their furs and their bodies were thrown into the river. The marker says that the rock ledges bear markings attributed to Red Bird.

Road work on Ky. 66 in the 1990s caused part of the cliff with the petroglyphs to fall, and the sandstone boulder—over 19 feet long and about 5 feet tall—was moved to a fenced-in shelter in the Stinson-Rawlings Park in Manchester, where it rests today.