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The ridge
Overview: In an isolated stretch of eastern Kentucky, on a hilltop known as Blade Ridge, stands a lighthouse that illuminates nothing but the surrounding woods. For years the lighthouse has been considered no more than an eccentric local landmark-until its builder is found dead at the top of the light, and his belongings reveal a troubling local history. For deputy sheriff Kevin Kimble, the lighthouse-keeper's death is disturbing and personal. Years ago, Kimble was shot while on duty. Somehow the death suggests a connection between the lighthouse and the most terrifying moment of his life. Audrey Clark is in the midst of moving her large-cat sanctuary onto land adjacent to the lighthouse. Sixty-seven tigers, lions, leopards, and one legendary black panther are about to have a new home there. Her husband, the sanctuary's founder, died scouting the new property, and Audrey is determined to see his vision through. As strange occurrences multiply at the Ridge, the animals grow ever more restless, and Kimble and Audrey try to understand what evil forces are moving through this ancient landscape, just past the divide between dark and light.
Book
Predictive modeling of cave entrance locations: relationships between surface and subsurface morphology
Cave entrances directly connect the surface and subsurface geomorphology in karst landscapes. Understanding the spatial distribution of these features can help identify areas on the landscape that are critical to flow in the karst groundwater system. Sinkholes and springs are major locations of inflow and outflow from the groundwater system, respectively, however not all sinkholes and springs are equally connected to the main conduit system. Predicting where on the landscape zones of high connectivity exist is a challenge because cave entrances are difficult to detect and imperfectly documented. Wildlife research has a similar issue of understanding the complexities of where a given species is likely to exist on a landscape given incomplete information and presence-only data. Species distribution models can address some of these issues to create accurate predictions of species or event occurrence across the landscape. Here we apply a species distribution model, MaxEnt, to predict cave entrance locations in three geomorphic regions of Kentucky. We built the models with cave locations from the Kentucky Speleological Survey database and landscape predictor variables, including distance from sinkholes, distance from springs, distance from faults, elevation, lithology, slope, and aspect. All three regional models predict cave locations well with the most important variables for predicting cave entrance locations consistent between models. Throughout all three models, sinkholes and springs had the largest influence on the likelihood of cave entrance presence. This unique use of species distribution modeling techniques shows that they are potentially valuable tools to understand spatial patterns of other landscape features that are either ephemeral or difficult to identify using standard techniques.
Journal Article
Citizens More than Soldiers
Historians typically depict nineteenth-century militiamen as drunken buffoons who stumbled into crooked lines, poked each other with cornstalk weapons, and inevitably shot their commander in the backside with a rusty, antiquated musket.Citizens More than Soldiersdemonstrates that, to the contrary, the militia remained an active civil institution in the early nineteenth century, affecting the era's great social, political, and economic transitions. In fact, given their degree of community involvement, militiamen were more influential in Kentucky's maturation than any other formal community organization.
Citizens More than Soldiersreveals that the militia was not the atrophied remnant of the Revolution's minutemen but an ongoing organization that maintained an important presence in American society. This study also shows that citizen-soldiers participated in their communities by establishing local, regional, and national identities, reinforcing the social hierarchy, advancing democratization and party politics, keeping the public peace, encouraging economic activity, and defining concepts of masculinity. A more accurate understanding of the militia's contribution to American society extends our comprehension of the evolutionary processes of a maturing nation, showing, for example, how citizen-soldiers promoted nationalism, encouraged democratization, and maintained civil order.Citizens More than Soldiersis not a traditional military history of campaigns and battles but rather the story of citizen-soldiers and their contribution to the transformation of American society in the nineteenth century.
eBook
Voices of African Immigrants in Kentucky
Following historical and theoretical overview of African immigration, the heart of this book is based on oral history interviews with forty-seven of the more than twenty-two thousand Africa-born immigrants in Kentucky. From a former ambassador from Gambia, a pharmacist from South Africa, a restaurant owner from Guinea, to a certified nursing assistant from the Democratic Republic of Congo -- every immigrant has a unique and complex story of their life experiences and the decisions that led them to emigrate to the United States. The compelling narratives reveal why and how the immigrants came to the Bluegrass state -- whether it was coming voluntarily as a student or forced because of war -- and how they connect with and contribute to their home countries as well as to the US. The immigrants describe their challenges -- language, loneliness, cultural differences, credentials for employment, ignorance towards Africa, and racism -- and positive experiences such as education, job opportunities, and helpful people. One chapter focuses on family -- including interviews with the second generations -- and how the immigrants identify themselves.
eBook
Use of electrical resistivity tomography to reduce landfill siting risks in the south-central kentucky karst
Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT) can be a key tool for aiding in characterization of karst geohazard risks at proposed landfill sites. This study is proximal to the south-central Kentucky karst and Mammoth Cave National Park and possesses siliciclastic cap rock upland areas that pose relatively high groundwater-contamination risks due to adjacent ravines floored by carbonates. Complex stratigraphy associated with the Mississippian-Pennsylvanian unconformity and juxtaposition of heterolithic sedimentary rocks in general presents further challenges for demarcating hydrogeological characterization of the base of engineered landfills. A conceptual site model integrates ERT surveying and field geology that both satisfactorily characterize the site and risks to groundwater resources without conducting multiple borings. The proposed landfill site is compared to well-known and mapped caves at a landfill near Bowling Green, Crumps Cave near Smiths Grove, and River Styx Spring at Mammoth Cave. Our work entails review of ERT datasets at known cave sites and compares these to two ERT profiles that traversed the proposed landfill site, which are integrated with study of outcrops, and an excavated pit and trench. ERT data range from several low 10 s to about 400 Ω-meter values for mud rock units whereas sandy units possess ERT values from approximately 500 to several tens of thousands of Ω meters. The greatest values are indicative of basal Pennsylvanian Caseyville Sandstone, and these exceed 32,000Ω meters. In comparison, ERT values at known cave sites range from one to 100,000 Ω meters, with elevated, dry rock or possibly dry (air filled) caves interpreted from the greatest values and low values reflective of conductive underground cave streams and moist caves. An unexpected challenge specific to the Hart County landfill study includes occurrence of well-drained and highly weathered Caseyville at the highest elevations of the site causing increased electrical contact resistance during ERT surveying. The overall ERT contrast however, between quartz-rich and clay poor strata (high-resistivity rocks and regolith) and clay-rich strata (low-resistivity rocks) provides independent data consistent with the observed stratigraphy exposed in site exposures. Nonuniqueness of conductive intervals at the Hart County site contrasts with other conductive areas at depth associated with moist or wet cave passages as documented at Crumps Cave and Mammoth Cave.
Journal Article