Rock Fences of the Bluegrass (Perspectives on Kentucky's Past: Architecture, Archaeology, and Landscape)

Gray rock fences built of ancient limestone are hallmarks of Kentucky's Bluegrass landscape. Why did Kentucky farmers turn to rock as fence-building material when most had earlier used hardwood rails? Who were the masons responsible for Kentucky's lovely rock fences and what are the different rock forms used in this region? In this generously illustrated book, Carolyn Murray-Wooley and Karl Raitz address those questions and explore the background of Kentucky's rock fences, the talent and skill of the fence masons, and the Irish and Scottish models they followed in their work. They also correct inaccurate popular perceptions about the fences and use census data and archival documents to identify the fence masons and where they worked. As the book reveals, the earliest settlers in Kentucky built dry-laid fences around eighteenth-century farmsteads, cemeteries, and mills. Fence building increased dramatically during the nineteenth century so that by the 1880s rock fences lined most roads, bounded pastures and farmyards throughout the Bluegrass. Farmers also built or commissioned rock fences in New England, the Nashville Basin, and the Texas hill country, but the Bluegrass may have had the most extensive collection of quarried rock fences in North America. This is the first book-length study on any American fence type. Filled with detailed fence descriptions, an extensive list of masons' names, drawings, photographs, and a helpful glossary, it will appeal to folklorists, historians, geographers, architects, landscape architects, and masons, as well as general readers intrigued by Kentucky's rock fences.

Gray rock fences built of ancient limestone are hallmarks of Kentucky's Bluegrass landscape. Why did Kentucky farmers turn to rock as fence-building material when most had earlier used hardwood rails? Who were the masons responsible for Kentucky's lovely rock fences and what are the different rock forms used in this region?

In this generously illustrated book, Carolyn Murray-Wooley and Karl Raitz address those questions and explore the background of Kentucky's rock fences, the talent and skill of the fence masons, and the Irish and Scottish models they followed in their work. They also correct inaccurate popular perceptions about the fences and use census data and archival documents to identify the fence masons and where they worked.

As the book reveals, the earliest settlers in Kentucky built dry-laid fences around eighteenth-century farmsteads, cemeteries, and mills. Fence building increased dramatically during the nineteenth century so that by the 1880s rock fences lined most roads, bounded pastures and farmyards throughout the Bluegrass. Farmers also built or commissioned rock fences in New England, the Nashville Basin, and the Texas hill country, but the Bluegrass may have had the most extensive collection of quarried rock fences in North America.

This is the first book-length study on any American fence type. Filled with detailed fence descriptions, an extensive list of masons' names, drawings, photographs, and a helpful glossary, it will appeal to folklorists, historians, geographers, architects, landscape architects, and masons, as well as general readers intrigued by Kentucky's rock fences.

From solitary individualism to post-Christian stoic existentialism: Quests for community, moral agency, and transcendence in the films of Clint Eastwood Hereafter and the problems of evil: Clint Eastwood as practical philosopher The smile and the spit: The motivational polarity and self-reliance portrayed in The Outlaw Josey Wales and the Dollars trilogy The representation of justice in Eastwood's High Plains Drifter Bad men at play: On the banality of goodness in Unforgiven Aristotle, Eastwood, friendship and death Giving up the gun: Violence in the films of Clint Eastwood Eastwood, romance, tragedy The use of silence in Hereafter: A study in neurocinematics The mortal hero: Two inductions on the meaning of loss Eastwood's dream: The philosophy of absence in Hereafter Desperate times call for existential heroes: Eastwood's Gran Torino and Camus' The Plague This Is The First Book-length Study On Any American Fence Type. Filled With Detailed Fence Descriptions, An Extensive List Of Masons' Names, Drawings, Photographs, And A Helpful Glossary, It Will Appeal To Folklorists, Historians, Geographers, Architects, Landscape Architects, And Masons, As Well As General Readers Intrigued By Kentucky's Rock Fences. --publisher. Carolyn Murray-wooley And Karl Raitz ; Color Photographs By Ron Garrison. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [203]-214) And Index.