Historic Homes & Landmarks of Lebanon, Ky...

 

Step back in time and get a significant glimpse of a town that flourished even after the Civil War had delivered a severe blow. In the 19th Century, Lebanon was one of the stops along the National Turnpike from Maysville to Nashville and Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson met here long before the Civil War.

Lebanon was susceptible to attack during the Civil War because of its L&N Railroad depot and Union Commissary located downtown. Confederate Gen. John Hunt Morgan and his Morgan’s Raiders visited the town in all three of their raids into Kentucky and he once burned 20 buildings in his effort to rout the Union troops protecting the depot.

Many of the homes on this self-guided walking and driving tour were built in the 1800s, including “Ann’s Chateau,” which became an infirmary in the early 1900s, was home to Dominican Sisters and nurses and was converted to apartments in the 1930s, “Evergreen Bend,” built in 1840 and where John Lancaster Spalding, the first bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Peoria and co-founder of The Catholic University of America, was raised, and “Myrtledene,” now a bed & breakfast but once taken over by Morgan for his headquarters and where he rode his horse right through the front door and started up the stairs.

There’s a home on West Main Street with a cave in the back yard that housed soldiers and horses during the Civil War and a home on Kobert Avenue that was a flourishing girls’ school in the mid-1800s. One of the teachers, J. Proctor Knott, later became governor of Kentucky.

Lebanon’s first hospital still stands and there are houses on the National Register of Historic Places and a striking Victorian mansion with third floor tower and cupola built in 1878.

There are significant cemeteries, such as the Lebanon National Cemetery, Belltown Cemetery and Ryder Cemetery, earthworks erected as defenses against Confederate invasion and statues of Morgan on a fiery steed with pistol blazing and Union Gen. George H. “Rock of Chickamauga” Thomas.

Brochures with maps can be found at the Lebanon Tourist & Convention Commission office along with other information. This tour is easy to follow and the homes, several of which have markers and wayside exhibits, are easy to find. The walking portion of the tour covers two miles and can also be driven.

Hours…

♥Lebanon Tourist & Convention Commission office – Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Closed state and federal holidays.

For more information, call 270.692.0021. The Marion County Public Library also has a comprehensive genealogy research room. For more information, call 270.692.4698 or visit www.marioncopublic.org/GenealogyRoom.html.

Download the Historic Home & Landmarks Brochure

 

**Find directions to Lebanon from your town under the About Us tab!

Centre Square is the visitor center in downtown.

 

All roads lead to Lebanon, the geographic center of the state and the true Heart of Kentucky! Call 270.692.0021 or e-mail VisitLebanonKy@windstream.net for more information or a FREE Welcome packet.