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Show I t . ! THE STORY OF j i OUR STATES t ; Ey JONATHAN BRACE I - - ( ty McOlure Nivapap-r Syn-iicaie.) KENTUCKY r THE kinship of hs 1 Kentucky and lt kAjS, '''-'"I'l Is tliitt of H '.-J K 2U parent and child. vSvl j? Vil'"illi" c'ame Ss.y-y "l0st of t,le set NS&J' tiers of the west ern state, and with them these pioneers brought Virginia Vir-ginia institutions and ideals. It was not until 17.-.0 that the first authentic journey was made by a white man inlo central parts of the region afterwards called Kentucky. - Further explorations showed that this territory held two important attractions at-tractions for settlers. The first was the great ferfflity of what was called the Blue Grass region. The so-called blue grass, from which this state is nicknamed the "Blue Grass State" is in no wise peculiar to Kentucky. The second inducement for settlers was the fact that there were no Indians In-dians living In this region. 1 was later found that many roving bands of savages crossed the Ohio from the north and sorely harassed the early colonists until Clark's expeditions into Ohio aud Indiana checked their invasions. inva-sions. In fact, the name Kentucky Is probably derived from the Iroquois word Kentka-ke, meaning "hunting land." Another interpretation is "dark and bloody ground," but this is doubtless doubt-less incorrect. The main highways of travel at that time were Daniel Boone's "Wilderness Road" through Cumberland Gap and down the Ohio. Hardy pioneers poured into this new territory In such numbers num-bers that in 1792, with the permission of Virginia, Kentucky was admitted to the Union as the fifteenth state with an area of 40.G0S square miles. Kentucky Ken-tucky has thirteen electoral votes for president. The remarkable physical condition of its population is shown in a report of the volunteers in the Civil war. This gave their average height as nearly an inch taller than the New England troops and with n correspondingly correspond-ingly greater girth of chest. |