Latest / WashCo Insider / Clay Kilgore

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Clay Kilgore · WashCo Insider

• speaker-0: When we launched this podcast, I promised you interesting people, and I wasn't kidding. He's a lecturer, a reenactor, and street theater performer. A former college basketball player, a blacksmith, a consulting historian for National Geographic's Diggers, a podcast host, he is a true Renaissance man. Clay Kilgore, executive director of the Washington County Historical Society, when we come back. Clay, you are a Washington County guy. Clay'sville, right? speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, born and raised, not directly in in Clay'sville, but out in the West Finley, so middle of nowhere. But yeah, always been here. speaker-0: So take us back, maybe as far back as the Clay'sville days, where, for you, where did your interest and passion and preserving history, how did that develop? speaker-1: so I think like any young kid, you know, was fascinated with, ⁓ with dinosaurs and you know, every, every young kid loves a, loves a dinosaur. And I remember when I was younger, my parents taken us to this place. I think it was out in Ohio, but I don't actually remember and you could dig your own fossils. They just had this pit and you could go in and you could dig through, ⁓ and you could find your own fossils. And I just was fascinated with that. I thought that was just the coolest thing in the world. So that led me down the road of possibly being an archaeologist. ⁓ And then, you know, started playing basketball. My dad was a basketball player, you know, ⁓ so I played basketball. And when I got to the point where I was going to college, you know, I was ⁓ thinking about what am I going to do after? Like, I know I'm not good enough to ever go professional. So I went to Penn State, ⁓ Penn State Barron. speaker-0: In college, where'd you get to college? speaker-1: And so, you I know I'm never gonna play professional basketball. I'm realistic on that. So afterwards, I still wanted to stay involved with basketball. And I thought, coaching would be a thing to do. Well, it's kind of hard to coach if you're gonna be traveling around to different archeological sites. That led me to history. You know, that was a way that if I worked in the museum, I could still play with cool artifacts, but not actually have to go dig them up and kept me local. And so that's kind of how it led to it. It's a weird... ⁓ combination of basketball and archaeology that led me to history. speaker-0: And was it Metocroft Rock Shelter that got your foot in the door? speaker-1: Yeah, so I was—it was my ⁓ senior year. I had to do a super senior year. my senior year, was trying to figure out exactly how I wanted to work history into my life. ⁓ And my advisor said, why don't—you've been talking about museums. Why don't you do an internship at a museum and see what you think? And so I did an internship at Metacroft and worked with Dave Schofield very closely. ⁓ And I absolutely— loved Dave. I just thought he was he was incredible. He had a very big influence on me because he was somebody that that he was also a basketball player. ⁓ And so I felt kind of like akin to him and getting to work with him and see what he did. Travel with him into the Heinz History Center. I thought, well, this is it. This is what I want to do. Yeah. And I remember on one road trip into the Heinz History Center, Dave told me, he said, listen, Clay, whatever you do, don't become the director of a museum, stay a curator. And I said, why? goes, because as a curator, you get to tell history and play with objects. As a director, you become a fundraiser. You have to raise money and handle people. And you know, when I took over as director, pretty much at least once a year, I think about that conversation and think, man, why didn't I? He wasn't kidding. speaker-0: I you so. So when you were at Metacroft, had you had a bit of a background in blacksmithing? Did you pick some things up from Dave or what did that look like? speaker-1: So weirdly enough, ⁓ my family, there's nine generations of metalworkers. ⁓ Actually, I'd be the tenth. So my dad worked at Jessup Steel. Even though he wasn't schooled in it, he was basically a metallurgist ⁓ at Jessup. My grandfather held a similar position as my dad at Jessup Steel. And then his father was a metalworker and then my great-grandfather was a blacksmith. ⁓ And so it just kind of went back in our family ⁓ Didn't realize it went all that far back until later on but I guess it was just in my genes I was predestined to become a blacksmith speaker-0: And you operate your own Ford, shall we? speaker-1: I do. I have a business old plank forge from from the road where I started it old plank road out in Lagonda. That's where I started the business. So plank forge. I do a little bit everything do custom iron work railings, you know, for for houses for for porches knives, you know, kitchen utensils, whatever else flint locks. I build flint locks. Yeah, a little bit. I just. speaker-0: cross-disciplinary. speaker-1: Just recently spent too much on a laser engraver so I could do more engraving work. ⁓ I'll never make that money back. ⁓ speaker-0: Well, I tell you, I mean, I know you've done a number of projects for us over the years and, you know, if you need something in the blacksmithing ⁓ carpentry world, call Clay. He does fantastic work. speaker-1: I appreciate that. Thank you. speaker-0: Now, so the Washington County Historical Society, which you are now the executive director of, is based at the LeMoyne House. And I'm sure I could throw just any historical topic at you and you could speak at length. But let's talk a little bit about who Francis LeMoyne was, what his impact was on the county and beyond that, and how the Historical Society is now operating his former house and some other properties as well. speaker-1: Yeah, so Francis LeMoyne is – I mean maybe I'm biased but I think he's one of the probably top four or five historical figures in Washington County when it comes to importance. He was an abolitionist. ⁓ He was into agriculture. He was into land speculation. He did so many different things ⁓ as well as being a physician and surgeon. He was His father was originally from France, left during the French Revolution, ends up in Gallipoli, Ohio, ⁓ and then he ends up moving back to Washington. He had traveled through going to Gallipoli, was there for a few years and comes back to Washington, settles down. He gets married and his wife, ⁓ Nancy McCully, they have one child together and that's Francis. So Francis, ⁓ he goes to... Washington Academy, which is now Washington Jefferson College graduates ends up going to Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia Comes back Starts a medical practice with his father who had built the Lemoine house It was actually his father that built the house at 1812 has the doctor's office and residents together So they have a medical practice there. He gets married ends up having eight children his father ⁓ Says well You you keep the house. You need more room. Builds another house across the road, which still stands today. So both the Moines houses are still standing and they had still had the medical practice, but now competing apothecary shops. But Francis gets involved. Well, it's when he's in Washington Academy that, that we find his first paper that he wrote on the evils of slavery. And he's, he's very, very harsh about it. He doesn't mince words and basically says, that it's impossible for him to understand how somebody that claims to be a Christian can own and abuse another human being. And so he condemns slavery in the South and he's 12 when he does this. So he's 12 years old and that kind of starts him on this path. And by the 1830s and 40s, he's one of the more prominent abolitionists in the United States. So much so that in the election of 1840 he is selected by the Liberty Party to run on their presidential ticket as vice president and Selected by them Yeah, yeah, so it's not only that but he's selected by them to run for governor of Pennsylvania on a number of different occasions Which he did very well the first time he finished second I think the first time he ran it wasn't too many votes behind so almost, you know governor of Pennsylvania speaker-0: What's that? I don't think I knew that. speaker-1: Now there's one point I noticed maybe the third time that his name was on the ballot He had two votes in the entire state. He had three sons in the state So I'd love to know which one didn't vote for him, ⁓ know that probably didn't talk about that at the at the dinner table, but It's his abolitionist movement that he becomes more Most famous for he's so outspoken ⁓ traveled down south signed contracts and actually traveled down to Southern states the Carolinas in Georgia to speak out against slavery And we have a letter where he talks about you know, was very close one time of him getting out He wasn't sure that he might be lynched. I think was the exact term that he used So yeah interesting incredible guy and then opened his house up as a stop on the Underground Railroad and we have numerous stories of freedom seekers coming through the house being hidden there or him helping them as they were coming through And it's a fascinating story for him. But by the 1840s, he had very bad arthritis. So his involvement in the abolitionist movement, his passion never fades, but his involvement fades a little bit because he can't travel. Now he still has the house open as a stop on the Underground Railroad, but he's not traveling to different conferences throughout the country anymore. And so you see him, his notoriety dipping a little bit. But that leads him to his next endeavor, which is the Lemoyan Crematory, which is the first crematory in the United States and the second one in the world. It's a new idea. He gets into that because he can't travel. So he gets more into medical research, and he latches on to burial practices and how burial practices of the time might be spreading disease. And he figures that the cleanest way to dispose of a body is through cremation. So he builds this crematory. The people of the town and the county are outraged. They thought it was barbaric and went against Christianity. mean, there were petitions against him. So he wanted to build it in the town, ends up having to build it on the hill overlooking the town on his own property. And it was built in 1876. So we're actually celebrating its 150th anniversary this year with the first cremation taking place in December of 1876, a gentleman by the name of Baron de Palm. speaker-0: visionary. speaker-1: So very much so and then his agriculture too. He was part of the group. So Washington County has this interesting history tied to the sheep industry. It's kind of neat. So they were known for their high quality wool prior to the Civil War, but they had stiff competition with farmers in the New England ⁓ region. But during the Civil War, there was such a call for wool that what most of the people doing high quality wool did is they would breed their sheep that had high quality wool with other breeds that may be produced more wool. They breeded them together so they could produce more medium quality wool. Washington County didn't do that. So they kept their merino sheep basically pure. didn't interbreed with the other sheep. So the Civil War ends and now there's a call once again for high quality wool and it's Washington County. So at one point in the 1870s, we were out producing the rest of the counties in the state. ⁓ speaker-0: sense? speaker-1: combined and we were the number one exporter of sheep's wool in the country. Yeah, very much because of the fact they wanted this high quality wool. And Francis is part of that. He is when the at one point when there's an issue with the County Fair, what's now the Washington County Fair, they didn't have the funding to operate one year. He funded it. So the Washington County Fair just celebrated a huge anniversary. speaker-0: had the market cornered. Two years ago? Yeah. Two years ago. Was it 225? speaker-1: Yeah, and part of that is because Francis gave them the money to operate for two years so that they could keep going. Yeah, he just had such an impact, know, when came to cremation, when it came to the abolitionist movement, the agriculture in southwestern Pennsylvania. Just an absolutely incredible guy and his house is a museum that you can visit. And we mainly talk about the abolitionist movement and the Underground Railroad during that. speaker-0: And if I wanted to take a tour, mean, call ahead, schedule, what does that look like? speaker-1: You can go to our website wchspa.org and schedule through the website or just give us a call at 724-225-6740. ⁓ You can call us and schedule it. But we're also open 9 to 2 Tuesday through Friday, so for walk-ins. speaker-0: And so, you know, besides the LeMoyne house and now your new building, you have a massive collection of artifacts, documents. Talk about, you know, some of the things that you might have and what type of people are coming to do research. speaker-1: So we just opened our new building two years ago, the Washington County Research and Education Center. That was a long, ⁓ long trek to get that building ⁓ constructed and get the objects moved in. We used to be housed completely in the LeMoyne house. So over 10,000 individual objects and 125 documents all in the LeMoyne house. I jokingly said that when we moved everything out of there, the house sighed. Like it was like, it's just weighing it down. But we built a large building to house the collection with ⁓ modern temperature controlled, ⁓ so we can keep everything how it's supposed to be and also give better access to the collection. We have researchers from all over the world that come in to do research. Washington County was kind of a gateway to the West for settlers in the 18th and early 19th century. So many people came through Washington County, stayed a year or two. and then made their way into Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, you know, going farther west. So we get a ton of researchers coming in. There was somebody there from California today ⁓ when I left to come in. yeah, it's a widely used ⁓ resource. I don't know the numbers of how many we have, you every year, but it seems like there's at least one researcher pretty much every day doing something and we're getting requests all the time for research. an amazing collection. mean, it was from the late, probably our earliest things that we have, let's say early 18th century, all the way up to 20 years from today. That's what our collection is. So 20 years back from today, which bothers me that things that I grew up with are now in a museum. I don't like that, but it's happening. It's listening to the oldie station and having a song from when I was in high school on an oldie station, that really bothers me. But so we it's it's a vast collection that people can use and we're actually celebrating our 125th anniversary this year so we've it's it's 125 years of Collecting of preserving of telling stories and that's the big thing we want to do and I tell people this all the time I Almost prefer to be called a storyteller more than a historian because to me historians are boring They know dates they know facts and they just you know, they're they just tell you dates and facts I like the stories built around those dates and facts and artifacts and documents because those stories tell us who we are as a people. You know, it tells us what Washington County is, what Southwestern Pennsylvania is, and that's what I really love. I love those stories. So when I go and do talks, it's very laid back. There's very few times though I have an outline of what I'm going to talk about. I just want to talk to people. ⁓ and tell them these stories because that's what draws them in and wants them. speaker-0: Yeah, I think listeners would be very familiar with some of the stories that you've told over the years. Going back, I don't know, was it prior to the pandemic when you launched Laidback History, which was a fantastic program. ⁓ If you haven't seen it, go to Facebook. We partnered with Clay on a couple of episodes, but this is Clay on the couch, unfettered access to his knowledge of history and so many good topics. speaker-1: Yeah, so laid-back history started during the pandemic because we were closed and I was bored like I was so bored, know, just sitting around the house. I'm like, what am I gonna do? ⁓ So I decided to start this video series where it quite literally was me sitting in my recliner, which is the logo for the for the show is the recliner was me sitting in my recliner just telling stories and I did it every Tuesday and Thursday at 7 And I would just sit in there telling stories. And it was a rocking recliner. And I remember one time I would have my TV screen. I would mirror the screen up there so I could see if people were making comments and asking questions. And this lady made a comment. And I remember she said, you need to stop rocking. You're making me dizzy. Because I would just sit there and I'd be rocking. But it started out like that. It was something to do during the pandemic. And people really liked it. I thought, well, if we get 50 people watching, that'll be great. We were getting three or four thousand people watching every episode and it was connecting people back to Washington County. I made friends over over laid back history on Facebook with people I still have never met to this day, but they're Washington County, you know, people that have moved to California. There was one in Hawaii, you know, they've moved all over the country and laid back history tied them back to their home. And so we had a lot of people watching like that. And it got to the point where I'd be doing an episode and I may not see a name up there viewing it. I'd message them afterwards, hey, everything okay? You weren't watching today. And they're like, ⁓ yeah, we're gonna watch a little bit later. So it was fun to get to meet people like that. And then after the pandemic, when we went back to work, I thought, well, this is a great outlet for storytelling. And so it expanded. And then we had laid back history road trips and and laid back history uncovered where we did metal detecting, the road trips, we went places. ⁓ I got my friends involved, Brian Cunning and Rich Baker, ⁓ and ⁓ had them on, and we would go do trips together. Had other friends of mine that were ⁓ experts in different fields like James Blake. He's a Native American, sorry, he always corrects me, it's American Indian, American Indian expert, and he did several episodes on his own. And it was just a, great outlet for the stories that make up ⁓ Southwestern Pennsylvania. And it was, it was fun. And we actually ended up, we're, we're, so there's two episodes left. We're, I wanted, I was going to end it at 200 episodes. We filmed the last two episodes, which was basically just looking back and saying, what, what are the 10 most popular episodes from laid back history? And we filmed it. And so we're going to air those. ⁓ There's a, I don't know if we want to get into it, ⁓ but right around the time that we got ready to air those very close friend of mine passed away and we kind of put them on the on the back burner, but we are planning on airing those here in the next few months. We're going to air those last two episodes and then we have a new thing coming out. So we're going to we're keeping it going, but in a different way. so we podcast flash video series that's called history happens here. So I wanted to go outside of Washington County and be able to go outside of the region and tell stories because there's things that happen in Ohio that are tied to people in Washington County. So I wanted to be able to tell more stories. So we're going to have a podcast. have guests coming in sometime in the fall. We're going to for our 125th anniversary of the historical society. We're launching that as part of the celebration. And so the first episode we're actually invited Rob Wenhurst from speaker-0: When do think that'll launch? speaker-1: Woodville plantation and he's coming in and he's going to be talking about the Whiskey Rebellion and he's going to give the federal side of the story. Everybody that knows me knows that I'm a farmer at heart. So I always tell the Whiskey Rebellion by the farmer's point of view but he's going to come in and tell it from the federal point of view ⁓ and I get to make fun of George Washington, which always makes me happy. speaker-0: That'll be great. And whenever it does launch, where can people find your episodes? speaker-1: On our website ⁓ wchsp.org and then also on our, you can look us up on YouTube and on our Facebook page. speaker-0: Let's go back to the Historical Society for a moment. ⁓ Throughout the course of the year, there's a number of programs and special events that you guys put on. ⁓ I just think they're so interesting. And again, with laid back history, the breadth and depth of your knowledge and the number of topics you've covered over the years. can you talk a bit about the programming kind of outside of the four walls of the museum? speaker-1: Yeah, I mean, it's been fun to get to partner with different groups. You know, if we jump to laid back history real quick, jump back to it. It was fun during the pandemic ⁓ where tourism, you know, reached out and said, hey, can we partner on a few episodes of laid back history wanting to do it for students? So we did laid back history student edition. So kids weren't in school and we wanted to give some resources that they could use virtually. And we did, you know, five or six episodes. speaker-0: We five. did American Indians of Western Pennsylvania, and that one, I think, is sitting at like 31,000 views on YouTube. We did West Pennsylvania, the Whiskey Rebellion, the Historic National Road, and the Underground Railroad. speaker-1: Nice. Yeah. I actually one of our, one of our most viewed videos on Facebook is the promo you did for that that has my bloopers in it. Yeah. And, ⁓ and so that's one of our most viewed videos. Weird. But we've got to partner with, with other groups. ⁓ you know, we've partnered with W and J the, the green County historical society, ⁓ the Jeffer, Jefferson college historical society. We get to partner with a lot of different groups to do these events. and you know, right now. speaker-0: That was a one. speaker-1: You know, we're partnering with the National Road Heritage Corridor and I know we're gonna talk about that here in a bit for another big event We've partnered with the Bradford house for their whiskey rebellion festival, you know, we try to help out and play part in that ⁓ so the Halloween events which actually have been sponsored by tourism So, you know partner with tourism on that we have our haunted history walking tours and that was from ⁓ my friend Brian cunning and I were sitting around one day and speaker-0: about your Halloween events. speaker-1: We were talking about the ghost tours at Gettysburg and kind of going, you know, those are fun, but they're, you know, we don't have anything like that around here. Could we do something? And so I said, well, I know some ghost stories, you know, let's go ahead and put them together. And so we started this and it was not meant to be as big as it became. We thought, well, if we get a hundred people for a week, that'll be great. The only advertising we did was on pizza boxes. There was a local pizza shop in Washington. that they let us put our flyers on their pizza box for like a month and a half leading up to the tours. And we were gonna do three tours, know, two nights, and ended up just exploding after the first year to where I did one tour that had 179 people on it, couldn't even talk at the end of it. And so the tours continued to grow from there. And so they're all over the place. We've done them out at Washington County Park, or the Washington Park for the Frontier History Center out there. We've done them up at the Lemoyne Crematory, walking through town in Washington. And it's just storytelling. We wanted a way to tell history, but make it fun. So if you come to the ghost stories, you get to hear a history story. Let's just say about the trolley car. There was a trolley car accident. So we talk about the story of the accident and that tragedy and what happened. But then there's a ghost story that's tied to it. So I always tell people the history is a fact. We're not, you know, we're not making anything up with the history. The ghost story, you got to decide on your own whether or not you want to believe that we're just telling the story that we've been told. ⁓ but we always do tell one completely made up story and we get people, we tell people at the head of time, listen, you're going to get six stories, five of them. The history is true. And the stories, the ghost stories we've researched, one of them is completely made up. ⁓ and you get to try to figure out which one it is. And if you can guess right, your name goes into a drawing for a special tour of the crematory, a ghost tour of the crematory. And so we've had a good time with that. Not gonna lie, I think we stole that from a TV show. was that? ⁓ from Star Trek, I can't think of his name right now, but he hosted, so we stole that idea, but you know, it works for us. But, no, the ghost tours are fun. We have our Hall of Fame Awards banquet, which is now a reception, where we honor historical figures of Washington County, but not just past, but living today. People that are making a difference in Washington County today, we want to honor them. So we have that, we have our spirits in the garden, which is an opportunity for you to meet. some of Washington County's historical figures. So we have actors that come in and portray, you know, Francis LeMoyne or Madeleine LeMoyne or I'm trying to think who was, Ulysses S. Grant we've had. So they, President Lincoln, so we have actors come in and portray these figures. They stay in character all day, you know, during the entire event. And so you get to interact with them, like you were interacting with Ulysses S. Grant. And so we have, we have fun with that. And I think that's the big thing about our events. We want them to be history-based. speaker-0: Yeah, he was great. speaker-1: But we want to have fun. We want people to have fun with history because, listen, history can be boring. It really can. We want to make it fun. speaker-0: Speaking of fun with history, in two weeks, believe, May 9th, we have a very fun event coming up and you are now in charge of it. Tell us about it. speaker-1: So all right, so We we have the running of the wolves coming up W O O L S just because so many people think I see wolves when I said it So running of the wolves which are the sheep races down Main Street, Washington speaker-0: And this is year four. Year four, yes. Let's start at beginning. Okay. How much alcohol was involved in the dreaming up of this event? speaker-1: Shout out to Liberty Pole spirits when they still had the location in Washington Sarah Collier and I so Sarah is a very close friend of mine. She is the director of the ⁓ National Road Heritage Corridor I think at that time she was still the head of the BDA the Washington Business District Authority So we ⁓ were sitting around down at Liberty Pole on a Thursday. We always met on Thursdays with some friends and you know, they were generous with their alcohol. So we were drinking and Sarah just somehow comes up with this. She's like, I just want to see sheep run down Main Street. And I'm like, what are you talking about? She goes, we're talking about the shipping industry. She goes, I just think it'd be so cool to just see a whole like flock of sheep running down Main Street. And I'm like, are you like running of the bulls? Like you want people running out in front of it? And she said, yeah, kinda. And I'm like, it could be running of the wolves. And that's where the name came from. So we, we drunkenly discussed this, and, and kind of fleshed out like they could be races or something like that. And it sat for about a year. Sarah ended up going to the national heritage corridor and Shana Brown was hired at the BDA. speaker-0: I remember when Shana first dropped this around to us and she was so excited and so were we. We loved the idea. speaker-1: Sarah and I we were talking and she goes, you know somebody that could make this event happen and I said who's that? goes, she just this would be right up her alley and I'm like, okay so it pitched the idea to Shayna told her what we were thinking and She said well, do you would you partner on this and I'm like, well, yeah so the historical siding the BDA kind of started partnering on this and I remember Shayna was at an event. It was a chamber event ⁓ and Suddenly comes she calls me as soon as it's over. She goes I was at this speaking at this event and mentioned it and had four people come up and say they want to sponsor it. One of them being range resources. ⁓ Laurel at range resource just immediately said, we want to sponsor this thing. and so with, and all she did was basically say the name of it and you know, the support from the community has been incredible. mean, thousands of people come out to this, but yeah, Shana went around and did a great job of, of building the foundation of the event. ⁓ And a very good friend of mine ⁓ Somebody it was like a like a brother to me ⁓ Sorry Drew Ross Drew was ⁓ he's a he was a local farmer ⁓ young ⁓ yeah 20s at this and We took the idea to him because he raised heritage sheep breeds and he said yeah we're gonna make this happen and so drew was a huge part of making running of the wolves happen because He provided the sheep, you know, ⁓ actually trained them. Yeah, he would ⁓ in his fields, he would be there with a shaker of food and basically teach them to run to him when he had the food so that we would be sure they would run down Main Street. ⁓ And Drew was, you know, basically Shana and myself and Drew, you know, worked, you know, to do, ⁓ yeah, there's ⁓ Barbara Wolters worked together to make this happen the first year. And we had no idea what was going to happen. know, we wanted, I wanted my side of it was let's tell the history and heritage of Washington County when it comes to agriculture. Shayna's side of it was let's promote the downtown of Washington and build it up. And Drew's side of it was promoting agriculture. mean, Drew was absolutely incredible. Drew spoke in front of, you know, ⁓ Pennsylvania Congress about youth and agriculture. I mean, he was, he made a huge impact. Recently, know, within the last two years when there were some budget cuts at some of the federal museums that had farms, the person they called was Drew to help us to help them find homes for their animals. I mean, just an absolutely incredible person. ⁓ Yeah, just amazing. But we all had our different side of it. And when that first year happened, we had no idea what was going to occur. We knew we had sheep, we had sponsors, and people really leaned into the absurdity of it. with the sheep names, know, because that's part of it. You sponsor sheep, you get to name them. And we had our spoke sheep was Barbara Wolters. ⁓ And then you had like all these just random names like... ⁓ speaker-0: Cool, Angela. Loro Siemba speaker-1: Yes, I forgot about Laurel C. Himba. Yeah, that was a good one too. And there's so many, so many great names. People just really leaned into it. And that's been the biggest part of it, I think, is people getting to name their, name their sheep. ⁓ And so, but the day, the day comes, right? We have a racetrack. We build this racetrack. We have vendors. We have ⁓ people doing ⁓ a skit and doing plays, you know, for kids. But what's going to really happen? Like how is this actually going to work? So we were all nervous. Like how many people are going to be there? And the first year there was 3000 people or so. I mean, if not more, and the first race is about to start. So we have these, these, ⁓ pennies on the sheep. So, you know, so you have pennies on them so you can tell which sheep is which and they're in this pin and I had made gates on wheels so I could, we could open them up and Shane and I are standing there, you know, ready to open up the gates thinking, What the hell's gonna happen right now? You know, are they just gonna stand here? Are they gonna actually take off? And we opened the gates and they just busted out of there and headed straight for the finish line. And the first race couldn't have been smoother. I mean, it was just like, they went down and I'm looking at Shane like, this actually worked. Like it actually worked. And then you're standing there at one point watching people cheering, going crazy for these sheep and It was so surreal because you're like, what is happening right now? There's just sheep racing down Main Street and people are going nuts over it. And it's just grown. I mean, we had 5,000 people, I think last year in the rain. Yeah. You know, it rained last year and I think we had like 5,000 people at it. And so for this year, we're expecting even more. We're expanding it a little more. We are partnering with the National Road Heritage Corridor this time. So Shana has moved on to greener pastures ⁓ and ⁓ So we started a partnership with the National Heritage Corridor and the Historical Society to put this on to kind of expand our reach a little bit and help the event grow. So there's going to be more demonstrating, more the history and heritage side of it and the demonstrating side of it. And then also the sheep races, of course. Yeah, there's kids activities. There's ⁓ the petting zoo, ⁓ lambies and pajamas. So got to give Shannon credit for that one. speaker-0: Food vendors, kids programming. speaker-1: So, Lambies and Pajamis and yeah, so it's a great event. It won an award for an event in Pennsylvania for like the most unique event or use of sheep maybe, don't know. Most unique use of livestock. yeah, it's been fun to see people really take it on and it's now... almost in three years become this iconic thing in Washington County where everybody's looking forward to it. And it's, and it started out with Sarah and I just having a drink down to Liberty. Thank you, Jim and Ellen at Liberty pole for, helping, ⁓ helping spark our minds to make this happen. speaker-0: I think it's one of the most interesting events that we have. It's so much fun. Love taking my kids. speaker-1: Yeah, it's ridiculous, but it's amazing. And like I said, we want to tell the history and heritage. So it's kind of like the ghost stories. We want to make it fun. So people are going to get their history lesson, but at the same time, they're going to watch sheep race down Main Street. So May 9th, ⁓ we're our fourth annual, downtown Washington, where the main pavilions are, the farmers market pavilions. We have the track ready to go. ⁓ still have sheep sponsorships open at this point. there's a couple left. So you can sponsor sheep and pick your name, you whatever you want it be. Yeah, it's a good time. speaker-0: Well, we at the Wash Co. Insider like to wrap up our episodes with a couple of fire questions if you're up for it. speaker-1: Yeah, I'm good. speaker-0: All right. What is your favorite Washington County history topic to discuss? speaker-1: favorite Washington County history topic. That's a great one. You know what? I'd have to say the Whiskey Rebellion. I was kind of brought up on that when I was the director of the Bradford House for a while as well as the historical society. And so I just absolutely love the Whiskey Rebellion history. ⁓ Specifically, the fact that Lewis and Clark met during the Whiskey Rebellion. And so I've actually spoken at the Lewis and Clark annual conference telling the story of how they actually met and it's all because of the Whiskey Rebellion. speaker-0: things change everywhere, right? But how has augmented reality and AI impacted how we experience history at museums and throughout our daily lives today? speaker-1: So for us, oddly enough, recently ⁓ we unveiled in February at our Arks of Freedom Symposium, which is our Underground Railroad and Abolitionist ⁓ Symposium, we unveiled the new Welcome video to the Arks of Freedom exhibit, which is the exhibit at the LeMoyne House on that same topic. And so we created a new Welcome video, and it's telling the story of a group of freedom seekers and their escape and their journey up north. Well, there's no images, there's no video. So how do you do it? I was able to use AI to create the elements ⁓ for that video based off the history and the facts that we knew. I was able to implement that using AI to create a visual that added a voice and added a face to these stories that we couldn't have been able to do before. ⁓ And so I think it, although it scares me some, there's sides of it that worry me. ⁓ I think in some respects, ⁓ like this way, ⁓ being able to add an image and bring something to life, because hearing a story is great, but being able to visually see it adds so more to it, and AI is going to help a lot with that. speaker-0: Absolutely. Now I know earlier you mentioned ⁓ you put Francis LeMoyne in like the four or five spot for most interesting people in Washington County. ⁓ If you had to, if you were to sit down and have a glass of rye whiskey with anyone from Washington County's history, who would you choose? speaker-1: There's so many. All right, so this is gonna be a weird one. might be a little telling. ⁓ So don't want to put anybody off. But I honestly would love to sit down and talk to William Crawford. Now, a lot of people know William Crawford, the gentleman that was killed by American Indians. This is a different William Crawford. This is a William Crawford that was hanged in Washington County for murdering his son. Now, I know that seems weird, okay? ⁓ speaker-0: of. speaker-1: But this guy is, it just fascinates me in a weird way because when he's on trial, ⁓ and they're, getting ready to sentence him, the judge asks him, ⁓ you know, if he wants to ask forgiveness from his family for what he did. And I do want to explain that I'm not condoning murder by any means, but his son was kind of a prick, ⁓ and, was egging him on and basically threatening him. Crawford said if you don't stop this I'm gonna shoot you and the kid didn't stop and so Crawford did it not condoning it just saying But the judge asked him do you want to ask for forgiveness and this man in? Court probably will get some lenience if he you know does this says no He goes I have nothing to say he goes if I could do it again. I would right so And then the day that he is to be hanged. It's it's a February day. It's snowing They're taking him up on gallows hill and he's on a sleigh sitting on the coffin that he's going to be put in like later that day with a pin knife and an apple slicing off pieces of apple and eating it like he's on this like this Christmas sleigh ride. They're going down the road and these boys come running out of the Duane hotel, which is now where Chico Baccello is in Washington coming out of the hotel because they want to get like good seats to see this happen because 10,000 people were in town for this. And he sees the boys running out and he looks down at him and goes, boys, ain't no reason to be in no damn hurry. Fun. Don't start till I get there. I mean, this guy who was so. Yeah. And so I'm fascinated by him and I have in my own personal collection to find them at one point on eBay, his letters that he wrote in his account of what happened. And there's just something about the way he wrote it. I would love to sit down and hear the story from him. And I know that's weird. speaker-0: was built differently. speaker-1: and I'm not making him like the top figure in Washington County history. It's just somebody that I think would be fun. speaker-0: Well, Clay, can't thank you enough for coming on today. I know you go on forever because you have that amount of knowledge, but thanks again. Coming up this Saturday, the Bradford House Museum is hosting an 18th century cooking demonstration. Tomorrow night through Sunday, May 3rd, a gentleman's guide to love and murder returns to old school house players in Hickory. Next Saturday, May 2nd, throw on your fancy hats because it's Derby Day at Hotwood Casino at the Meadows. Stop by for the watch party and stick around for a special grand opening we might be talking about on this podcast next week. Next week we will have... DJ AJ Fresh on the Wash Co. Insider to talk about his newest project. Until then, thanks for joining us. We'll see you at Running of the Wolves in downtown Washington on May 9th.