Wednesday 30th December 2009 - Last Night There Were Four Glasgows

          The man who said this place was named for Glasgow VA was the son of the man who donated the land to build this one.  It would be safe to assume that if he was so interested in the history of the place to write articles about it, he would have asked his father and (probably) grandfather about it.  So it's probably safe to assume that there was a Glasgow VA available as a candidate, at least.

          And it turns out that in Amhurst county, VA, back from 1760 and onwards, in the court deeds, there were people referred to as coming fron Glasgow, maybe sometimes New Glasgow.  That place is now called Clifford, and is about 20-30 miles east of the present Glasgow VA.  It seems, also, that many Barren County KY citizens had land in Amhusrt County VA.

          The intriguing thought is that they effectively moved the name from VA to KY, or at least brought it with them.

 

          There is a fine quote from a Hessian Officer (British mercenary) during the Revolutionary War: "call this war whatever name you may, only call it not an American Rebellion: it is nothing more or less than a Scotch-Irish Presbyterian Rebellion".  Given the view these people must have taken of what the English did to their native land, it is easy to believe they would have had supported what "celtic fringe" rugby supporters now call "ABE" - Anyone But England.

          But they must have been fiercely independent, because they rebelled again, in 1794, when Washington was president, against the taxing of their whiskey.  It is alleged to be the suppression of the "Whiskey Rebellion" in Western Pennsylvania which brought the whiskey-making here to Kentucky and Tennessee..

 

          Later that night, discussing the bootleggers who bring booze from Bowling Green, I'm told that you can still get bootleg spirits here.  The favoured one appeared to be "Apple Pie" which was described as coming in a "mason jar with a cinnamon stick in it".  I got the impression it was corn whiskey flavoured with apple juice, rather than some cousin of Calvados.  They knew you had to be careful to buy it from someone who knew what he was doing.