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of Irvine." - Contributed to the Estill Co., KY Archives by Jen Bawden, Originally written by Bobby Rose in the 1970s, Used here with their permission, Date: 05/16/1999, Accessed 10/10/2020 at [http://files.usgwarchives.net/ky/estill/history/comm.txt].
== "A Mark Twain Town" ==
"The area where Ravenna now stands was originally surveyed by Josiah Hart as part of a 5200 acre tract patented to Charles Morgan and his partners in 1800. The original patent included much of Irvine and all of the land that bordered on the Kentucky River from the Irvine bridge to the American Legion building at Millers Creek. Neither Morgan nor his fellow land speculators lived in the area and soon sold their holdings. Among the first white people to establish permanent residences on the Ravenna site were: William and David Chamberlain (Chamberlain Branch is named for them), James Blackwell, James Hoy, George R Smith, Isaac Wilson and Jesse Noland. The properties, after passing through several owners during the nineteenth century, were acquired by the L&N Railroad in 1909. The character of the land changed dramatically after the railroad established the headquarters for the Eastern Kentucky Division on the site in 1915. In addition to erecting quarters for the administrative staff, the L&N built a switching yards and a roundhouse. As a result, large numbers of employees were transferred to Irvine, creating an acute housing shortage. Due to the scarcity of housing, the railroad provided camp cars as living quarters for some of its employees. The influx of new families caused the largest building boom the county has ever known. Many of the new dwellings were constructed on former railroad land just beyond the eastern edge of the Irvine city limits.
To help ease the housing shortage and to maximize railroad profits, the L&N decided to develop part of its property for residential use and sell lots to railroad employees. The Ravenna Realty Company was established to sell lots for the company. The railroad guided the early development of the town by laying out the first streets and providing electricity during the early years.
By December of 1920, the community had grown large enough for Bernard M. Burns and others to petition the Estill Circuit Court to allow the growing village to incorporate as a sixth-class city. Judge Hurst ruled in favor of the motion, during the January term of the Court in 1921. A board of trustees was appointed to manage the village. The interim officials appointed to administer the community until an election could be held were: Chairman of the Board: Walter. S. Yaden; members of the Board: W.S. Robbins, W. J. McLemore, C.H. Smith and R. L. Mclemore. Police Judge: G. Hackworth; Town Marshal: Dudly Webb; Tax Assessor: Mack Richardson and Clerk: Dr. E. S. Caywood.
The Board held its first meeting on February 5, 1921. At that meeting and subsequent meetings in March and April, the trustees enacted a large number of ordinances. Privilege taxes were imposed on the various businesses, a speed limit of 15 miles per hour was set for city streets and many other ordinances needed to govern the growing city were decreed.
In addition to these mundane laws, the trustees felt compelled to enact a series of morality ordinances to protect the men of the city against women of ill-repute. It is not known what prompted Ravenna’s founding fathers to move so decisively in protecting its males. Perhaps it was because of Irvine’s experience with its men; or perhaps not. In any event, Ravenna men hardly ever stray, except on those rare occasions when they are under the influence of outsiders. This remarkable attainment is unmatched by any other municipality in the civilized world, with the possible exception of one remote village, populated by celibate monks, near the crest of the Himalayan Mountains.
In the November elections a new board and other city officials were elected to replace the appointees. They were: Chairman of the Trustee Board: S. A. Hunt ; members of the Board: J. E. Power, Dr. E. S. Caywood, Guy Congleton and J. M. Hamilton; Police Judge: H. E. Neal; Town Marshal: Jack King and Clerk: Orie P Gruelle.
The little village continued to grow and prosper. By 1924, Ravenna had a population of twelve hundred and forty-five souls and was elevated to a fifth class city by the Kentucky General Assembly. At that time the government of the city was changed from a trusteeship to a mayor and city council form of government. C.C. Stanfill became the first mayor and was the predecessor of a long line of enlightened mayors.
Most towns, including Irvine, developed over many years in a haphazard fashion without much thought to planning. Ravenna was a planned community that grew to its present size in just a few years. As a result, the town was one of the best laid-out and most modern communities in the state. Streets were named and house numbers assigned in 1916. In 1924 contracts were let to pave Main Street and to install sidewalks, curbs and storm drains throughout the town. During that same busy year a contract was let for a sanitary sewer line to run from Seventh Street to Cow Creek . As was the norm for the time, there was no sewage treatment plant and raw sewage was dumped untreated into Cow Creek. Unfortunately, Cow Creek fed into the Kentucky River just above Ravenna’s favorite swimming hole below the locks. Not many people concerned themselves about such things in those days, and large crowds flocked to the river beach on hot summer days. During the great Polio epidemic of the nineteen-forties, warnings were posted not to swim in the river. Even then, many people continued to use the beach.
At its inception, Ravenna was a company town, dependent on the railroad for its very existence. At that giddy time, few foresaw that within a few years the railroad would became a less significant factor to the town that it created. Beginning in the nineteen fifties, Ravenna was required to make some difficult adjustments when the railroad cut back operations. Those who oversaw the painful process of weaning the city from dependency on the railroad saved Ravenna from the fate that has befallen so many company towns. The town is now less vulnerable to future economic upheavals. Two of Ravenna’s more recent mayors, Claude Isaacs, Jr. and Beverly Thompson, with the support of their council members, have managed to keep Ravenna progressive as well as charming in spite of a deteriorating economic base.
In earlier times Ravenna contained a bank, post office, theater, city park, train station and one of the finest elementary schools in the state. No place on Earth is more richly endowed by nature. The magnificence of Ravenna’s Alpine setting and the easy access to mountains, creeks, caves and the river make for a quality of life second to none.
A somewhat envious editor of an Irvine newspaper wrote, in jest, during the early development of the town, that Ravenna was no more than a mud hole and a cliff on the side of a hill with nothing to recommend it other than its being the site of the Edward Hawkins hanging. The picturesque little village is a great deal more than that. It is a Tom Sawyer--Huck Finn sort of place and those lucky enough to grow up there are privileged indeed."
- by Ralph Barnes, April 24, 1997
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