Curious Louisville

You may have seen it while driving down Lexington road, away from downtown, just before Headliners Music Hall. A retaining wall in the side of the hill... with a door in the middle. What's behind it? It's a question we get a lot at Curious Louisville. On this episode, Ashlie Stevens takes us behind the door.More Info

For fourteen years, Robert Miles has seen cars in ditches, in neighbor’s yards and in his own fencing that borders the boundary of the horse farm his family owns. He lives off Todds Point Road in Shelby County. “It’s horrific, you’re taking your life in your hands every time you go through,” Miles said of a particular curve in the road. Todds Point is an idyllic rural road going through horse country. But it’s narrow, and doesn’t have white outer edge lines that could help drivers stay on the road. Miles asked Curious Louisville: “Why do some roads have white outer lines and others don’t? What determines who gets what paint?” WFPL reporter Lisa Gillespie went looking for the answer.

The United States prides itself on a kind of rugged individualism. We like to think we do things our own way here. So while the rest of the world uses the metric system, here in America, we use a system based on inches, feet, yards and miles. Except on a particular stretch of Louisville highway. Lots of you asked us why. On this episode, WFPL's Ashlie Stevens finds out. Curious Louisville wouldn't be possible without you! Click here to support the work we do: http://donate.curiouslouisville.org +

Woody Woodpecker. Donald Duck. Iago from “Aladdin." Louie, the U of L cardinal. All these birds have something in common: at various points in their histories, they have been depicted with a full toothy grin. Which leads to our latest Curious Louisville question from Rachel Peterson: “Why does the U of L cardinal mascot have teeth?” “Birds don’t have teeth,” Rachel said. “I get that it’s trying to look fierce, but it’s just biologically inaccurate." WFPL’s Liz Schlemmer and Ashlie Stevens looked for an answer.

Nadeem Saddiqui and his family recently moved to Valley Station, in the southeastern part of Louisville. "It's stereotypically not the most multi-cultural area of Louisville," he said. So it surprised him to see a street named Omar Khayyam Blvd. "It was a medieval Persian poet," he said. "Growing up my parents had a lot of books of his poetry." Nadeem wanted to know how this street came to be, in this neighborhood. So we went looking for the answer.

Support Curious Louisville: Curious Louisville is all about you. You send us your questions, and we take you along with us on a search for the answer. It's people-powered. In fact, our whole organization here is people-powered -- it's because of your support that we can do the work we do. Join us with a pledge today, and we pledge in return to keep letting your curiosity be our guide! Click here to give. Thank you! History is full of untold stories, and today on Curious Louisville, we're telling one. It's about two sisters who had a lasting impact on Louisville, and whose graves are here, even though they never lived in the city: Mary Elizabeth and Mary Gwendolyn Caldwell. Listener Chuck Rogalinski wrote us: “Will you tell the story of the two sisters who weren’t born in Louisville, owned property in the city, married into European aristocracy and are buried in Cave Hill?” In today's edition of Curious Louisville, we do just that.

Is it art? Is it crime? A little bit of both? Whatever it is, it's part of your morning commute. "Every morning when I commute to work, no matter which way I go, I started to see more and more graffiti on the back of the signs," Joe Sullivan reported. "I saw it and I thought, I hope they take that down, because if they don't take it away, it's just going to embolden people to do more. And it seems to have." Joe says he sees the artistic talent on display in some graffiti. But he also thinks it's distracting to drivers, and a bad look for the city. "It sort of gives the impression that we're not taking care of things." So Joe asked Curious Louisville, who's cleaning that up? WFPL's Ryan Van Velzer took up the mantle. And the answer takes us on a commute of our own, through both sides of the art/vandalism debate.

Every year at the beginning of Lent, (the period in the Christian calendar between Ash Wednesday and Easter) WFPL publishes a guide to all the fish fries in Louisville. It's always one of our most popular stories of the year. There are Facebook groups dedicated solely to rating the different fish fries around town. And hundreds upon hundreds of people line up in our city's churches every Friday night to eat fried fish, hush puppies, and macaroni and cheese. This made US curious: Why exactly are there so many Catholic fish fries in the city? And what (aside from the delicious food) makes them so popular? WFPL's Ashlie Stevens investigates, in this edition of Curious Louisville.

Louisville is a city of neighborhoods. For a lot of people, where they live is a big part of their identity. And Curious Louisville listener Evan Patrick wondered about how one neighborhood developed an identity of its own. WFPL’s Ashlie Stevens looked into the answer.

In the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, a young Muhammad Ali -- then called Cassius Clay -- defeated three-time European boxing champion Zbigniew Pietrzykowski. He returned to Louisville with a gold medal, which he wore around his neck for days afterwards; some biographers say he even slept with it around his neck. But then, the medal disappeared, and its fate has long been the topic of sports media speculation (despite the fact that he received a replacement medal in 1996). One prevailing theory is that Ali had been turned away from a restaurant because he was black, so he tossed his medal off the Second Street Bridge into the Ohio River. But in interviews, Ali never gave a definitive answer regarding the medal’s location. An Ali fan named Ray Watkins asked Curious Louisville to help him find out, once and for all. WFPL's Kyeland Jackson took on the challenge. You can ask your own Curious Louisville question at curiouslouisville.org.

It was supposed to be Louisville’s answer to the St. Louis arch. But in the press, it was eventually called ugly. A turkey A good idea gone bad. It’s been gone since 1998, but not entirely forgotten. In fact, it’s been on Curious Louisville listener Mark Friedland’s mind: Whatever happened to the Falls Fountain? In this edition of Curious Louisville, we find out the answer.

If you're driving downtown near the river, you can't miss it: a brand new paint job in progress on the Clark Memorial Bridge. We've heard it compared to a school bus, a canary, and butter. Curious Louisville listener Allan Steinberg wanted to know how the color was chosen. (Allan's not a fan: "I was hoping it was only the primer!") WFPL's Amina Elahi went to Rebecca Metheny, the director of the Louisville Downtown Partnership. They're responsible for the paint job, and they also oversaw the KFC Yum Center design and construction--and it turns out, the two are related. Great questions make great stories, and Curious Louisville wants yours! Send us your question at CuriousLouisville.org. You and your curiosity might be featured in a future story.

In a park off of River Road, nearly hidden by scrubby grass is a mystery: an about 50-foot wide stone circle marking long-ago infrastructure. This ring intrigued Curious Louisville listener Jim Turner, and he asked about it. “I heard [the circle] was a wading pool administered by the Louisville Water Company in the late 1800's. Is that true?” he wrote. Turner grew up in Louisville, not far from the stone circle. He remembers riding his bike from Field Elementary to the waterworks on Zorn Avenue. “The waterworks was my playground because I grew up very close to it. I rode along and through the waterworks property going places I probably shouldn't sometimes. But when you're a kid, an indestructible kid, adventurous, that's what you do.” So when one day Turner saw an old picture, taken from the distance that appeared to show a body of water — he thought maybe a pool — at the site of the stone circle, it made him curious. Turns out, this stone ring in that's now in a fairly inauspicious place — the Champions Park dog run — was actually part of a lofty nineteenth century vision of a genteel Louisville lifestyle, made possible by pumped household water: “The grounds will furnish our citizens with a delightful place of public resort where the man of business can find recreation from toil and oblivion of care, women and children obtain unrestricted exercise and amusement in the open air and the infirm consult heaven’s pure atmosphere and the genial sunlight as their medical advisors.” That’s from around 1860, when the Louisville Water Company began pumping water. And it’s a description of the park around the stone circle. Louisville Water spokeswoman Kelley Dearing Smith said she believes it was written by Charles Hermony, the company’s chief engineer and superintendent. In 1860, the water company’s major infrastructure was all located near the intersection of Zorn Avenue and River Road. There was the water tower and pump station; those are still standing. There was the city’s original reservoir, which was on a bluff where the Veterans’ Hospital is located today. And across the street, at the current site of the Champions Park dog run, was Water Works Park. A central attraction of the park was this fountain. And in 1860, it was an engineering marvel. “So what they did is, they took the pressure that was coming off of the water in the reservoir — because it's on a bluff right behind us,” Dearing Smith said. “And that pressure helped the water to shoot up into the air from the fountain.” Unfortunately, Hermony’s vision was never really fully realized. Dearing Smith said the park was damaged shortly after it was built, by soldiers walking through on their way to fight in the Civil War. There were also possibly some other problems with upkeep, and with the park not being the attraction it was expected to be. By 1879, Louisville Water had built its current Crescent Hill reservoir, and the original reservoir wasn’t needed. That stone circle is what’s still visible of the fountain. If you go into the dog park today, it’s hard to miss: it’s the site where all the little plastic wading pools are gathered, to help small dogs cool off in the summer. And Jim Turner wasn’t the only person to wonder about it. We’ve gotten a few questions at Curious Louisville, and Dearing Smith has fielded some at Louisville Water, too. Sometime this spring, Louisville Water and Metro Parks plan to put a sign at the site, so everyone who comes to the Champions Park dog run will know the history of Water Works Park. Have a question of your own? Ask it at CuriousLouisville.org.

In the middle of the Ohio River, visible from I-65 and Louisville’s Portland neighborhood, is a tiny island called “Shippingport.” You can drive to the base of the island, but you’ll be met with an array of “no trespassing” signs and wire gates. And Curious Louisville listener Ruby Fields wanted to know what was behind them.

If you’re driving down I-64, and happen to look out over the Ohio River, you may catch a glimpse of a house-like structure on top of the 14th Street Bridge. It’s small -- barely noticeable -- but a lot of people have questions about it. Including our latest Curious Louisville listener. WFPL’s Ashlie Stevens has more.

Over the last couple years, WFPL's Curious Louisville has received nearly a dozen questions about Louisville recycling. People want to know what happens after it leaves the curb, where it all goes, and how a 2017 Chinese policy impacts recycling in Kentucky. In this installment of Curious Louisville, WFPL’s Energy & Environment Reporter Ryan Van Velzer visits the largest recycling center in Louisville to answer one of our most commonly asked questions.

Traffic signals: you barely notice them until they’re not working. But what actually causes them to malfunction? That's what a Curious Louisville listener wanted know; As WFPL's Amina Elahi found out the culprit is often power, or -- more accurately -- the lack of it. Here's more:

What do Paul McCartney, Betty White and Muhammad Ali have in common? All three, along with about 100,000 other people, have been given the title “Kentucky Colonel.” But how does one gain the honor? That was listener Patrick Grantz’s question for Curious Louisville -- and our resident Kentucky Colonel, broadcast managing editor Rick Howlett, has the answer:

If you listen to our sister station WFPK, or attended Forecastle in 2016, you’ve probably heard of Pokey LaFarge He’s an artist whose music, as NPR’s Stephen Thompson once said, “evokes the old-timey spirit of a thousand crackling 78 RPM records.” LaFarge is based in St. Louis, but lived in Louisville for a time, which is what inspired his 2015 song “Home Away From Home” -- and our latest Curious Louisville question from listener Troy Richardson. WFPL’s Ashlie Stevens has more:

Earlier this month, Curious Louisville asked what questions you have about the JCPS audit and possible state takeover. You sent us more than 50 in the first 24 hours, and we realized we’d need to dedicate some extra time to answer them all. Here's our hour-long news special, hosted by Kentucky Public Radio’s Ryland Barton and WFPL education reporter Roxanne Scott.