Jackson Purchase Historical Society

The Jackson Purchase Historical Society (JPHS) will meet on Saturday, May 17 at 10:30 am at Temple Israel at 330 Joe Clifton Dr, Paducah, Kentucky. Our speaker will be Society Vice President Richard D. Parker, who will discuss his research on the Bernheim and Dreyfuss families, formerly of Paducah, Kentucky and their connections to the development of the bourbon industry and major league baseball.

People associate Kentucky with bourbon, of course. Baseball typically does not come to mind when one thinks of Kentucky bourbon. Believe it or not, the two go hand-in-hand as the man responsible for baseball’s modern-day success called Paducah, Kentucky home for eight years and worked in the bourbon industry. That man, Barney Dreyfuss, would leave region and go on to create the World Series and help turn baseball into the popular sport it is today. If it wasn’t for Kentucky Bourbon, however, none of Dreyfuss’ success might have been possible. His uncle, Issac Wolfe Bernheim—who called Paducah home for 20 years—would become one the world’s most powerful “Bourbon Barrons” and helped propel the young Dreyfuss into his baseball management career. Learn the whole, fascinating story on May 17 at Temple Israel.

Richard D. Parker is a native of Paris, Tennessee and a history graduate of Murray State University and has his master’s degree from Western Kentucky University. He is Vice President of the JPHS and has written several articles and book reviews that have appeared in the Journal of the Jackson Purchase Historical Society. In 2019, JPHS received the Kentucky History Award as Volunteer Organization of the Year. Parker’s most recent contribution to the society’s Journal won the 2019 Dr. Lonnie E. Maness Award as the Most Outstanding Article. The 2019 Journal also received a Kentucky History Award for Excellence in Publications. This was the Journal’s third such award in the last six years. Parker is a former speaker for the Kentucky Humanities Council Speakers’ Bureau and has written two regional history books. He and his wife, Emily, co-own Atomic City Tours, a company focused on providing historical walking tours in downtown Paducah. Atomic City Tours has won two Kentucky Historicsl Society Awards for Excellence in Education.

In 1958, a group of historians met in Murray, Kentucky led by faculty from Murray State University and University of Tennessee-Martin and formed the Jackson Purchase Historical Society to promote interest, study, and preservation of the regional history of the territory encompassed in the Treaty of Tuscaloosa, known as the Jackson Purchase. The society holds a number of meetings each year with a speaker on Jackson Purchase history and publishes an award-winning journal on local history. Members include a wide range of people who simply share a love of history and a love of the Jackson Purchase area.

Articles are welcome for future issues of the JPHS Journal and can be sent to the editor at billmulligan@muray-ky.net  The editor also welcomes inquiries about topics for articles, books for review, or offers to review a book. Copies of the Journal are available from the Jackson Purchase Historical Society, PO Box 531, Murray, KY 42071. The cost is $15.90 including postage and sales tax. Anyone interested in Jackson Purchase history is welcome to join the JPHS. Information about membership and future programs is available on the society’s website.  Free electronic access to back issues of the Journal through 2023 is also available through the Society’s website.