Drive through Kentucky today and you are likely to come across signs reading “Welcome to the Front Porch of the South.” Yet Kentucky has never been an easy state to define. During the Civil War, Kentucky straddled the line between North and South, gaining the somewhat generic classification of a “Border State.” Yet there is a region that Kentucky at one point in time was most identified with and it was neither the North or South. Join us today for a talk with a former research fellow, who helps explain why Kentucky was considered to be a part of the West and why that changed after the Civil War.

Dr. Christopher Phillips is the John and Dorothy Hermanies Professor of American History and University Distinguished Professor in the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at the University of Cincinnati. He holds a PhD from the University of Georgia. He has written numerous books, including Damned Yankee: The Life of Nathaniel Lyon, Freedom’s Port: The African American Community of Baltimore, 1790-1860, and The Civil War in the Border South. We are talking today about his award-winning book The Rivers Ran Backward: The Civil War and the Remaking of the American Middle Border. Thank you so much for being here with us today!

KHS Chronicles is inspired by the work of researchers from across the world who have contributed to the scholarly journal, The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, in publication since 1903.
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Hosted by Dr. Daniel J. Burge, associate editor of The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, and coordinator of our Research Fellows program, which brings in researchers from across the world to conduct research in the rich archival holdings of the Kentucky Historical Society.
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Kentucky Chronicles is presented by the Kentucky Historical Society, with support from the Kentucky Historical Society Foundation.
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Our show is recorded and edited by Gregory Hardison, who also wrote the original underscoring of the interview. Thanks to Dr. Stephanie Lang for her support and guidance. Our theme music, “Modern Documentary” was created by Mood Mode and is used courtesy of Pixabay.

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