My Old Kentucky Home

So, driving down the avenue along the Kentucky/Tennessee border a while back curious about the land and the landscape in the area where some of my kinfolk once lived I came across the Jefferson Davis Memorial - a Kentucky State Park - commemorating the famous Kentuckian who became the first (and only) President of the Confederate States of America.  Davis was born in the vicinity on June 3, 1808.

Does it look at all familiar?

At 351 feet tall, it is said to be the world's tallest concrete obelisk.  The walls are seven feet thick at the base, two feet thick at the top.  An elevator runs to an observation room on top.  It is eerily similar to the Washington Monument, the world's largest stone monument.  The Washington Monument was begun in 1848 but not completed until 1884.  Construction on the Jefferson David Monument wasn’t started until 1917. 

"Kentucky, my own, my native land. God grant that peace and plenty may ever run throughout your borders. God grant that your sons and daughters may ever rise to illustrate the fame of their dead fathers and that wherever the name of Kentucky is mentioned, every hand shall be lifted and every head bowed for all that is grand, all that is glorious, all that is virtuous, all that is honorable and manly."

All of the above were in Fairview, Kentucky.  Then just a little ways down the road, in Russellville, another plaque:

I wonder if kinfolk were part of that?  Some of them lived in these parts about then!