Bonnie Strassell - Owen County Historical Society

“The simplest most important thing you can do for your family may be the simplest of all: develop a strong family narrative.” 

Author Bruce Feliler attributes family stories as the secret sauce that holds families together.
Owen County is replete with family and community narratives that have been shared with others. These stories of home life and community events serve to strengthen our ties both with our immediate family and with those with whom we share those stories.

They produce love and laughter, heartache and tears and build a tapestry of personalities that connect and bond together to create families. Each family member reflects the past, present, and future; and family stories etch themselves into memories and nourish souls.
Preserving family stories presents challenges to modern man.

“It’s as cheap as dirt, as plentiful as dirt and as dirty as dirt.”

This quote reflected the opinion of someone who obviously had occasion to live in an era when bituminous coal was king in Kentucky.
Though there may be truth in this statement the fact remains that coal played a integral part in the history of the commonwealth, and most Owen countians remember the days when area homes, businesses and schools depended on this smooth sooty sometimes smelly resource for heat.

They are unwelcome residents and for hundreds of years they have squatted on Owen County land.
New ones seemingly appear overnight and their appetites are insatiable. Gaping mouths are fed dirt, rock, lime, trash and an occasional rusty car or pickup, yet to no avail. These indefatigable giants are a constant irritation but from earliest times Owen countians have accepted their presence as part of the local landscape. Most don’t need an introduction to these sometimes cavernous depressions known as Owen County sinkholes.