00:00:00
GEORGE GEOGHEGAN: My name is George Geoghegan. Uh, the date
is January the, uh, twenty-night--(laughs)--of 2014 and we're in the, um, foyer
of the T.B. Ripy home.
[Pause in recording.]
JOANNA HAY: George, can you tell me a little bit about
yourself. What year were you born--(Geoghegan laughs)--uh, where you're from, where
you spent your life, and your connection with the Ripy, this beautiful(??)
house.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, yes, I shall do that. Um, I'm ancient.
I'm seventy-one. (laughs) I was born in 1943.
My father was, um, George Geoghegan as well. He was in
the road construction business and married a gal from Lawrenceburg, uh, who
was Betty Ripy. She was, uh, the daughter of, um, William
Ripy, who was my grandfather. He was Tom B.'s grandfather's brother.
William Ripy was the youngest of all of the, T.B. Ripy's
children. And his wife was Elizabeth Ballard of the, the Ballards
00:01:00that you've hear about from Louisville. And uh, and his, um,
his, his wife, Mr. Ballard's wife was a Witherspoon Lillard family here
in Lawrenceburg. So, that's where I go; that's my part of
the family. But, I, um, I'm, uh, I'm a lawyer.
I retired about five or six years ago as clerk at the
Kentucky Court of Appeals. And, um, I am now, um, struggling
with this house. (laughs) I have two, two sons: one
is a biomedical electric-, electrical engineer who works for Medtronic in, uh,
Tempe, Arizona, and lives in Chandler, Arizona; the other son is, uh,
Jeff Geoghegan. Uh, the first one's name is George also.
00:02:00The, the second son is Jeff Geoghegan and he resides in, um,
Newburgh, Indiana. He is a radiologist and works at the, uh,
Trover Clinic in Mad-, uh, Madisonville, Kentucky. His wife is an
OB/GYN physician, and they, they have, uh, three daughters; one 3 years
old, one 2 years old, and, um, one 5 months. So,
um, but I've lived in Lawrenceburg most all of my life.
And, uh, love it here. I live in the house, um,
that was, uh, that my other great-grandfather lived in, Ballard, who was,
he got the house and the land because he was married
to a Witherspoon--(laughs)--is the reason he wound up with the house.
So, is there anything else you would like to know?
HAY: Uh, where did you go to college and law school?
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, yes. I, uh, graduated from the best college/university
in the Southeastern Conference, Vanderbilt University. (laughs) And, um, I went
00:03:00to law school, graduated from the law school at the University of
Kentucky.
HAY: Thank you.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes. (laughs)
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: OK.
GEOGHEGAN: My name is George Geoghegan. Uh, the date is
January the, uh, twenty-ninth of 2014. And we're in the, um,
foyer of the T.B. Ripy home. Uh, the home was built
by my great-grandfather, T.B. Ripy, in, um, the late 1800s. It
was finished in 1888. Um, but there were several, uh, times
when they did additional construction after the original part of the house
was here. If you'll notice, the back part of the house
has all of the, all of the running water in it.
And it was added later than the front part. Um, we
think that the front porch was modified, or at least I do,
00:04:00because there is a separate--actually, there is a window in the basement
that you climb over to go under the front porch, which is
eleven feet deep. It's eleven or twelve feet deep in the
main part of the basement under us as well. But there
is an incline and it goes all the way around under the
veranda. And it's only about six feet deep. And we
wonder-, we have wondered many times whether they stored, um, bourbon barrels
in there during the Prohibition Era. So. (laughs) Um,
since there are all sorts of rumors about Mrs. Dowling and the
liquor that she had in her home across the way. But
at least there were no convictions there, so. (laughs) But
we're in the foyer. The woodwork in the, in, uh, the
foyer is mahogany. And, um, if you'll look closely at
it, you cannot see any nails. When they installed it, they
would take a piece out, nail it in, put the piece back,
00:05:00and then finish it. And if you'll look at the back
of the foyer, it's a herringbone pattern there. Uh, the chandeliers
and the lights on the stairway were originally gas. This was
the first house in Lawrenceburg with carbide gas lighting. It was
the first house in town with indoor plumbing as a matter of
fact. But they, they were all powered with a carbide gas.
And, um, they were modified to electric, uh, years ago.
So, uh.
HAY: This blue fireplace, overmantle is?
GEOGHEGAN: Um, this, unfortunately the lady who lived here last removed
all of the overmantles. There was a beautiful overmantle over this
one. I do not know, I, I think the tile was
perhaps made, it came from Cincinnati. Um, and we have two
figures at the front of the fireplace, and I would say that
00:06:00perhaps could be Saturn. And if you will notice the stained-glass
windows at the front of the house and in the parlor, all
of the windows you'll see a planetary theme. And, um, you
will also notice, as you come up the front porch that there's
spheres around all over the front porch, which, which sort of reinforce
the planetary theme. And, um, the, the additional thing I'd like
to point is that could be is, if that is Saturn, if
you were to portray that, uh, with an orb or a sphere,
you would, you, since it's the only planet with concentric circles, if
you'll notice the spheres in the upper level on the porch, they
have two grooves, and that could be portraying the planet Saturn.
In addition to that, you have the spheres overhead over the stairway
00:07:00as well. So, uh, where would you like to go now?
(laughs)
BRITTANY ALLISON: That is great.
HAY: That's good. Let's pause for a minute.
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay, I'm looking straight now at the full--
GEOGHEGAN: --yes--
HAY: --can you just describe about the planets again?
GEOGHEGAN: You can notice that in all, in, in the windows
at the front of the house that you have a planetary theme
in, uh, both the windows over the doors and the windows on
either side of the door.
HAY: And the motif to the right is different leading into
the parlor?
GEOGHEGAN: Uh, the motif over the interior doors, both to the
right going into the parlor and into the music room or library
on the left is, is a different, it's, it's probably a kantha
silk pattern. And, um, it is not, uh, necessarily compatible with--(laughs)--the
00:08:00planetary theme that's on the outside windows.
HAY: Do you think they were all put in at the
same time--
GEOGHEGAN: --I think it was probably a little bit different time
period.
HAY: I just wanted to get into the, that's, that's the
library in that direction?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes.
HAY: Four, there's four libraries?
GEOGHEGAN: You're right.
HAY: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay, we're rolling.
GEOGHEGAN: Okay, yeah, when you come into the room, you can
see the orbs in the windows here or the spheres of the
planetary system here, and especially the one back in the alcove.
Um, you can also notice clouds in the one back there.
The mantles in here and in the dining room also had overmantles
but they're missing. This room is, is mahogany, as is the
hall. Uh, the dining room, which is a room in that
direction, is, um, walnut wainscoting.
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: The chandeliers in the room are original. As I
00:09:00said previously, the one in the hall was original to the house.
They were originally gas. Now they're modified to electric.
The, I think that the, the detail of the, uh, mold, ceiling
moldings in this room are extraordinary. They're rather extraordinary in all
of the rooms but especially in this one.
HAY: Let me scan around and we'll have a look at
those.
GEOGHEGAN: When I was a child, uh, my grandfather, William Ripy,
was the youngest of the Ripy, T.B. Ripy's children. And he
married, uh, but my grandmother died when my mom was six.
And they had three little girls. And those girls either lived
here or at the house where I live, which is my other
great-grandfather's home. And, um, they were up here all the time.
00:10:00And then when I was a child, my grandfather moved back
here as after, after his wife died, and lived here until 1965
or [nineteen fifty-] six. And he would stop by and pick
me up as a child and bring me here for dinner a
couple, a three nights a week. And it was, uh, it
was interesting. My great-grandmother was always seated in that corner; my
grandfather here, Artemisia Ripy, his sister, was over here, and her husband.
And, uh, I was usually on the floor playing with building
blocks that were wonderful. Tom B. probably remembers those because they
had animal pictures all over the fronts of them. But, um,
when I first began coming up here, my great-grandmother and all of
the, the whole family would be listening to Edward R. Murrow on
the radio. And later, after my great-grandmother died, John Cameron Swayze
on the television, the newscast. And, uh, they would be sipping
00:11:00their cocktails, I would be playing with the building blocks. And,
um, we would hear a gong. Harry, the butler, would ring
the gong and open the door and say, "Dinner is served," and
they would all totter away into the dining room for their dinner.
HAY: That's in that direction?
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: Mind if--
HAY: --can you say that again?
GEOGHEGAN: This room was the dining room. Uh, unfortunately, once
again, the overmantle is missing. And there was a lot of
water damage in this room, uh, especially in the corner. We're
awaiting the, uh, we're trying to repair the remainder of the, uh,
ceiling moldings in this room. It should be done shortly.
HAY: Could you tell where the, um, the wait-, the, the
00:12:00servers came from?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes.
HAY: Can you explain how this room works?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, the servers in my, in my era--(laughs)--came from that
door. The butler's pantry was in the room behind here.
And two rooms back was the kitchen. And when Tommy and
I were here and Olivia too, probably, you were a little bit
younger, but, um, the cook used an old wood stove. It
was Lou, and Adele sometimes, and Harry was the butler and the
yardman as well. Um, they would serve dinner every night.
Harry waited the table. We always had our water in silver
tumblers, which to this day I, I like the taste of water
and silver. (laughs) My great-grandmother sat at the head of
the table. And actually there was a buzzer under the table
00:13:00that she could buzz to call the, the wait staff. After
she died, I used to sit at the head of the table!
(laughs)
HAY: And test the buzzer?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, yes. That was the main drawing card.
(laughs) To touch the buzzer. (laughs)
HAY: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: Because this is one of the most interesting mantles in
the house. You can see the pictures of the animals.
There's a dog on one side and a cat on the other.
It looks like a Cairn Terrier, or a soft-coat, or a
Westie. And, uh, a, a, a landscape scene in the middle
and a cat on the right. I think that the fireplaces
were originally wood but they were converted to coal fireplaces.
HAY: Somebody loved these animals.
00:14:00
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
HAY: They're portraits; do you think of family animals?
GEOGHEGAN: Hmm, I don't know. (laughs) I, I don't
remember them ever having dogs of that sort here but, uh.
(laughs)
HAY: Interesting.
GEOGHEGAN: And I've remarked, already indicated that the, the, the woodwork
is walnut. In the far room, which has not been renovated,
the library, it's, it's cherry wainscoting.
HAY: So, we're still in the dining room here?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes. And if you notice, the, um, pattern on
the floor, that was not original to the room. (laughs)
That was the last owner had, um--(laughs)--she apparently loved leopard skin.
There's leopard skin in the house on, on--there was when we first
00:15:00got, bought the house, on the floors, on the ceilings, and on
the walls. [pause] I thought I'd arrived at Belle Watling's.
HAY: Tell me how far into the renovation are we, what
phase do you feel like we're in?
GEOGHEGAN: We are probably, we are actually just at the first
stage. But, um, we're probably going to hold off here and
try to recoup and get some additional help if we can get
it. Frankly, the downstairs, except for the kitchen in the far
room is, is almost, I, I, I would say is 80 percent
done. And we haven't done anything upstairs except with the foyer.
HAY: What would you call the style of this? Any
00:16:00idea?
GEOGHEGAN: Uh, no, it's just, um, it appears to be grape
leaves and, and grapes. I think it's a grape theme, the
dining room. And when we, when we arrived, the, the grapes
were all purple. (laughs)
HAY: You mean these?
GEOGHEGAN: Well, the last owner had the grapes were, the grapes
were purple, and had painted the grapes purple and the leaves green.
Uh, of course, when my great-grandmother was here and my family
was here, it was all either, it was cream-coloured. It's
the same color it is right now, all of the moldings.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay, can you tell me what room we're in again
00:17:00now and what style it is?
GEOGHEGAN: This, this is once again the parlor. And the
stained-glass windows in here, on the outside windows are, is, is a
planetary theme, as, as are the windows in the foyer. The
design of the stained-glass windows over the interior doors is, I think
it's a acanthus leaf.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: --I don't know(??), I know there was a large Steinway
00:18:00Grand in the, in the, in the library, or music room.
HAY: So, say it again; what was in this alcove?
GEOGHEGAN: There was a baby grand piano in this alcove and
in the, um, library, or music room, across the way from, um,
they had a large Steinway Square Grand.
HAY: Alright.
GEOGHEGAN: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: If you'd stand next to him, he can hear your,
he can pick up on the mic. Can you explain what
this tray is?
TOM B. RIPY: Oh, this is a tray, uh, that was
produced when the Waterfill & Frazier Distillery Company was, uh, operating in
Juarez, Mexico. Uh, of course, this is a bullfighting scene.
Uh, and you'll notice, uh, on the sides that, uh, at least
00:19:00some of it is in Spanish, uh, basically saying, "The Best of
America." Uh, it also has the name of her Mexican corporate
partner, Bermudez. The Bermudez family, uh, were, uh, her partners because
that was required under Mexican law for, for her to operate the
distillery.
GEOGHEGAN: And Tom B., I think some of her sons, their,
the Bermudez attended, uh, Kavanaugh Academy--
RIPY: --yes, uh, Jamie, uh, who was, or--(Geoghegan laughs)--Jamie Bermudez went
to Kavanaugh Academy. And I remembered that, that, that--(laughs)--one of them
did, and I couldn't remember the name. So I went to
some of the older ladies here in town, uh, Pauline--
00:20:00
GEOGHEGAN: --oh, yeah, yeah--
RIPY: --and the others--
GEOGHEGAN: --Jamie--
RIPY: --and I said, "Can you remember the name, uh, the,
the boy from Mexico who, uh, was in the business with the
Dowlings, whose family was in the business with the Dowlings who came
here to school?" And all they could say was, "Boy, was
he good-looking! Can't remember his name"--(Geoghegan laughs)--"but all of the girls
wanted to go out with him." Well, finally, one of them
who kept telling me she couldn't remember the name did. And
I, I got a phone call saying, "It was Jamie."
GEOGHEGAN: Yeah.
RIPY: And I said, "What was the last name?" "I
don't know, I don't know." And so, I've had this tray
for a long time in my collection. I pulled out the
tray. And I saw the Bermudez name and then it struck
me just like that; it was Jamie Bermudez. I remember him,
you know, and I remember, I remembered that Jamie was right.
Couldn't remember the last. But I found the last name on
the tray. (laughs)
HAY: That's a great story.
00:21:00
GEOGHEGAN: That was it.
HAY: Thank you.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: Spanish, but. (laughs) [los mejores de America]
HAY: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
RIPY: Um, I'll leave you with, that's not a very good
copy of the picture.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, yeah, yeah.
RIPY: Because I didn't have photo paper. But that is,
uh, for you.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, okay.
RIPY: And I'll give you a better, I might send you
the, over the Internet, copy of it.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, okay.
RIPY: It's the picture I had taken at the tennis court
that year.
OLIVIA RIPY: Oh, I want a copy of that, too.
RIPY: Back about nineteen-, I'd say around 1910.
OLIVIA RIPY: Isn't that neat.
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
RIPY: I, I, I wonder who that is.
GEOGHEGAN: I don't know.
RIPY: I thought it might be Whit but I wasn't sure.
GEOGHEGAN: It's not, it's not William.
RIPY: It's not. But it's a fairly tall fellow.
And I think that's Mary Belle Safra(??). And this could be
Aunt Wallace.
GEOGHEGAN: I think that is Aunt Wallace.
00:22:00
RIPY: Yeah, and she and Mary Belle(??) were good friends, so
I thought that might be her.
GEOGHEGAN: --yeah, I might, I might--
RIPY: --and Mary Belle(??) was kind of stocky, too.
GEOGHEGAN: I might have a picture with him in it.
I, I have some old pictures, so I'll, I'll look that up.
RIPY: I'll send you a copy over the Internet.
GEOGHEGAN: Uh, okay, okay, great.
OLIVIA RIPY: Oh, you're going home(??).
RIPY: Yes, I'm going to go home and feed my wife
OLIVIA RIPY: That's nice.
RIPY: I think, I hope so, anyway. (laughs)
OLIVIA RIPY: I'm going home too.
HAY: Thank you. Bye Olivia.
OLIVIA: Bye, it was really good to see you all!
HAY: Thank you. Did we lose Brittany?
UNKNOWN: She went to the car.
HAY: Okay. She's doing all right?
UNKNOWN: I think so, she's ----------(??).
HAY: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: This room looks like--(laughs)--what it looked like when we bought
00:23:00it. We have not modified this room at all. We
have just stored various items in here. Uh, if you do
look at the, the wainscoting in this room is cherry, um, which
is, and it's, the pattern is different from the other rooms.
Um, but what we have here is an exhibit of some of
the, the pieces that they've duplicated, uh, new pieces, and you'll find
some old pieces, and they duplicated the old pieces. So it's,
uh, it's a study in what, what the builder has been able
to accomplish here and what they've come up with.
HAY: That's tremendous. And we were in here a minute
ago putting our things down, and, and saw(??) something fell from the
ceiling.
GEOGHEGAN: Well, the, uh, molding in this room is in, in
very bad disrepair, the ceiling mold--
HAY: --it makes us be able to see what you've done
in the other room.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes. Um, there were just water leaks. Uh,
00:24:00the gutters were leaking in the roof, and it was forcing the--actually,
when she lined the gutters, and they're box gutters, she lined them,
and whoever put the liner in put them in the wrong way.
It rolled back outward and it forced water in the gutter
in, into the interior of the house. And that's what caused
the damage. I will show you another unique feature about this
house because it's the only one still left.
HAY: Hmm.
GEOGHEGAN: This is an, an 1800, a late 1800's intercom system.
(laughs) You would yell through this to the kitchen or
to the butler's pantry. (Hay laughs) And they could yell
back, but the, the ones back there are gone now, I don't
know.
HAY: I'm going to get a really, really close-up ----------(??)
00:25:00
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: One of them was in perfect shape until recently, there
used to be a spring, and it would flip back if you
didn't push it. But now, I, I think somebody's overdone it.
You would push the thing and the lever and talk.
And they could hear you in the other room.
HAY: (laughs) That's great.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: It had been knocked off. But the way they
built them was they had small pieces and they glued them on.
So when we began working with this particular mantle, we could
use these pieces or duplicate them to fit on, and, and repair
what's missing here. See, that goes right in there.
HAY: Right.
GEOGHEGAN: This was a little door where they kept their matches,
00:26:00and--and whatever they were going to use with the fireplace.
HAY: I like that. Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: You can see, once again, they've painted the woodwork in
this room, which never should've been done. As I recall, this
was also mahogany. My great-grandfather actually slept in here in his
last years. Is somebody crying?
UNKNOWN: She's laughing.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, okay. (laughs) In his last years, when
he was in bad health and my great-grandmother's bedroom was right upstairs,
so she could do, there's a service stairway through this door that
goes up to the second floor. Um, but we think this
was T.B. Ripy's office at the house. You can walk around
the veranda. There is a side entrance. You don't have
00:27:00to come in the front entrance. It's in a separate doorway
for this, this room. Much like, and the, the, the, the
situation at the Dowling house, it was on one side of the
house was, uh, Mr. Dowling's office.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay. Again.
GEOGHEGAN: Okay. This is the back foyer or back hall.
And the room there, as well as this, used to be
one rather-, the lavatory was in this room and the commode and
tub were in this room. We decided to, um, since it
was less work to do in this one, we would make it
two separate restrooms. And this one is complete. That one
needs some work on it.
HAY: Um-hm.
GEOGHEGAN: And if you walk in, you'll notice that they also
had, um, overmantles on the mantles in the bathroom. And they
00:28:00did leave those. (laughs)
HAY: How interesting. Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: The--
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: I don't know whether you want to go back in
here or not. You want to go.
HAY: Oh?
GEOGHEGAN: That's just the, uh, butler's pantry. And the kitchen
is behind that--
HAY: --okay--
GEOGHEGAN: --and that's kind of rather, you can't tell much about that.
HAY: Okay. That's enough then.
GEOGHEGAN: Do you want to go upstairs?
HAY: Yes.
GEOGHEGAN: Okay.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay, go ahead.
GEOGHEGAN: This is the stairway, which is also mahogany. You
have the stained-glass windows on the landing that also seem to have
orbs in there or spheres. Um, and I will say that
when I was a child, this was a wonderful stairway, stair rail
00:29:00to ride downstairs on. You picked up a lot of speed
in a hurry. (laughs)
HAY: Go ahead and walk on(??). Okay, continue up.
GEOGHEGAN: Okay.
HAY: And I'll, okay, good.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, you're not ready yet?
HAY: Now I am.
GEOGHEGAN: You might notice that the, um, the arches and
the woodwork here, um, also have a planetary theme to them, as,
as is the case over the stairways, stairway at the bottom.
Um, she has a, the last owner put a fan here, which
was never the situation. There was a, um, a lovely chandelier,
a tear-, tear-dropped shape chan-, uh, chandelier that was in this foyer,
00:30:00the upstairs foyer. There were shutters on those windows and she
removed those, and you can see that it has damaged some of
the mahogany woodwork. It's bleached it.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay, here's that motif again--
GEOGHEGAN: --yes--
HAY: --like down--
GEOGHEGAN: --the motif down, similar to that downstairs.
HAY: What did you say the wood is?
GEOGHEGAN: It's mahogany up here as well. Unfortunately, when you
go into rooms, you'll notice that one of the intervening owners after
the Ripy's, uh, painted the woodwork. The woodwork upstairs that the,
the wain-, we don't have the tall wainscoting like downstairs. We
just have the, um, the woodwork of the, that's right here on
00:31:00the landing, the same, all, in all of the rooms upstairs.
There's no shoulder-height wainscoting.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: --when, when they were here.
HAY: Can you say that again?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, my mother and her two sisters stayed in this
room when they were visiting overnight. This was a lovely room
at the time, now it's a--
HAY: --it's got the alcove.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, it has an alcove.
HAY: Which mirrors the one downstairs.
GEOGHEGAN: Exactly. Which mirrors the basement. This goes all
the way to the, to the basement. The alcove actually begins
in the basement and goes all the way up to the tower.
HAY: So you can see that as the turret off the
side--
GEOGHEGAN: --yes, that's correct--
HAY: --is that what it looks like?
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
HAY: Alright.
GEOGHEGAN: And, uh, the, the room over here, it goes all
the way to the basement. In modern times, when they had
bay windows and, uh, alcoves, they usually just start them on the
00:32:00first floor, and uh, it doesn't, it's not included in the basement,
but here we have them that, uh, go all the way to
the basement. And as I said previously, the basement, the main
part of the basement's eleven feet deep, or twelve-, eleven or twelve
feet deep. All stone walls.
HAY: And this, we can see through two more rooms--
GEOGHEGAN: --yes--
HAY: --here?
GEOGHEGAN: --this, this was, um, has been considerably modified by an
intervening owner. They've put a closet, uh, in, in this room,
there never was a closet. They all used armoires, except for
the closets in the two front bedrooms. This was where my
great aunt, the last owner of the house, this was her bedroom.
Artemisia Ripy Gaines, she was married to Lester Gaines, who was
an officer with Kentucky Stone Company.
HAY: Okay.
00:33:00
GEOGHEGAN: That closet was never there.
HAY: Yeah. This just shows us where we are.
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
HAY: A little, had a hard trap there.
GEOGHEGAN: You'll notice that the floors on the first floor are
oak; the floors on the second floor are pine; and now it
would be the other way around. But in the Victorian era,
oak was thought of in higher regard than, than was pine, so.
(laughs) My house is the same way. (laughs)
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: This, this bathroom is over the butler's pantry. Uh,
00:34:00this was, has been a bathroom as long as I can remember,
but before I was born, there was a, uh, and actually, when
most of the children, the Ripy children, were grown, there was a
flue fire in the fourth floor, third and fourth floor. And
they decided at that time to replace the gravity furnace, the old
gravity furnace that had huge ducts that were this big around, they
replaced it with, um, steam heat. They removed a service, a
second service stairway that went down through this foyer. This was
a separate back foyer, before they made it, before that decision to
re-, to add the additional chimney. They put another chimney specifically
for the steam heat and removed that service stairway. And you
can see, that's why the configuration here is strange. There are
two doors coming to the bathroom, one contains the commode, which would
00:35:00not have been the case, so. And then I will show,
this is one of the few places you can see--and this tub
was never here, even when I was, even when it was a
bathroom--
HAY: --remodeled--
GEOGHEGAN: --and I was here.
HAY: This is double-door, seen(??).
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, see, I, I think, maybe, there was an original
bathroom here. And this was the foyer. And, uh, then
when they took the chimney out, they just made it a full
bathroom because my great-aunt and uncle lived there. Stayed in that
room. The only interesting feature about this room, especially with this
hideous color, is this is one of the original gas outlets for
the carbide gas lighting. It's struggling. It's warming up.
00:36:00(laughs)
BRITTANY ALLISON: How many rooms?
GEOGHEGAN: Uh, probably over thirty, if you count every one of
them and including the basement one, so I. But that doesn't
include, it's eleven-thousand square feet, but that doesn't include the half-floor on
the fourth floor, which was never fully brought back to what it
once was after the flue fire.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: ----------(??), this room, I mean, the, um, um, oh, the
mud room, uh, which you shouldn't include. This, this is built-in.
And she, they, they painted, they painted the woodwork. These
are cedar-lined. And they painted the woodwork all around on this
00:37:00floor, which is a shame.
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: Incidentally, there were nice chandeliers in every room and not
these fans. (laughs) I mentioned, I mentioned earlier, when my
00:38:00grandmother died, my grandfather moved back here. This was his bedroom.
And, um, in my opinion, these, these are probably the nicest
stained-glass windows in the house. They portray a traditional Victorian-type theme,
and in the center of the window, you'll see two Griffins, mythical
birds, Griffins.
HAY: Those match the ones downstairs, don't they?
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
HAY: The front ones.
GEOGHEGAN: Right, but they don't have the Griffins in them, yeah,
00:39:00yeah.
HAY: But the style?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes.
HAY: And tell me what we're looking outside at.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, oh, you're looking across the street at the, at
Dowling Hall. It was built by John Dowling. John and
Mary Dowling lived in that house. Um, actually, they were in,
John Dowling and his brother were in business with, uh, T.B. Ripy
and the Clover Bottom Distillery, which was also at Tyrone. And
I think they were in business in eighteen--went into business in 1881
in that distillery. T.B. Ripy was earlier in another distillery out
there in the 1860s. But this was in 1881, and then
he bought them out I think two or three years later.
He was in business with the Waterfill's and the Dowling brothers.
And, you know, the Dowling brothers were into, uh, making barrels as
00:40:00well. Um, and the Dowling's and Mr. Ripy were also in
the roller mill business together for many years. Flour and all
of that kind of stuff.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: While it was, when I was a child, it was
actually a funeral home. And Stuart Gordon was the, uh, head
of the business operation. He married my father's sister, so I
have been in that house numerous times as well, so. (laughs)
I think that house is for sale.
ALLISON: I just love that, I love this chandelier. That
00:41:00is so neat.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, the--
ALLISON: --it's all different--
GEOGHEGAN: --yes, yes--
ALLISON: --it's so unique.
GEOGHEGAN: We've got the, and we don't have too many, somebody's
broken the globes.
ALLISON: Hmm.
GEOGHEGAN: We only had enough globes for the one in the
hall.
ALLISON: You headed this way next, Joanna?
GEOGHEGAN: You going to, this is where my great-grandmother lived when
I was a child. This was her bedroom rather. And
it had, it has a separate bathroom.
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: --have probably more of the furniture than anybody else.
ALLISON: Oh, okay.
GEOGHEGAN: In my house, so. (laughs) I have the boule
table that every, they used to serve the eggnog from in the
downstairs foyer.
ALLISON: Ah, wonderful!
HAY: Okay.
00:42:00
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: --dog kennel was back there at the end of, of
the property. The, the school is back there now. But
about hundred yards back, he had a dog kennel. Uh, over
here, just where you see that structure, there was an, they, they
used to call it a laundry house, but it was a two-story,
clad work Victorian. And I think maybe they, they lived in
that while they were building this house. And then after, they
called that the, afterward, they called it the laundry house. But
I also think that they probably used the kitchen in that house
to cook the food. Because when this house was first built,
the first part of it, it was not very safe to have
your cooking done in the house. Later on, technology improved.
And they, if you noticed, this wing is not as wide as
that wing. And it's not as, doesn't go as far back.
00:43:00And if you look at the wings from the outside, you'll
notice that the detail work on the corners of this wing to
the rear are much more elaborate than the, on the other.
So, uh, I think that that was widened and they added the
kitchen.
ALLISON: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: So, uh--
ALLISON: Great, we'll ----------(??).
GEOGHEGAN: And then, they also had a well house over the
top of the little chicken feeder. And, uh, they, they had,
a, a, a smokehouse as well that were both brick. And
I can recall I left my phone at the home, so I
can't show you the spider. (laughs) When I was
a child, I was either going out to see my grandfather at
the dog kennel or I was out there and coming inside.
And I went by the laundry house and on the porch I
saw a spider that was this big. So I ran to
00:44:00get my grandfather or great-aunt and uncle. Got them there.
And they convinced me that it was my imagination. Well, this
summer in the front foyer, one of the workmen took a picture
of a spider on the floor. It was as big as
my hand. And it was eating a bat. So, I
have a picture of that spider on my other, uh, telephone that
I left at home or I could show it to you.
It was a wolf spider but it was huge.
HAY: It was a relative of that one you saw as
a child. (all laugh)
GEOGHEGAN: Yes! (laughs)
ALLISON: No doubt(??).
GEOGHEGAN: I now know I did see it (all laugh)
HAY: Great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather?
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, of that spider! (all laugh) And this
is, um, this has always had a concrete floor. I guess
00:45:00there were eight boys. Maybe they just put the concrete floor
and said, "Go in there and get a shower," in the morning.
And there's a drain in the floor.
HAY: Very practical.
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm, under the tub.
HAY: Um-hm. It's like, it is a shower.
GEOGHEGAN: Um-hm.
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: Belinda did that. We didn't--(laughs)--my family didn't do that.
We think all of this back was added because all of
the waterwork is in the back part of the house. And
we can go up if you all want. (laughs)
ALLISON: Oh yeah. ----------(??).
GEOGHEGAN: Be careful. There's, there's no railing.
ALLISON: Do you know who the stained glass artisan is?
00:46:00
GEOGHEGAN: The artisan?
ALLISON: Yeah.
GEOGHEGAN: No, I don't.
ALLISON: No?
GEOGHEGAN: Unh-uh.
ALLISON: That would be interesting. ------------(??).
GEOGHEGAN: We, we think the front, the ones on the outside
downstairs were some company in Flynt, Michigan. This is where their,
they had the carbide gas tank, and the storage tank for the
water supply in the house. They, there was a widow's walk
up, there is a widow's walk up there. The railing is
now missing, or the balustrade, because it was going to damage the
rest of the roof, so we removed it. But it collected
there, and ran into here, plus all of the other, um, gutters
00:47:00in the house drained into the cistern and filtered in, and then
they could pump that water back upstairs and put it in the
holding tank, and then use it in the bathrooms. There also
was a carbide gas tank in this room that fed all of
the, uh, gas lights in the house. But they never redid
the upstairs after the flue fire, so. And here are some
overmantles that came from the second floor. The ones that were
on the first floor are, were larger than these. However, I
think that one will work. Um, that's a beautiful overmantle there.
ALLISON: This is so pretty.
GEOGHEGAN: This one's okay and can be repaired. Both of
them can be repaired and we have another one, uh, in storage.
And here is, uh, one of the fittings for car-, for
00:48:00carbide gas. You can hook it on to those things.
And--
ALLISON: --so, how does that work?
GEOGHEGAN: You hook it on to those things, like, stick out
of the wall, and then you can use them for light.
ALLISON: Ah!
GEOGHEGAN: And this is an antique. This is a turkey
feather duster. The remains of one. Made by Chicago Universal
in 1875. And this is number 37.
HAY: I love it. Better get to work there.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes! (all laugh)
HAY: These are such interesting rooms up here.
GEOGHEGAN: And here is a balcony. We haven't gotten far
00:49:00enough along yet to repair this, so, uh. And this is
the room where you can access the tower.
HAY: Oh ----------(??)
GEOGHEGAN: Now, this, you, you go up, and there's a trap
door, and you push it up, and go out on the tower.
I used to bring my friends up here all the time.
We've had a couple of ghost walks here. Maybe more
than a couple. But, um, and, and then--(laughs)--an interesting story, and
ghosts have shown up. But one day, when they were initially
00:50:00installing that chandelier, we had to take it down when we started
the repair work, and the one in the downstairs foyer, I put
a bag of light bulbs on the mantle and left. They
put the chandelier up. And I came back while they were
still here and they said, "Is this house haunted?" And I
said, "Well, no." And they said, "Well, we think it is
because it got really cold in here and that bag of light
bulbs moved all the way across the mantle." And I said,
"Well, I, I guess it's just because you're not supposed to be
here, and I am." But I've never seen a ghost here.
I used to play up here by myself as a child."
HAY: That's a good story.
GEOGHEGAN: (laughs) I don't think you can see this, but.
But it just goes up, and actually you could at one
time, walk around the outside of it. You're inside the house
00:51:00but you're outside this partition.
HAY: Let me see if I can get.
[Pause in recording.]
HAY: Okay.
GEOGHEGAN: The, this is the added chimney. And this is
where the stairway went down to the first floor or, or even
maybe the basement. A, a second service stairway. Now, I
00:52:00don't know where they put, they've, they've taken the, there was a
newel post here. And I, I think the workmen put it
somewhere when they were working up here. But you can see
where it goes down, and that, before that chimney. When they
put the chimney in, they had to take it out.
HAY: I see. Okay. Alright, anything more in here?
GEOGHEGAN: That's just, um--
HAY: --rooms, I love these rooms--
GEOGHEGAN: --the third floor
HAY: I just ----------(??)----------
GEOGHEGAN: Oh yeah. Uh, actually, you know what? You
could put geothermal heating in here. Do away with this.
And put an elevator here, going all the way to the basement.
So, um, that could be--
HAY: --be efficient.
GEOGHEGAN: Yeah, now, this is the way you go to the
widow's walk. You climb up here. And I don't know
whether you can see it. You can see the ventilator up
00:53:00there on the top of the widow's walk. And usually there
is a ladder up there that goes up to another trap door
there. That, that is higher than the tower. Where is
the ladder? (pause) I can't seem to see the ladder.
I think they've taken the ladder down. But you can
see the ventilator on the top.
HAY: Yeah, I can see that. That's great.
UNKNOWN: Do you know when the stained glass was, was put
00:54:00in, or?
GEOGHEGAN: When the what?
UNKNOWN: When the stained glass was put in, like, what era?
GEOGHEGAN: Uh, you, that had to be when the house was
built--
UNKNOWN: --I see--
GEOGHEGAN: --in, in the late 1800s.
UNKNOWN: Cool.
GEOGHEGAN: And if you look at the front of the house,
this is actually a, a, a brick Queen Anne but it has
other overtones. It has Eastlake. If you look at the
front of it, it has the, the woodwork that goes like this,
it almost looks stick style, and, and it, it, uh, it's, it
just has several different styles in it. Uh, Eastlake, and stick
style, and, uh, you can even, on either side, on both of
the wings, you have what looks to be like a rosette, which
sort of looks like the Rococo furniture. So, you have a,
um, any number of combinations of features that, that are in this
00:55:00house.
HAY: That's great. Camera--
[Pause in recording.]
GEOGHEGAN: What is making the noise? Oh, that.
UNKNOWN: ----------(??), space heaters probably.
GEOGHEGAN: Oh, okay. (pause) Hmm. All the way
up. It didn't look like there was anything wrong. It
had--
ALLISON: It was looking like--
GEOGHEGAN: --we had to replace--
ALLISON: -- ----------(??)--
GEOGHEGAN: --we had to replace half of the columns out there.
00:56:00 More than half, so.
ALLISON: So, what, are you already submitting at all through--
GEOGHEGAN: --well, uh, we've just been furnishing the money.
ALLISON: Yeah.
GEOGHEGAN: Yeah, we would like to try to raise the money.
Have events here and raise some money to help out.
This house would be, in my opinion, a great bed and breakfast
and a reception center for, for the city of Lawrenceburg.
ALLISON: Um-hm.
GEOGHEGAN: And, uh, frankly, it's so large, they could even have
a hist-, a, a museum of bourbon history in the third floor
of the building.
ALLISON: Oh yeah, it's a possibility--
GEOGHEGAN: --I mean, it's the house that bourbon built, so, um.
ALLISON: The possibilities are endless.
HAY: But it takes, it takes that investment that you guys
are putting in it.
GEOGHEGAN: Yeah.
ALLISON: Millions.
HAY: Yeah.
ALLISON: Putting in the --------(??).
GEOGHEGAN: Yes. I have often wondered, it would be, are
we still on mic? (laughs)
ALLISON: Yes.
GEOGHEGAN: It would--would be nice to get someone interested, like, uh,
00:57:00what is it, 21c?
ALLISON: Um-hm, Steve Wilson.
GEOGHEGAN: Yes, because their hotel, they will have one in Lexington,
they have one in Louisville, but they're not in the center of
the Bourbon Trail. This house is in the center of the
Bourbon Trail. And it would be wonderful if we could get
them interested, in, in helping out, and having, but they could put
their people up here who wanted to be in the Bourbon, center
of the Bourbon Trail. And, um, it would, it could be
a nice bed and breakfast. It could be a breakfast club,
a, a dinner club.
ALLISON: Um-hm, that's great.
GEOGHEGAN: There are a variety of things it could be used
for.
UNKNOWN: ----------(??)----------
GEOGHEGAN: Well, Tom B. and I bought it because we didn't
want it torn down, and. And we've gone from there.
UNKNOWN: Now, ----------(??).
GEOGHEGAN: I will tell you a funny story. When we
00:58:00got this house, you could not see the house from the road.
It was so overgrown with huge bushes and trees that you
simply couldn't see it. And of course, I remarked to everyone
that I saw that, uh, I was going to recommend it for
the next version of Jurassic Park. (Hay laughs) And I
also made that remark to the person who was clearing the property
with his, uh, Bearcat, or whatever you call those things. And
one, one day, he went in a big clump of bushes with
the, with that machine and pulled back. And he panicked; he
saw huge eyes looking at him. So he stopped and he
discovered Belinda had left a huge plastic turtle, this big. (Unknown
00:59:00person laughs) And it had been overgrown. He thought the
dinosaur had him. (all laugh)
ALLISON: (laughs) Well, very cool. This has been really cool.
HAY: Alright, that's fine.
[End of interview.]
