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We’ve heard the buzz—now we want your vote! Quick pulse check: Yea or Nay? We’ve been asked about launching a monthly podcast that discusses the research surrounding the true crime, local legends, and lingering mysteries of Pulaski County & the region—and we’d love your input! Would you tune in? Want to be interviewed or become a sponsor? What is your favorite podcast platform? Do you have specific topics or ideas? Let's hear them! Cast your vote and let us know in the poll a

They called him the Yarb Doctor. A man of strange brews and stranger talents. Part Choctaw, part rumor, all shadow. He arrived in Pulaski County under pressure—pushed from Tennessee by court orders and quiet threats—and built something no one expected: a sanitorium. Unity Hill rose out of the hillside like a defiant breath. One hundred beds. A piano in the parlor. Typewriters tapping beneath the sound of labored coughs. And somewhere beneath it all, a tunnel—dug not for comfo

Less of a Mystery and More of a Curiosity Photos Courtesy of Rod Zimmerman, Somerset, KY In the early 20th century, just outside Somerset, Kentucky, a quiet legend took root in the town of Ferguson. His name was Pylap Medekle—Seminole herbalist, healer, and the last of a dying tradition. Long before the clinics, long before white coats and insurance forms, there was Doc Medekle, mixing wild cherry bark and golden seal in a weathered bottle, curing what others couldn’t—or woul

In 1922, honor carried a loaded gun. Image of James Franklin Todd and the 1st National Bank On a cold February morning, the quiet rhythm of courthouse square in Somerset, Kentucky, was shattered by four sharp cracks echoing from the second floor of the First National Bank building. Inside, a man lay dying. Outside, life carried on—until word spread that James Franklin Todd had kept his word. The warning was simple: “If you get on that stand and swear a lie, I’ll kill you.” Th

Some places don't fade. They wait. Photo by MR Grigsby Just four miles outside Somerset, Kentucky, nestled in a quiet hollow where the mist clings tight to the trees and the roads remember old names, the remnants of Soules Chapel lie buried in ash and story. Once a thriving house of worship, the chapel stood tall against the ridge for over a century—until time, fire, and something darker consumed it. They say a preacher came through in the early 1900s—his words sweet as hone

A Hometown Murder. A Vanished Child. And a Justice Carried Out in the Shadows. It was a quiet December afternoon in 1908 when ten-year-old Nannie Womack left her one-room schoolhouse in Russell County, Kentucky, and set out for home—just a mile down a dirt road she’d walked a hundred times before. She never made it. Photograph of Nannie Womack, circa early 1900 (n.d.). Public domain image retrieved from Find a Grave. ( Nannie Pearl Womack (1898-1908) - Find a Grave Memorial).

A forgotten well. A whispered warning. And a secret not buried deep enough to stay hidden. Pulaski County, Kentucky—summer, 1880. The days were hot, the air thick, and the past wasn’t quite as buried as the townspeople believed. Image: Downtown Somerset, Kentucky, 1896. Public domain. Courtesy of Pulaski County Public Library Historical Society, via Flickr (uploaded December 2023). https://www.flickr.com/photos/pcplphotos/53396396527 When a group of children tossed stones in

Original Image: ©k Svensson | Adobe Stock • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby Happy (almost) November! For me, fall is a time when nature herself seems to steal my focus with faint whispers on the wind, luring me away from responsibilities with a sense of urgency that makes me want to shrug off the daily grind, leave priorities to work themselves out and connect with everything the wilderness has to offer. Unfortunately, the closest I can get to that at present is nice long w

The Murder of Martha VanHook — February 1959 Original Image: ©breakermaximus | Adobe Stock • Post Image design: jrgrigsby She was a young mother, a waitress known by many in the small town of Somerset, Kentucky. On the night of February 3rd, 1959, Martha Mae VanHook's lifeless body was found sprawled across Crab Orchard Road—half-dressed, still warm, and brutally beaten. At first, the scene looked like a tragic accident. But within moments, it was clear: this was no crash

A dead-end road. A call in the dark. And a meeting that would end in blood. Original Image (gun): © ef art | Adobe Stock | Image (orniment): ©Zamurovic Brothers | Adobe Stock | Image Design: jrgrigsby Christmas night, 1962. While families across Pulaski County were settling in after the holiday feast, thirty-year-old Murrell Trimble stepped out into the cold, heading toward what he believed was a late-night meeting with an old acquaintance. A quiet roadside call had sum

The last execution case carried out for Pulaski County Image: ©MR Grigsby | LCTI Publishing • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby In the waning days of summer 1947, Pulaski County bustled with the hum of progress. Somerset’s leaders debated a new water system, the VFW planned its infamous donkey ball game, and the local law office of John G. Prather opened its doors. But beneath this picture of small-town life, something dark was waiting. On a quiet September night in the town o

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | April 2022 Original Image: ©shaiith | Adobe Stock • Image Design: jrgrigsby A Tribute April 13, 2022, marks 20 years since Pulaski County Sheriff Sam Catron was killed in the line of duty. In memory of his service to Pulaski County (and surrounding counties), this edition of Hometown Murders & Mysteries is dedicated to Sheriff Catron . In Pulaski County’s long and storied past, few names evoke as much awe, respect, and sorrow as that of She

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | March 2022 Image: ©Unknown | Adobe Stock • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby He was just a small-town boy from Buncombe, Kentucky, with red hair, blue eyes, and a smile that could charm a courtroom—or a county fair. Noble “Red” Holt was known in Pulaski County for his charisma, work ethic, and tight family ties. So how did this well-liked farm kid end up at the center of one of Ohio’s most high-profile capital cases, sentenced to death by elect

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | February 2022 Original Image (The Virginia): ©David Rogers • Original Image (gun & rose): ©MrWirot | Adobe Stock • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby It began as a love story—two of Pulaski County’s most respected families joined in marriage. He was a driven, dignified banker with a voice like warm bourbon. She was a high-spirited woman from one of the region’s most influential bloodlines. But what started with vows and promise ended in a front-

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | December 2021 Image: ©Kirly Lis | Adobe Stock • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby In late 1937, Eliza Tarter walked out of Pulaski County Circuit Court with a fresh divorce decree in hand. Just one month later, she was the sole heir to a 400-acre estate... and her wealthy employer, local attorney Simpson Phelps, was dead. What followed was a saga that would grip the Commonwealth for nearly a year: an exhumation, lab tests, FBI involvement, and a

Special Edition Image: ©tomertu | Adobe Stock • Post Image Design: jrgrigsby The Ghost of Fishing Creek - Pulaski Park Roads. It has been said, in years past, that folks driving up Fishing Creek hill late at night would suddenly sense someone behind them in the vehicle. When they turned to see, there would be the ghostly image of a woman riding in the backseat. Once they reached the top of the hill, she would simply get out and vanish. Folks who told the story said that h

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | October 2021 Original Image: ©CLShebley | Adobe Stock In the summer of 1938, Pulaski County was humming with quiet progress—air conditioning was a luxury, ginseng was a cash crop, and doors were still left unlocked. But on a farm tucked near the banks of the Cumberland River, something far darker was taking root. Thomas Hurd was a respected, if eccentric, member of the Tateville community—a widower with a talent for conversation and a habit of

Hometown Murders & Mysteries | October 2021 This month our story takes us back to the beginning of a new millennium to the late 1930s. We follow a man's journey from Russell County, where he was born, to the Somerset city limits, where he spent many years as a well-liked and respected community member, to his settling a farm on the banks of the Cumberland River in southern Pulaski County. From the moment we began researching his story, we felt a connection to our subject and

Hometown Murders & Mysteries: September 2021 (Part 1 & 2) | September 2021 Figure 1 By the mid-1950s, Pulaski County was humming with new life. The Cumberland River had been tamed, Lake Cumberland was drawing vacationers from across the state, and America’s youth were falling in love with jukeboxes, fast cars, and rebellious songs. But in the shadow of these changing tides, a tragedy was brewing on the shores of Tateville. When 22-year-old Tom Richardson eloped with 16-year-o