Payne Hollow (Photo from Payne Hollow on the Ohio, Inc.)
Along the lush, bountiful riverside banks of the Ohio River in Trimble County, lays a 60-acre sanctuary – a secluded place for creative and reflective kindred spirits. Named “Payne Hollow,” the property once was the homestead to Anna and Harlan Hubbard, famed Northern Kentucky artists and naturalists who lived sustainably off the land.
Anna and Harlan purchased Payne Hollow after several years of living on a shantyboat, floating down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. Harlan was widely known for his writing and art. Their life at Payne Hollow inspired his second published work, Payne Hollow: Life on the Fringe of Society, which details the creative, beautiful, and viable lifestyle they followed there.
Members of the Payne Hollow on the Ohio (Photo courtesy John Nation)
The non-profit organization, Payne Hollow on the Ohio, Inc., has recently purchased the historic Hubbard homestead to protect and preserve the land and structures. Join David Wicks, board chair and Jessica Whitehead, founding board member of as they give a history of Payne Hollow and what is being done to honor the Hubbards’ legacy in the NKY History Hour: On the Fringe of Society: Revitalizing Historic Payne Hollow at 6:30 p.m., Wednesday, April 5.
Register and participate in the free virtual presentation by Behringer-Crawford Museum online.
Information on how to connect to the Zoom session will be sent after registration. The event will also be streamed live on BCM’s Facebook page.
David Wicks (Photo provided)
David M. Wicks. Ed.D is chair of the PHOTO board of directors. He is also vice chair of the Ohio River Way and leader of the Nature Based Recreation Working Group with the Plan for the Ohio River Basin 2020-2025. He serves on the River City Paddle Sports and the Salt River Watershed Watch boards to promote paddlesport safety, education, citizen science and the enhancement of the Ohio River and our urban water ways.
Dr. Wicks is on the editorial board of the international journal Applied Environmental Education and Communication and currently is an adjunct professor with the University of Louisville’s honors program. He retired several years ago as the director of the Jefferson County Public Schools and the University of Louisville Center for Environmental Education Center, where he directed educational programs at Blackacre State Nature Preserve, Kentucky’s first state nature preserve. He is a past president of the North American Association for Environmental Education and served three times as president of the Kentucky Association for Environmental Education.
Jessica Whitehead (Photo provided)
Jessica Whitehead moved to the Louisville area in 2011 after graduating with a BA in Art History and English from Hanover College. As Curator of Collections at the Kentucky Derby Museum, she works closely with the rest of the Curatorial and Education departments to promote a rich and diverse understanding of the Kentucky Derby and what it has meant — and means — to the Commonwealth and the country through exhibits and collections-based programming.
Whitehead is currently writing a new history of the Kentucky Derby. In addition to her work at the museum, she is an independent writer, artist, and curator, specializing in themes related to Ohio River Valley history, the natural world and the arts. She has written the introduction to the recently published The Watercolors of Harlan Hubbard: From the Collection of Bill and Flo Caddell (University Press of Kentucky, 2021) and her first full book, Driftwood: Harlan Hubbard in the American Grain, is under contract with University Press of Kentucky, to appear in 2023.
NKY History Hour programs take place every other Wednesday evening and are currently free to the public but may become a BCM members-only benefit in the future. To support NKY History Hour and access many other entertaining and thought-provoking programs for free, join BCM.
Behringer-Crawford Museum
