History, ghost stories, on display at White Hall

Oct. 20—Spencer Mahon

Tucked away in the countryside of Madison County just off exit 95, on Interstate 75, sits a piece of Madison County history. Originally built as Clermont in 1798 and completed in 1799, White Hall stands as a testament to one of Kentucky's most elite families.

White Hall focuses its history on Green Clay and his son Cassius. Cassius was the longest tenant of the home, spending the majority of his life living on the property until his death in 1903 and is the primary subject of the tour.

With Halloween around the corner, White Hall will be hosting an event on Halloween called "Ghost Stories and Scandals" tour of the mansion. That tour will focus on hauntings and scandals Cassius Clay found himself in.

Many of the Clays were military officers, business owners and politicians, but they also controlled much the local and state economies and held major influence over frontier Kentucky and the national government.

"Basically, this was one of the most elite families here in the area," stated White Hall site coordinator Mathew Parrish.

Cassius Marcellus Clay was born at Clermont in 1810 and led a very eventful life.

"He was a Kentucky politician, he served as US Minister to Russia during most of the 1860s, so was a key political figure globally," Parrish said.

Clay served as the 19th and 21st Ambassador to the Russian Empire with terms in 1861-1862 and again from 1863-1869. Parrish said Clay also served as a captain during the Mexican War and a general during the Civil War.

Clay attended Yale and returned to Kentucky after his time an emancipationist in the early 1830s and by 1835 was elected to the elected the state's House of Representatives.

He continued to speak out against slavery, he also started emancipating slaves his father owned. For pre-Civil War era Kentucky, this was a stark contrast to what was popular in the state, according to the history pamphlet issued by White Hall. By 1845, Cassius Clay no longer owned slaves.

Over time, the estate fell into many different hands, tenant farmers would rent the land to farm and would turn rooms of the house into barns and places store animals as well as tools. That was, until Kentucky's Parks department bought the land in the 1960s, the building opened for tours in 1971.

Kentucky gave the land to Eastern Kentucky University to run in 2019, Parrish said. At the time, the state parks department had been running it. The park and Historic Site is still run like it was when the state ran the site.

The White Hall site is also featured on this year's Kentucky After Dark Passport which also includes sites like Louisville's Waverly Sanitorium and Georgetown's Dead Man's Hollow along with many other sites throughout the state.

Tickets are still on sale for the Halloween event with four different guided tours taking place at 6 p.m., 6:45 p.m., 7:30 p.m., and 8:15 p.m.

Links to tickets are available on the White Hall State Historic Site's Facebook page.