While driving along U.S. 68 going toward May’s Lick, you will find an elegant antebellum home sitting atop a hill at 5037 Kentucky 2514 (Old US 68). This residence is known as the Longnecker House and has played a prominent role in Mason County history.

The land for the home was purchased from Simon Kenton prior to 1788 by Samuel Smith. Mr. Smith then built a log structure with an attached kitchen and storage room that the current home was later built around.

In 1810, Mr. Hudson purchased the house and built the double parlors of the present central brick structure finished in 1825. The formal front, built in a second construction was finished circa 1834. The property was then known as Briar Hill Farm.

When the Lexington-Maysville Turnpike (Old U.S. 68) was created in 1835, this farm served as a trade out stop and watering location for spent horses, weary from pulling the stagecoaches. The spring fed watering hole is inlaid in native limestone and is still there today, right at the edge of the road in front of the home.

The interior of the home boasts a unique setting due to its construction. The front entrance flanked by sidelights leads to a gently curving stairway with a cherry handrail. The double parlors are divided by two of the original three folding doors, that now slide into pockets built between the rooms. Unique to the home is the original six feet wide by five feet high cooking fireplace in the kitchen. The logs for cooking were pulled by a horse-powered rig that used a rope pulley system with two opposite doors that allowed the log to be rolled into the fireplace.

In 1847, Mr. Smith’s grandson, George Riley, purchased the house. He was a successful wheat and tobacco farmer and freed the farm slaves prior to their legal freeing. At his passing, his daughter Mrs. Ben Longnecker and her children inherited the property and it became known as Longnecker House.

Family lore has everything from the infamous Nightriders shooting up the house in the 1890’s to pre-Civil war silver buried in the family cemetery to hide it from Morgan’s Raiders. Historic in fact, in tradition, and in story, the Longnecker House is a gem in our county’s narrative.

Today, Locust Bend Farms Inc. owns and has owned the home since about 1957 when the late James Pyles purchased it from David Longnecker.

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Lacey Holleran