Gratz Graded School, 1909

 

Looking West on Main Street in Gratz

 

At the Gratz Lead Mine, 1930

 

Gratz Lead Mine
It burned down on Sept. 16, 1914
1902 News story on lead in Moxley, here.

 

Gratz, 1964

 

Gratz in the 1937 Flood

An item in the 11-19-1886 Owenton Democrat says that
Gratz citizens shipped 300 rabbits to market aboard the
 steamship Blue Wing.  A week later, 1,000 were shipped.

"The suit against A. C. Rice by the Gratz Deposit Bank of which he was the cashier, has been settled.  Rice was short in his accounts $9,000, money spent on diamonds, flowers, and fancy driving horses.  The American Bonding Company of New York was his surety.  His morals were not bad but he had a fool habit of buying diamonds and flowers for his lady friends, while he kept a stable of fine horses equal to a nabob. It is said a rich uncle from Bergie, Mercer County, where Rice formerly resided put up $6,000 of the shortage, the surety company paid $1,000, and the bank took care of the balance.  Rice is said to be traveling for a hardware house in Eastern Kentucky."  from the Warsaw Independent, January 6, 1906

 

Benjamin Gratz Brown
...after whom Gratz is probably named.  A grandson of Kentucky's
 first senator, John Brown, he was later a Governor of Missouri.

 

 

Gratz

Story of the dedication of Gratz Methodist, in 1886, is here.

Curiously, the following week finds the story of the dedication of the new Gratz Baptist Church, here.

“A party composed of Misses Edith Ireland and Ida Lillard, Prof. W. H. Cord and R. C. Ford attended the dedication of the Baptist church at Gratz Sunday, and after the services were over and a bountiful dinner had been spread and partaken of, they, with their team, boarded the steamer Hibernia, and went to Monterey, then returned home.  The trip was greatly enjoyed, and everything passed off quietly – save that, as they boarded the boat at Gratz, one of their horses passed overboard with a lunge into the river and almost frowned.  Reasons many and ludicrous were given for the horses demeanor; one being that he had absorbed religious proclivity and was determined upon baptizing himself; another, that Owenton was very dry.”     From the Owenton Democrat, November 11, 1886.

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