Appalachian Community Histories – Oak Hill, Pulaski County: The Baptist Church, Country School, and Life Along Stones Ferry Road
Southwest of Somerset, in the countryside of Pulaski County, Oak Hill developed around the institutions and family relationships that sustained many of Kentucky’s rural communities during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Its Baptist church, country school, farms, cemetery, and neighborhood stores provided gathering places for families whose lives were closely connected to the surrounding countryside.
Although Oak Hill never developed into a large incorporated town, its history survives in an unusually detailed collection of local newspaper reports. During 1920 and 1921, the Somerset Journal regularly published correspondence from Oak Hill, recording everything from tobacco planting and church meetings to railroad employment, family migrations, and improvements to local roads. These reports provide a picture of a community whose residents were connected not only to Somerset and neighboring Pulaski County settlements but also to the growing industrial cities of the Midwest.
Oak Hill’s name is traditionally attributed to its Baptist church, which stood on a hill associated with oak trees. Kentucky place-name researcher Robert M. Rennick included the community in his work on the origins of Kentucky settlement names. While the precise date when the surrounding neighborhood began using the Oak Hill name remains uncertain, the history of its church and early school establishes that the community was already developing during the nineteenth century.
Oak Hill Baptist Church and the Community’s Early Years
Oak Hill Baptist Church became one of the community’s enduring institutions. According to the congregation’s published history, the church began in 1895 with eighteen charter members. Its establishment gave local Baptist families an organized place of worship and created an institution that would become closely associated with the identity of the surrounding neighborhood.
The church was part of a much larger network of Baptist congregations throughout Pulaski County. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Baptist leaders began discussing the formation of a county association that could better coordinate their religious activities. The existing South Kentucky Association had grown considerably, and local congregations believed that a separate organization would better serve churches within Pulaski County.
On May 4, 1904, a meeting at Somerset Baptist Church initiated the process of establishing the Pulaski County Association of Missionary Baptists. Representatives of twenty-three churches attended a preliminary meeting that July, and the new association was formally organized in Somerset on October 11, 1904. Oak Hill was among its founding congregations, alongside churches from Burnside, Somerset, Fishing Creek, Pleasant View, and other communities throughout the county.
Frank M. Masters documented these developments in A History of Baptists in Kentucky, preserving the association’s organizational history and identifying the churches that participated in its establishment. Oak Hill’s inclusion demonstrates that within nine years of its reported founding, the congregation was already participating in organized Baptist activities beyond its immediate neighborhood.
The church also served a broader social purpose. In rural communities where families often lived considerable distances from one another, regular worship services, Sunday school gatherings, and special religious meetings created opportunities for neighbors to maintain relationships and share news.
The Somerset Journal of June 4, 1920, reported that a fifth-Sunday meeting at Oak Hill had attracted good attendance. The following week, the newspaper identified Reverend Wesley Colyer as conducting his regular Saturday and Sunday services in the community. Afterward, Colyer and his wife joined Mrs. Bryant Gholson for dinner at the home of Lula Frisbie, demonstrating how religious observances and visits between neighboring households were often closely connected.
The Oak Hill Schoolhouse and Rural Education
The history of education in Oak Hill extends into the nineteenth century, when rural schools provided children with opportunities that were often limited by distance, agricultural responsibilities, and the availability of teachers.
Alma Owens Tibbals, in her 1952 book A History of Pulaski County, Kentucky, documented the early education of Dr. Charles L. Waddle, who was born in Pulaski County in 1880. Waddle, the youngest of fourteen children, attended Oak Hill’s county school before graduating from Somerset High School in 1899. He subsequently graduated from the Louisville School of Medicine and practiced medicine in Somerset until his death in 1946.
Waddle’s educational history establishes that Oak Hill had a functioning county school during the late nineteenth century, although the precise date of its establishment and the location of its earliest building remain to be determined.
By 1920, the community’s educational activities were sufficiently established to appear regularly in the local newspaper. The April 23 edition of the Somerset Journal reported that Myrtle Bogle was conducting the local school census, an administrative responsibility that helped county officials determine the number of school-age children in the district.
The schoolhouse also served as a place for community entertainment. On October 15, 1920, the newspaper published an invitation for residents to attend an event at the Oak Hill schoolhouse the following evening, beginning at 7:30. The announcement encouraged people to bring pies or purchase them at the gathering.
Events of this kind illustrate how rural school buildings could function as neighborhood meeting places outside regular classroom hours. They offered opportunities for families to socialize, organize community activities, and support local institutions without traveling into Somerset.
Oak Hill’s educational name survives through Oak Hill Elementary School, which operates within the Pulaski County school system. The available historical evidence establishes the existence of both the earlier county school and the modern elementary school, although additional school-board records would be needed to reconstruct the institutional history connecting them.
Farming, Neighborhood Stores, and Everyday Life in 1920
By the beginning of the 1920s, agriculture remained an important part of Oak Hill’s economy. The surviving newspaper correspondence describes families working their farms, preparing tobacco beds, purchasing property, and maintaining relationships with neighboring households.
The February 27, 1920, edition of the Somerset Journal reported that farmers around Oak Hill were sowing their tobacco beds. The same column announced the birth of Mary Alma Neeley, the daughter of Joe Neeley and his wife, and described a number of family visits involving the Frisbie, Claunch, and Nicholas households.
One particularly revealing announcement concerned the construction of a new neighborhood store. The newspaper reported that Mr. Wilson was erecting a store beside Oak Hill Church, indicating that the church property had become an important reference point for local commerce as well as religious life.
Less than two months later, on April 9, the newspaper confirmed that O. L. Wilson had opened his new store. The two reports establish a documented sequence of construction and opening during the spring of 1920.
A country store offered rural residents access to merchandise without requiring every purchase to involve a trip into Somerset. Stores also provided convenient places for neighbors to meet and exchange information, although the surviving reports do not establish the complete range of goods Wilson carried or how long his business remained in operation.
Other records reveal how land continued to change hands within the community. On January 21, 1921, the Somerset Journal reported that Mrs. Loveless had purchased J. E. Neely’s property for $1,200. The transaction provides evidence of the local property market and a starting point for further research into the original county deed.
The names appearing throughout these reports demonstrate the importance of extended family networks. Members of the Neeley, Frisbie, Bogle, Gholson, Wilson, Lorton, and Waddle families frequently appear in accounts of Sunday visits, illnesses, marriages, and community activities. Their repeated appearances help reconstruct a neighborhood in which family relationships extended across farms, churches, schools, and nearby settlements.
Influenza, Migration, and Changing Family Fortunes
Oak Hill’s newspaper correspondence also documents the challenges facing rural families in the years immediately following World War I. Although the community was geographically removed from major industrial centers, its residents experienced the consequences of national disease outbreaks and changing employment opportunities.
In February 1920, the Somerset Journal reported influenza among several Oak Hill families. Mrs. Arnold Curtis traveled from Stearns to care for her sister, Mrs. Earl Curtis, who was suffering from the illness. By late March, the newspaper was reporting that members of the J. R. Combest family were recovering from influenza, while Reverend Jacob Mayfield and his wife were also improving after illnesses not specifically identified in the report.
These accounts illustrate the importance of relatives and neighbors when disease interrupted ordinary life. Household visits and family assistance were especially significant in communities where professional medical care could require travel outside the immediate neighborhood.
Employment also took residents far beyond Pulaski County. The March 12, 1920, Oak Hill column reported that Charles Neeley had accepted railroad work, while James Todd and Norman Corder had gone to Iowa and R. P. Taylor had departed for Mississippi. Another resident, Margaret Tucker, had returned to Bedford, Indiana, and Fred Phillips had come home from Indiana.
Later that month, the newspaper reported that Tom Bryant had traveled to Indiana for employment. In June, Ray Thurman departed for Detroit, Michigan, while Noel Watson and his wife left for Cincinnati. These individual journeys demonstrate that migration from rural Pulaski County to other states was already an established feature of local life in the early twentieth century.
Not everyone who left permanently settled elsewhere. Newspaper columns frequently recorded returning residents, visits from relatives living in other states, and family gatherings involving people who had moved away. Migration therefore did not necessarily sever ties with Oak Hill, and the community remained connected to a wider network of former residents and relatives.
Improving Stones Ferry Road
Road construction and maintenance were persistent concerns throughout rural Pulaski County during the early twentieth century. Communities depended upon reliable transportation routes to reach markets, schools, churches, and medical services, yet improvements frequently required substantial investments that county governments could not always make without additional financial support.
Oak Hill residents became directly involved in one such effort in October 1920.
The October 29 edition of the Somerset Journal reported that George G. Waddle, Granville Lorton, and other citizens living near Oak Hill Church appeared before Pulaski County Fiscal Court with a proposal concerning Stones Ferry Road. They agreed to purchase $4,000 worth of county bonds on the condition that the proceeds be used to reconstruct the old pike along the road.
The newspaper reported that the county accepted their proposition. Although this confirms the agreement, the report alone does not establish when the proposed reconstruction was completed or the precise extent of the improvements.
The proposal nevertheless provides important evidence of local participation in infrastructure development. Rather than simply waiting for county authorities to improve their transportation routes, these Oak Hill residents committed their own money to county bonds intended to finance the work.
The same fiscal court report also discussed construction of a steel bridge across Pitman Creek near Elihu, where residents had agreed to provide the bridge abutments without charge. Together, these projects demonstrate how local participation and county financing could intersect in the development of Pulaski County’s rural road network.
For Oak Hill, improvements to Stones Ferry Road represented more than a transportation project. Better roads could make it easier for farming families to reach markets, children to attend school, and residents to travel between the community and Somerset. The proposed investment also indicates the significance that local residents attached to maintaining their connection with the wider county.
Singing Schools, Sunday Gatherings, and Community Traditions
The surviving newspapers show that Oak Hill maintained an active social life despite the demands of agricultural work and the movement of some residents to other states.
Church services were recurring events, but organized singing also occupied an important place in community life. In February 1921, Professor Virgil Ware conducted a singing class in Oak Hill. The February 11 edition of the Somerset Journal reported that the class was progressing well, while the February 18 edition announced that the sessions had concluded the previous Sunday evening and described Ware’s instruction as successful.
The singing classes provided opportunities for residents to learn and practice music together, continuing a tradition closely associated with religious and community gatherings throughout rural Kentucky. The same newspaper columns reported that Oak Hill’s Sunday school was also progressing well.
Family visits filled much of the remaining correspondence. In October 1920, the newspaper recorded a gathering at the home of Ova Casada attended by numerous young people from the Waddle, Bogle, Wilson, Neeley, Nicholas, Tucker, Frisbie, and Cundiff families. Other reports described Sunday dinners, visits between cousins, and relatives traveling from neighboring settlements.
These seemingly ordinary announcements are among the most valuable surviving records of Oak Hill’s social history. They preserve the names of people who may never have appeared in a formal county history and reveal relationships that would otherwise be difficult to reconstruct from census records and deeds alone.
Oak Hill Cemetery and the Families Who Remained
Alongside the church and school, Oak Hill Cemetery became another enduring institution of the community. Its surviving history offers evidence of the families who lived in and around Oak Hill and the personal losses they experienced.
On April 23, 1920, the Somerset Journal reported the death of an infant belonging to Mr. and Mrs. Ira Gholson. The child was buried in Oak Hill Cemetery, and the newspaper recorded visits involving members of the Gholson and Frisbie families during the same period.
Another account, published on October 29, 1920, recorded the death of James Cundiff, commonly called Uncle Jimmie, who died at his home near Shafter at the age of eighty-two. His funeral was held at Oak Hill Church, after which he was buried in the Oak Hill graveyard.
These records demonstrate the cemetery’s significance beyond the immediate boundaries of Oak Hill. Families living in nearby communities maintained connections to the church and burial ground, reflecting the wider geographical reach of rural congregations.
Oak Hill Cemetery also provides an important opportunity for further historical research. Comparing surviving gravestones with newspaper obituaries, church registers, census schedules, and county death records could help reconstruct several generations of families associated with the community.
Oak Hill’s Continuing Place in Pulaski County History
Oak Hill’s surviving historical record tells the story of a rural community shaped by institutions and relationships rather than by large industries or rapid urban development. Its church, established in 1895 according to the congregation’s own history, became an enduring part of the neighborhood, while its country school provided an education to children who would eventually pursue opportunities both within and beyond Pulaski County.
The newspaper correspondence of 1920 and 1921 reveals a community confronting many of the changes experienced throughout rural Kentucky. Families were recovering from influenza, young people were leaving to find employment, farmers continued their seasonal work, and local residents were investing in the roads that connected their homes to the surrounding county.
Oak Hill Baptist Church continued to develop long after the period documented in the earliest surviving newspaper accounts. Its published history records the addition of a children’s and youth building in the summer of 2016, illustrating the congregation’s continued institutional development more than a century after its founding.
The history of Oak Hill also demonstrates the value of small-town newspaper correspondence. A brief announcement about a new store, a schoolhouse gathering, or a family visit may initially appear insignificant, but together these records preserve the experiences of ordinary people whose lives formed the foundation of their community.
For descendants of Oak Hill families and those researching Pulaski County’s rural past, these surviving accounts provide a starting point for reconstructing a history that extends well beyond the boundaries of any single church, school, or cemetery.
Sources & Further Reading
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” February 27, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/2_27_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” March 12, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/3_12_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” March 26, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/3_26_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” April 9, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/4_9_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” April 16, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/4_16_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” April 23, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/4_23_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” June 4, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/6_4_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” June 11, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/6_11_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” July 30, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/7_30_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” October 15, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/10_15_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Fiscal Court in Session This Week.” October 29, 1920. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/10_29_1920.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” January 21, 1921. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/1_1921/1_21_1921_2.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” February 11, 1921. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/2_21/2_11_1921_4.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” February 18, 1921. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/2_21/2_18_1921_3.htm.
Somerset Journal. “Oak Hill.” April 15, 1921. Pulaski County KYGenWeb. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/news/4_21/4_15_1921_2.htm.
Oak Hill Baptist Church. “Who We Are.” Accessed September 25, 2026. https://www.oakhillbaptist.com/who-we-are.
Masters, Frank M. A History of Baptists in Kentucky. Louisville: Kentucky Baptist Historical Society, 1953. Chapter 34, “The Final Group of District Associations, 1900–1925.” https://baptisthistoryhomepage.com/ky.baptists.masters.chp.34.html.
Tibbals, Alma Owens. A History of Pulaski County, Kentucky. Somerset, KY: Moore, 1952. https://books.google.com/books/about/A_History_of_Pulaski_County_Kentucky.html?id=hUh4D_2eUFMC.
Rennick, Robert M. Kentucky Place Names. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1984. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt13x1s3p.
Works Progress Administration and Robert M. Rennick. “Pulaski County: Post Offices & Place Names.” 1939. County Histories of Kentucky, no. 284. Morehead State University. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/kentucky_county_histories/284/.
United States Geological Survey. Somerset Quadrangle, Kentucky. 15-minute topographic map, 1935. Robert M. Rennick Topographical Maps Collection, Morehead State University. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_maps_all/934/.
Morehead State University. “Robert M. Rennick Manuscript Collection.” Kentucky Place Names collection. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/rennick_ms_collection/.
Pulaski County Public Library. Digital Archives of the Pulaski County Public Library. Historical newspapers, census schedules, tax lists and county court records. https://pulaskilibrary.advantage-preservation.com/.
Pulaski County Clerk. “Land Records.” Pulaski County, Kentucky. https://pulaski.kycountyclerk.us/land-records/.
Pulaski County KYGenWeb. “Pulaski County, KY Cemeteries.” Cemetery index including Oak Hill Cemetery. https://kygenweb.net/pulaski/cemetery/cemeteries.html.
United States Geological Survey. “topoView.” Historical topographic map collection. https://www.usgs.gov/tools/topoview.
Pulaski County Schools. “Oak Hill Elementary School.” https://oes.pulaski.net/.
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Appalachian Counties Served by ARC.” https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-counties-served-by-arc/.
Author Note: Oak Hill’s surviving records reveal the everyday experiences of the families who built their community around its church, school, farms, and shared traditions. If your family has connections to Oak Hill, I encourage you to share photographs, documents, or memories that can help preserve its history for future generations.