Kentucky   
Bluegrass State

Motto: United We Stand, Devided We Fall.

Hotels     Airlines    Rental Cars

Famous For: Thoroughbred Racing Horses, Kentucky Debby

{State Bird, Cardinal}  {State Flower, Goldenrod}  {State Tree, Kentucky Coffee Tree}

Economy: Manufacturing, machinery, apparel, electrical equipment, chemicals,
finance, insurance, real estate, tobacco, cattle, corn, soybeans, dairy, coal, gas, tourism.

Corn is sold more by the Gallon than by the bushel, and made into the finest Bourbon whiskeys

Kentucky's beauty is at its most appealing in the mountainous east and the small towns of the Bluegrass Downs , Bourbon whiskey, thoroughbred horses and bluegrass music. Louisville , home of the Kentucky Debby , is a busy manufacturing and arts center; the more reserved Lexington , eighty miles east, is a major horse breeding market.

LOUISVILLE , just south of Indiana across the Ohio River, is firmly embedded in the American national consciousness for its multimillion-dollar Kentucky Derby . Each year, the horse race attracts over 500,000 fans to this cosmopolitan and well-diversified industrial city, which still bears the traces of the early French settlers who came upriver from New Orleans. Today a third of the country's bourbon is made here.

Louisville's history revolves around a perennial rivalry with Cincinnati, a mere one hundred miles upstream. For example, despite being pro-Union during the Civil War, it promoted itself thereafter - erecting Confederate statues and so on - as the place for Southern business to invest, as opposed to Midwestern Yankee cities like Cincinnati.

Besides a lively arts scene and lots of citywide festivals, Louisville boasts an unrivaled network of public parks, many designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. One native son who took advantage of the recreation facilities was three-time world heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali , who used to do his early-morning training in the scenic environs of Chickasaw Park.

The productivity of the bluegrass fields has kept LEXINGTON 's economy ticking over since 1775, though its lack of a navigable river always made its traders vulnerable to competition from Louisville. Eighty miles east of Louisville and ninety south of Cincinnati, Ohio, it still retains large numbers of fine antebellum houses. However, its current affluence dates from after World War I, when smoking caught on internationally and Lexington emerged as the world's largest burley tobacco market. Despite a population now exceeding 200,000, the city maintains an almost rustic atmosphere, with its most conspicuous activity the horse trade.