Coming up on Kentucky Life... we visit Taylorsville Lake State Park, one of the most heavily stocked fishing lakes in the Commonwealth.

And speaking of fish, we take you to a Louisville institution that's now been serving fish sandwiches for more than 100 years.

We'll meet UK sculpture professor Garry Bibbs, whose legacy includes not only many public works but the next generation of sculptors as well.

And we'll visit the HollerGirl Music Festival, providing a showcase for Appalachian female musicians.

All that's next on Kentucky Life.

[music playing] Hey, everybody, and welcome to Kentucky Life.

I'm your host, Chip Polston.

So, our entire season here on Kentucky Life is being spent in one of the greatest resources the Commonwealth has to offer, the Kentucky State Park System, which turned 100 years old in 2024.

And today, our travels bring us here, Taylorsville Lake State Park, located in Mount Eden, Kentucky.

In addition to horse trails and great hiking, the big draw at the park is this beautiful lake and all the fish right out there just waiting to be caught.

And that's a great lead into our first story on our show.

Now, full disclosure, I'm a very proud native of the south end of Louisville.

One of the biggest institutions in that area is marking a century of selling fish sandwiches.

Mike Linnig started as a roadside stand with fried fish back in 1924.

And through three generations of the Linnig family, it stayed a family-owned business that has remained true to its roots.

Just how tough is it to keep a family business together for 100 years?

We visited to find out and to have a few fish sandwiches as well.

[music playing] When you look at the sprawling complex that is now Mike Linnig's, it's hard to believe it started from a simple clapboard building in this very location some 100 years ago.

The land was initially a working family farm where Mike Linnig and his wife Carrie sold fruits, candy, and fresh apple cider.

In 1925, he started a little roadside stand and just started selling fish sandwiches.

Kind of people suggested selling fish.

It started out as a fruit stand.

There used to be an apple orchard down here near the river.

I remember our mom answering the phone, "Mike Linnig's Place, Mike Linnig's Place, Mike Linnig's Place."

And we were kind of unique.

So, it was a place, but now we've gotten fancy.

You know, now we're Mike Linnig's Restaurant, but we're still Mike Linnig's Place.

The Linnig family, three generations of them, called this place home.

The small, simple sandstone house right next to the restaurant is where Mike's son, Bill Sr., who became the second generation to own the business with his brother Len, raised his family.

That family included siblings Bill Linnig Jr., Nancy Wuerth, and Teresa Sissel, the third generation who now co-own the restaurant together.

Their entire lives have been built around this place.

This was home to you, right?

This was home.

Tell me about that.

Well, we lived in the stone house next door.

So, I'd get off the bus here.

I would always get off the bus here because I could come in and get a Clark Bar and a Nehi Grape, you know, and get a snack before I had to visit grandma and grandpa and get home then.

One of the few things that ever slowed down the family was wartime.

In World War II, both Bill Sr. and Len entered military service.

Gas and food rationing in that era forced the restaurant to close from 1942 to 1946.

Members of the Linnig family are still in the military to this day, and their sense of country is clear throughout the establishment.

Over the past century, Linnig's went on to become a staple of South Louisville.

As the business grew, so did the number of customers and what it takes to feed crowds as large as 2,000 people per day.

And while it may look wild, it operates efficiently.

Orders come in, paper plates get set, the items get put on, and it all slides to the counter to be delivered.

It's been done like this for decades because, as Bill says, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

That philosophy could be one of the big reasons why the business has flourished over the past century.

This is Vaughan Scott, director of the University of Louisville's Family Business Management Program.

He says a key factor in family businesses continuing to thrive is their ability to hang on to their history and legacy while also continuing to innovate.

I was walking with Bill earlier on the campus, and, you know, he's talking about the investments that they're gonna make in the future and the things that they're gonna upgrade and that they always find, you know, some way to reinvest every year, and that's part of the secret sauce too.

What should we hold on to that's critical and is really part of who we are, but also what do we need to do to improve over time?

But Scott also says running a family business is tough, especially one that has spanned three generations.

Between wars, fires, and floods, each generation of the Lenig family has faced a test.

For the latest generation, it was COVID.

They found themselves, like all Kentucky restaurants, where for nearly a year and three months they could not operate at 100% capacity.

Research shows close to 20% of restaurants never reopened after the pandemic.

But with a sink-or-swim attitude, the Linings' kept swimming, serving to-go orders from their parking lot.

We had some reporters come out and interview us and said, "What are you gonna do?"

And I said, "Look, we've been through fires, we've been through wars, we've been through tornadoes, we've been through floods."

This virus is not gonna get us.

And it didn't, but it got a lot of restaurants, and it wasn't easy, but we got through it.

And who would think that world geopolitics would affect the price of a fish sandwich on Cane Run Road in Louisville?

We're finally starting to make a little headway after COVID.

Russia invaded Ukraine.

And you'd say, "Well, how does that affect y'all?"

Well, it just so happens we get a lot of our cod from Russian waters, and the government put on an embargo on all the fish.

So, then you say, "Well, okay, where are we gonna get our fish from?"

Well, you can still get it from Iceland.

Well, the Icelandic guys, what do you think they're gonna do when they say, "Well, you've got to buy it from us."?

You're right.

There goes the price.

The price went crazy.

So, how do you keep it together?

How do you keep this working for 100 years?

What's the magic secret?

Well, this is our home.

I had someone tell me, "Why don't you retire and go spend the time with your grandkids and stuff?"

You know, it's like, "I hear what you're saying.

I know what you're saying."

But how are you gonna retire when this is your home?

This is your home.

You can't retire from your home.

And it's considered home to their loyal customers as well.

Not only has the Linnig family been here for generations, but so have many of their patrons as well.

One of those families there the day we visited was the Bloyds.

Bill Bloyd wanted to come there because it was his dad's favorite place.

Three hours earlier, he'd buried his dad.

And there wasn't any place else he could think of that was more perfect than Mike Linnig's.

You know, it's my dad.

Phew.

He just enjoyed it.

You know, he liked the atmosphere, and he loved cold beer.

He just enjoyed being out and in family.

This is the best way to do it.

Lots of things have to fall into place for a business based on a simple model to not only survive but thrive over 100 years.

But the common thread that's key to Mike Linnig's success is clear.

It's family.

Someone asked us before and said, "Well, how long do you think it's gonna keep going on?"

I said, "Being successful."

I said, "Well, I think we'll keep going on as long as at least one of us is willing to go back in that hot kitchen on a Friday and a Saturday and a Sunday and do that hard work."

[music playing] Art can have a powerful effect on people in the communities in which they live.

But what about the stories behind these works?

UK sculpture professor Gary Bibbs has created more than 30 public sculptures, and he attributes much of his success to the mentors who have helped nurture his creative journey.

Now, as you might imagine, Professor Bibbs is continuing this tradition of guiding future generations of artists.

Suspended above the atrium in the University of Kentucky's Gatton School of Business and Economics is one of Professor Gary Bibbs' most impressive works.

Among its hidden mysteries lies a legacy of mentorship, and Bibbs' career is a master class in the art of passing the gift forward.

I had no idea that I was ever gonna be a sculptor.

You have to keep in mind, sculptures introduced, no one wakes up and says they're gonna make a large outdoor sculpture.

That doesn't happen.

From an early age, Professor Bibbs showed an interest in art, but the Louisville native found resistance to the idea of pursuing that passion.

They don't understand the deep meaning behind you putting an idea into some kind of composition or painting or drawing.

Just the whole title as an artist is something very abstract to a lot of people.

Luckily, Professor Bibbs found a silver lining in the form of art teachers.

Bibbs says his teachers saw something in him that he didn't see in himself, and he credits them with nurturing his talent.

Those particular people collectively helped me connect the dots.

So, from junior high to high and then on to college, fortunately, I had a person in place to keep mentoring me.

As a professor for more than 30 years, Bibbs has had the opportunity to mentor hundreds of students, and his influence reaches far beyond the campus in Lexington.

There's a professor from America who's coming to visit, and he's actually a sculpture professor.

Gary comes to my studio, and that was it.

You know, and looking at my work, then giving me a critique of what I should build or how I should improve on it.

[music playing] Having his work critiqued by someone who would become his mentor is something Professor Bibbs can relate to.

When finishing his postdoctoral work, he reached out to the internationally acclaimed sculptor, Richard Hunt, for his final project review.

Under the Ford Postdoctoral Fellowship, which was for one year, it allowed me funding to get a studio and study at the Art Institute of Chicago, get housing, but after the years, I now needed a review of my artwork, and he agreed to do it.

So, he comes, he reviews it, he's at my studio, we're talking.

The next thing you know, he's like, "Do you need a job?"

[laughs] I said, "Of course.

You're not working for Richard Hunt."

With more than 160 public art commissions, Richard Hunt is an iconic figure in abstract sculpture.

Professor Bibbs worked as Hunt's assistant from 1986 to 1990 and helped fabricate and install eagle columns in Chicago's Jonquil Park.

The daily experience became the art.

A lot of artists sit down and draw out what their plans are, and then they say, "Okay, this is what this is gonna be," and then go ahead and pursue it.

Not Richard.

Okay, the piece starts this way, comes back this way, goes back this way.

You can never look at a Richard Hunt and see where a piece starts or finish.

Richard Hunt is, he's been the mentor of mentors, you know.

Everybody looks up to Richard Hunt, and for Gary Bibbs, especially to work under him.

You know, this is another blessing coming with it.

Everything that all my teachers and mentors put in me, I put that out in him.

He gets to work, you know.

There's no joke about working.

There's no joke about, you know, producing or creating.

It's work, you know.

So, we turned him loose in the shop, and it's just off the rails.

Matter of fact, after a month or two, he was not coming home at all.

That was a turning point in my career, you know, when I found Professor Gary.

He's my professor, and then he's also like my dad, at the same time my mentor.

He's guiding me.

I'm not just like a student.

I'm also an apprentice.

When Kiptoo left UK, he brought the lessons he learned from Professor Bibbs to his first love of wood carving.

And his art has come a long way from those early days in Kenya.

I came with one mallet that I really fashioned, and I wrote in Kenya from just a tree branch and a chisel that was from a nail, pounding the nail, pound the end of it.

And then, you know, on a stone, sharpen it, you're ready, good to go.

But then, here comes the chainsaw that, you know, most of the time, you know, it was for logging.

And now it is a tool that has transformed the art world completely right now.

While Kiptoo's work is very different from Professor Bibbs, he carries on the spirit of creation he learned from his mentor.

After all, the artist's job is to explore, pushing ideas into new places and discovering new possibilities.

There's this whole spectrum now that I'm now opened up into that, you know, it's really so many possibilities that I've always been wanting to do, to venture into, you know.

Well, you know, I could tell people I feel like I'm just starting, you know, 64 years old.

And I think I'm now just getting it.

Taylorsville Lake State Park is a 1,200-acre outdoor recreation and wildlife park located in Mount Eden, Kentucky.

Situated midway between Lexington and Louisville, this state park extends into parts of Anderson and Nelson counties.

It really is just a beautiful setting right here in the heart of Kentucky that offers unique outdoor recreation opportunities for all ages and abilities.

We had a chance to explore the park recently.

Let's take a look.

[music playing] What started as a 60-acre land grant back in 1799 from Richard Taylor, an early pioneer landowner and grist mill operator, Taylorsville, Kentucky, in Spencer County, is now home to one of the premier outdoor recreation areas in the entire region.

We're in a cool spot because if you look at Lexington and Louisville, we kind of sit in the middle of that.

The Army Corps of Engineers essentially dammed up a river and created Taylorsville Lake.

The state leased the park land from that starting in the early 80s, 1982, I believe it was.

And that's when it became the park.

And over the years we've developed, you know, the trail systems, campground, and all the different lake access points since that time.

So, the lake itself is about 3,000 acres.

The state park land is about 1,300 acres.

And, you know, other fun numbers, trail system, 24, 26 miles of trails throughout here.

We have four different boat ramps, so four different places you can access the lake, and 77 campsites for you to park an RV or a tent and hang out there too.

[music playing] Well, Kentucky, it's a horse state, and it always will be.

And we wanna make sure that we maintain that heritage.

The horse audience equine world is huge for what we do.

Folks are coming in from other states.

We have a lot of horse events here, but they're riding our trail system.

We have a unique opportunity here for horse camping.

So, you can bring an RV or trailer, a camper, and you can hang out with your horse right there, and they stay with you over the weekend as well.

The trail system is a big one for anybody that has a horse to come out here and ride it to the camping and then events as well.

We're hosting events here this weekend for orienteering that are bringing people from all over the country right here to Taylorsville Lake.

[music playing] [music playing] Fishermen are a big audience here.

A lot of folks fishing on the lake.

Kentucky Fish and Wildlife does an amazing job stocking this lake and mapping out where to go and make it pretty dummy proof.

So, the pros love it, but those of us that are pros, we love it too.

And then our trail system is just a unique opportunity to get out and walk a lot of miles, ride on the horse a lot of miles, or get on a mountain bike and hit some miles on the mountain bike.

I think a park manager is different at every park because every park is different.

At Taylorsville Lake, I think it's probably the widest breadth of job description in that we pick up the slack of any specialists that we have on our team.

It all just depends.

It's a lot of coordinating events, a lot of customer service, and a lot of just making sure we're keeping our eye on this place and having a high standard for what it looks like.

When you think about those numbers of thousands of acres of land and lake, there are four of us full-time that are on the parks team, and then one additional ranger, and that ranger is law enforcement.

I'm a huge team player.

I believe in team concept.

I do jobs here in the park that aren't part of my job description, but I love being a part of the team, and so I help out with a lot of other stuff.

Typically, you know, during the summer, our main role is our boat ramps, doing compliance checks, make sure people are operating their vessels in a safe manner.

As far as the campground goes, make sure everybody's in compliance with our park rules and regulations.

Just make sure everybody's having fun but making sure everybody's safe.

If you've never been here, I would say take in a little bit of everything.

Take in a little bit of it all.

Go down to the lake and just sit for a bit.

Hit a trail up, and just enjoy that for a while.

Go remove yourself.

Sit by the day-use horse area.

Take in the sights of just Kentucky.

People unloading and loading horses.

It's a blast.

So, take little snippets of all over the park.

I say it a lot.

I think it's a hidden gem, and I always thought, "Wow, this is close, and it's vast."

And I think if you're looking to get away, this is gonna feel like a getaway without putting in a weekend or a whole week.

It'll feel like a getaway if you come out for the afternoon, and that's a special feeling here at this park.

[music playing] Music festivals are a staple of the summer season.

Spending time outside, listening to bands you love, and maybe discovering some new artists you've never heard.

And a new festival on the block aims to do all that while also doing some good along the way.

The HollerGirl Music Festival provides a showcase for Appalachian female musicians, all while supporting a good cause.

[music playing] HollerGirl is a three-day music festival.

We focus on women's empowerment by having a lineup of three full days of music that is completely all female.

And then within the festival perimeters, we focus on healing, we create a safe space, and we focus on raising awareness for two domestic violence organizations, which are GreenHouse17 and Oasis Farms.

I'm a survivor of domestic violence a couple of times over, unfortunately.

My grandmother was a survivor, so that's really what this is about, focusing on healing.

What's more healing than music?

So, it all kind of comes together that way.

GreenHouse17's primary mission is working with survivors and their families who've experienced intimate partner violence.

And our programming really is whatever that family might need to move from a place of crisis to self-sufficiency.

So, we serve 17 counties.

That's the name of GreenHouse17.

We're in central Kentucky, so we're all the way down to like Danville and Harrisburg area and all the way up to Nicholas and Harrison County.

So, actually, it was HollerGirl that reached out to us.

I think this was a critical piece for Kristen when she was kind of devising HollerGirl.

I think she has some experience herself with intimate partner violence and sadly so many women in Kentucky have had experience either firsthand or a family or friend.

And so, we would say probably one in three or one in four women experience intimate partner violence.

I think what we loved about HollerGirl, and I think what is similar to GreenHouse17, is that she really wanted to focus on the resiliency of women, the artistry of women, and the powerful voices of women, and I think that was really critical to us at GreenHouse.

Our first name was Bluegrass Domestic Violence Program.

We really wanted to shift that attitude of victimization and a low self-esteem and lack of empowerment and go, these women are strong.

They are survivors.

They have lived through things, and people can come through that in lots of different ways, and music is a really critical piece to that.

I think any time that there is an opportunity to celebrate women while also empowering women, you know, I'm on board for that all day, every day.

And it's such a special thing to be a part of where women are coming together and they're being celebrated for their experiences, for their stories, and what they have to offer, and then at the same time they're helping women who are in situations that aren't great, that they're trying to better themselves, and, you know, anything that I can do, anything that any of us can do to help with that, I'm gonna be on board with that.

[girl singing] ♪ I'm just a poor girl ♪ Nobody loves me So, HollerGirl is two years old.

Year one, I saw their flyers online, and I had wanted to be involved in what GreenHouse17 was doing anyway, just in my own personal life, and so I saw a music festival led by women partnering with GreenHouse17, and I was like, "Oh, those are my people."

And I went year one and just bonded with so many of the women who are involved immediately, and one of our board members, Sarah Blue, saw my Facebook videos after the festival of me singing and told Kristen we just have to have her next year, and so they asked me to play, and it was just a privilege.

You know, it felt like being seen by people that I really admired in a way that I don't think I had felt seen before.

When you go to these other shows, you see a lot of incredibly talented men.

I have so many male musician friends that I think are just stellar, but I wanna see those women up there too because they are incredible.

They're equal, you know, and we just don't get to see that.

And I think bringing that to the forefront and saying, "Yeah, I've got three full days of these of women."

That's three full days of music that's all women, mainly within this Appalachian area.

That's incredible, you know, and I had to turn down some women.

So, next year we're gonna keep building.

We're gonna keep bringing new people to the forefront and bringing in other, you know, bigger artists that are more interested and, you know, we're just gonna keep going with this and fighting it.

There is a community of men and women that really wanna support this issue, and it doesn't have to be just because I've experienced it, and it doesn't need to be private and it doesn't have to be, "Oh, that's just, you know, sort of between you and your friends or family," but we are all in this together.

And if someone has experienced abuse or violence and not living to their full potential, this matters to everyone, and artists are just wonderful at magnifying that and kind of putting a spotlight on that, and it just helps, I think, the rest of the people that are attending and showing up and being present at a beautiful venue.

We tend to get a bad rap that we're all petty and catty and it's all competition, but it's really not.

When you get in these settings where there's this common mission of bringing women together, it's magical and it's powerful.

And I truly believe that it has the ability to change the world and change lives.

[music playing] We've had a terrific time here at Taylorsville Lake State Park.

Stop by [Weddle Line] sometime if you get a chance.

We've got lots more state parks to visit this season on Kentucky Life, and we cannot wait to tell you all about them.

Now, if you've enjoyed our show, be sure to like the Kentucky Life Facebook page or subscribe to the KET YouTube channel for more of what we like to call Kentucky Life Extras, where you'll have access to lots of other great videos.

Until next time, I'll leave you with this moment.

I'm Chip Polston, cherishing this Kentucky life.

[birds chirping] [serene music playing] [birds chirping] [serene music playing]