Census page showing John W. Bell, Isham Link’s employer, and Isham Link.
September 1, 1870
Census page showing plantation owners, R. Laprade and Thomas J. Smith, and African Americans, Thomas Sr, Payton, and Colby Smith.
August 20, 1870
The first page of the Hadensville, Kentucky, Pollbook.
April 25, 1870
The first page of the 1870 Hadensville pollbook, showing Jerry Mimms and Payton and Colby Smith.
April 25, 1870
Damaged First Page from the Pollbook for the August 1870 election in Brandy Springs, showing a “+” or “x” annotation next to each African American voter’s name.
August 1, 1870
Last Page of the Pollbook for the August 1870 election in Brandy Springs, showing total votes cast for George Denny, Republican Candidate for Judge.
August 1, 1870
The letter from Abraham Lincoln to Orville H. Browning, in which Lincoln explains the importance of Kentucky.
September 22, 1861
(Library of Congress)
The pollbook from Fairview for the April 1870 congressional election showing Gustave Jessup’s vote.
April 25, 1870
Page from the Lancaster precinct pollbook for the August 1, 1870 county election, showing Philip Dunn’s vote.
The pollbook from Fairview for the April 1870 congressional election showing Mack Jessup’s vote
April 25, 1870
Certification of the poll from the pollbook for the August 1876 election in Lancaster showing votes for William M. Kirby.
August 7, 1876
Page from the 1860 Census slave schedule for Todd County, KY, listing the people owned by John W. Bell
July 2, 1860
Isham Link and Mattie Long’s marriage license and certificate.
October 4, 1872
Ancestry.com
The New York Times’ coverage of the KKK violence against the Links.
November 29, 1874
The Kennedy-Sellers riot made headlines across the country, including in Pennsylvania.
August 24, 1874
A detailed two column story appeared in the Indiana State Sentinel on the Kennedy-Sellers riot.
September 1, 1874
The House Joint Resolution proposing the 15th amendment to the Constitution, December 7, 1868. The Amendment was ratified on February 3, 1870, and became part of the U.S. Constitution on March 30, 1870.
First page of the 1880 census for Allensville township, showing the Wooldridge and Grinter households.
June 10, 1880
Pollbook from the 1886 Allensville town trustee elections showing the votes of Sam Mart (voter 21) and Claude E. Haddox (voter 25)
May 1, 1886
News report about the Bryantsville Election Riot from a west Kentucky newspaper.
August 14, 1883
The South Kentuckian
Headline from news article describing the Kentucky convention debates about the Australian Ballot.
August 10, 1890
Messenger Inquirer, Owensboro KY
Daily Louisville Commercial coverage of the acquittal of Woods.
September 22, 1874
Daily Louisville Commercial
Secret Ballot used in the 1889 Massachusetts gubernatorial election.
1889
Courtesy of American Antiquarian Society
George Caleb Bingham’s famous painting, which depicts the 1846 viva voce election in Saline County, Missouri (1852, Saint Louis Art Museum).
“First Vote” from Harper’s Weekly (14 November 1867) showing black men voting in Virginia’s 1867 election for constitutional convention delegates.
Frank Bellew’s “Visit of the Ku-Klux” from Harper’s Weekly.
February 24, 1872
Library of Congress
Postcard showing Todd County Courthouse in Elkton, Kentucky circa 1908.
CourthouseHistory.com
Postcard showing Lancaster Courthouse, built in 1868, out the front of which Denny shot and killed James H. Anderson.
c1868-1914
CourtHouseHistory.com
A Thomas Nast illustration, showing an African American man voting in the District of Columbia in 1867.
March 16, 1867
Harper’s weekly, Library of Congress
The passenger train depot at Allensville, where local elections were held.
May 4, 1878
Filson Historical Society
Illustration titled “The First Colored Senator and Representatives” showing the first black men elected to Congress.
1872
Library of Congress
Flyer for 1888 Republican presidential candidate, Benjamin Harrison. Our nation’s choice, Benjamin Harrison
Levi P. Morton, New York
“Stringing the Primings” shows women and children removing the leaves of tobacco plants in tobacco production in Richmond, Virginia, in the 1870s.
Scribner's Monthly, 1872; Image courtesy of Slavery Images: A Visual Record of the African Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Early African Diaspora, http://www.slaveryimages.org/s/slaveryimages/item/1166
The 1879 Beers and Lanagan map of Garrard and Lincoln Counties. Created as a commercial venture by skilled surveyors, the map shows the geography of the time and, more more importantly, it locates and names select landowners who, if sufficiently wealthy and vain, might purchase a copy of the map.
1879
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries
Inset from the Beers and Lanagan 1878 map of Christian county, showing Jefferson Davis’ birthplace in Fairview.
1878
Library of Congress
Detail from the 1879 Beers and Lanagan Land Ownership Map of Garrard and Lincoln counties showing the village of Lowell, which was almost 60% African American in 1880.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries
Map of the Buckeye precinct showing the locations of black 1879 gubernatorial election voters William and Jesse Aldridge, Samuel Simpson, and Sanford Mayfield relative to the polling place.
