I would like to address to question of why designate the Colonial Gardens building as a landmark. I am a member of this community. I serve on the Board of Directors of the Iroquois Neighborhood Association and Civic Club. I am committed to helping make our neighborhood a better place.

In 2004 Stefanie Buzan and I began research on what would become the book A View from the Top, the Neighborhoods of Iroquois Park and Kenwood Hill. This two year process involved numerous oral history interviews with long time residents. It was so delightful to hear the stories of what the neighborhood once was like. I began to see what used to be here, how people lived and how the neighborhood developed.

What Stefanie and I both found so sad was how much of the history and heritage was no longer here. We still have the stories, but much of what made our neighborhood unique no longer exists. So many people would tell us of a special place and say that they hoped we could find a picture of it for our book. They would love to see the building one more time. It made me think of the times we all have thrown something away and later regretted it. I would like to share with you some of the special places we have lost.

1. Escher’s Grocery, for 56 years they delivered groceries to your home and even put them away for you if you were not home. It is now a Pizza Hut.
2. The Calico Club, a small nightclub/gathering place on National Turnpike. It is now a White Castle.
3. Simm’s Corner, remembered for Margaret Simms’ fish and her pies. It was so well known in the area that when the bank was built on that site it was referred to as the Simm’s Corner Branch of the Bank of Louisville.
4. The Hill House on Kenwood Hill above the Little Loomhouse, where Mildred and Patty Hill wrote the song Good Morning Dear Teacher and later changed the words to Happy Birthday to You, creating the most well known song in the English language. It was lost due to development on the top of Kenwood Hill that did not take into account what changing the drainage would do to the buildings below. It was literally washed off the hillside.
5. The Trolley Turnaround at Kenwood Drive and New Cut Road, now the Republic Bank. The trolley was extended to Iroquois Park and that is why the Senning family built out here. The turnaround was known as the Senning’s Loop.
6. Iroquois Gardens, a very upscale nightclub with outdoor dining and dancing in the warm months. Many top name entertainers such as Tommy Dorsey performed there. It is now apartments. The neighborhood tried unsuccessfully to save the site in the early 1970’s. Iroquois Park and Amphitheater, Iroquois Gardens and Colonial Gardens were the reasons people came from all over the city to the South end.

Of all these sites and more, Colonial Gardens and the Little Loomhouse are all we have left to remind us of what used to be. I would hate for us to look back and wish we had had the foresight to keep Colonial Gardens.

I would like to add that when we conducted our interviews, there was usually a Colonial Gardens story. It was a common thread tying the neighborhood stories together. It touched the lives of almost all who lived in the neighborhood. People were entertained, celebrated the special occasions in their lives and met their friends and neighbors there. There were people in their 80’s who told of the zoo animals, the bears, lions or monkeys. They remembered as children buying popcorn, seeing the animals, spending time in the park. Some spoke of the bands, dressing up, having a wonderful meal and dancing. Others remembered more recent times, pool tournaments, country bands and line dancing.

This building has been a part of the neighborhood for over 100 years. It has been re-invented by each generation to serve the community’s needs. I hope it will continue to serve the community for a long time to come. So many residents are afraid of what it looks like now. That is just cosmetics. I believe it is worth trying to save her and make her something we can all be proud of again.

We owe it to those who came before us to remember what it once was and in so doing remember them. We owe it to the next generations to hand on our heritage and our history. And we owe it to ourselves to keep something special in our neighborhood, something unique, something that allows us to step out of the ordinary in our lives and to connect with our past in a special way.

There are special places in all of our lives. It may be a park, grandma’s farm, or an historic site where we remember our personal past. We call these places our landmarks. They allow us to remember what we have been and what we have become. They help define who we are.

Colonial Gardens is a special place. It has been a landmark for over 100 years. I hope we can make that landmark status official.