Searching for Histories of Tourism in the Ohio Valley

More than three decades ago, the geographer John Jakle observed that tourism is "a nearly universal behavior in advanced, industrialized societies." Recent statistics from the Ohio Valley affirm his point. In 2018, Illinois hosted 114 million visitors who collectively spent $40 billion at attractions across the state. The previous year, nearly 80 million people visited Indiana, pouring a record $12.7 billion into the state's economy. Meanwhile, tourism ranks as Kentucky's third-largest industry, surpassed only by automobile manufacturing and health care. As it is in many other parts of the world, tourism is a fundamental part of life in the Trans-Appalachian West, so common that it is usually taken for granted. In fact, to many residents of the region, it likely seems virtually "natural," so basic that it scarcely deserves more than a passing thought.¹

Scholars who study tourism have tended to view it differently. Rather than seeing it as natural or inevitable, they have emphasized the choices made in creating tourist attractions and the actions of tourists themselves. "Tourism is not destiny," writes historian Dona Brown. Attractions do not simply grow out of the landscape but are selected, staged, and promoted. The sociologist Dean MacCannell has described a process of "sight sacralization" that invests particular places and objects with meaning and touts them as worthy of attention. Tourism is a learned behavior, a kind of ritual requiring economic resources, the desire for uncommon experiences, and an attitude of "respectful admiration." Carried out under safe and pleasurable circumstances, it turns sightseeing into a consumer commodity, a pastime ostensibly undertaken in pursuit of learning, entertainment, inspiration, and perspective.²

In short, historians and other scholars have identified tourism as central to the way power is exercised in modern societies. Rather than simply characterizing it as superficial or perfunctory, they have subjected it to careful examination, studying its origins and development in detail. Historians have paid particular attention to the rise of tourism in nineteenth- and twentieth-century America; its role in forging local, national, and regional identities; its transition from an elite activity to one practiced by millions of middle- and working-class people; and the ideologies expressed in the creation and representation of tourist attractions. The commercial ambitions behind tourist campaigns and the consequences of tourist development have also received careful study. These efforts have produced a sizeable body of literature that resoundingly demonstrates tourism's social and cultural importance and connects it to questions about nationalism, consumerism, economics, and social and political hierarchies.³

Although historians of tourism have not ignored the Ohio Valley, they have not explored the history of the region deeply. The articles in this special issue take a modest step toward a fuller understanding of the subject. By examining tourists' experiences, the origins of a well-known attraction, and labor in one of Kentucky's best-known industries, they bring vital histories to light.⁴

In "'Let's Buy It!' Tourism and the My Old Kentucky Home Campaign in Jim Crow Kentucky," Emily Bingham chronicles the making of My Old Kentucky Home, the state historic site commonly cast as the place where Stephen Foster wrote his celebrated ballad "My Old Kentucky Home, Goodnight." Bingham's essay charts the convoluted developments that tied Foster's song to Federal Hill, an aging plantation outside of Bardstown, Kentucky, and the campaign that opened the site for public tours in 1923. Bingham's analysis emphasizes Kentuckians' eagerness to cast their state's history as a tale of Old South nostalgia, the commercial motivations behind the drive to turn Federal Hill into a historical attraction, and persistent willingness to overlook the absence of evidence connecting Foster to Federal Hill. Ultimately, "'Let's Buy It!'" suggests what stands to be learned from detailed investigation of Ohio Valley attractions. With the history of one of Kentucky's foremost historic sites poorly understood until now, Bingham's essay leaves readers wondering what others have to offer.

Rebecca Richart's "The 'Backside' of the Track: Race, Recognition, and Labor Shifts in Thoroughbred Horse Racing" examines the intertwined histories of race and labor in Kentucky...